Hi,
I'm trying to find out the formula for the amount of horsepwer required to compress air. Given cubic feet per minute and PSI how much would I need?
Thanks in advance for any help or pointers in the right direction,
Cheers,
Scott
Forumula for calculating horsepower required to compress air
Jul 18, 2007
3 Replies
Hi,
I'm trying to find out the formula for the amount of horsepower required to compress air. Given cubic feet per minute and PSI how much would I need?
Thanks in advance for any help or pointers in the right direction,
Cheers,
Scott
That's not enough data. What kind of compressor? How efficient? What inlet/exit temperature?
In general: W = d(PV) and P = dW/dt
Plug in appropriate expressions for your particular application and the necessary unit conversions and you're there.
Tom.
Dear Scott:
Start at a compressor manufacturer's website. Usually Kaeser is pretty good.
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You'd need to know the ambient temperature and absolute pressure that the compressor is drawing from. They generally compress "ACFM" (actual cfm), and many processes are interested in mass flow (scfm = standard cfm, with a few different definitions of "standard").
As good a place to start as any is here:
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David A. Smith
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