Compressor Failure

All sound advice until the last. Outside my shop is 5 acres of dirt. LOL.

Grainger's Speedaire line _used_ to be pretty good stuff. I haven't looked at their line-up in awhile though...

I have one of their 20 gal horizontal tank models with wheels. I think it was the largest one available that could still be run off 120v. Never had any trouble with it but I don't use it like you have been either. The only weak point I felt was the wimpy pressure switch, but so far it has held up for the past ~20 years okay.

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i have that one (purchased ~6 years ago for $500 and change). it's also rated continuous duty, so has lasted a long time. i use it for sandblasting, so it's run for hours at a time ok.

regards, charlie

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Has anyone bought a separate compressor pump from HF? How's the reliability? I have one of their 5hp(searz) compressors with the

20gal tank and it does me just fine. But if I wanted more CFM, moving to a larger motor and pump might be the way to go. $180, 15.2-17.5 CFM and 6.5hp gas or 5hp Leeson motor.

-- Live Simply. Speak Kindly. Care Deeply. Love Generously. -- anon

=A0LOL.- Hide quoted text -

Just depends on what's dustier, the inside of the shop or the outside. If you're doing orbital sanding on wood, might be the safer intake is outside. And nothing keeps anyone from making a cyclone separator for the intake followed by the paper filter if you're subject to that tough of a dusty environment. I'd expect someone to come down with black lung, though, if it's that bad outside.

Stan

You have never visited the desert?

Yes--I have the above pump...it leaked a lot of oil till I finally = re-torqued all the bolts. Other than that, so far I've gotten about 5 = years daily use out of it without any issues...

--downtime is expensive for me and so hopefully if it dies before I do, = then instead of rushing and buying a completely new unit and then = wasting time shopping for parts to fix the old one etc all I'll have to = do is go pick up a new pump, slap it on and I'm back in business...

I'm running mine with a Baldor 5hp 3ph @3450 rpm, that has a 5in = diameter duplex sheave on the output shaft and dual B series vee = belts...the tank is probably only ~20 gallons and so it fills up pretty = quickly in the morning--great for intermittant use like occasionally = blowing chips during part changes etc although if I'm going to steadily = use more air for some reason, then I'll usually also connect a 60 gal = auxillary tank onto the main line to prevent short-cycling