Air compressors for painting

Necessary for spray painting work, air compressors are very powerful devices whose main role is to suck in air to store it or deliver it directly, in a compressed way to allow the spraying of compressed air for the application of paint. Most compressors are equipped with a tank in which the air is stored at high pressure (up to 8 bar generally). There are air compressors for domestic as well as industrial applications, and in this article we will focus only on the compressor used for spray painting or airbrush painting, with two types of compressors: reciprocating compressors and rotary compressors.

Definition
Air compressors are mechanical devices that draw air at atmospheric pressure (low pressure) and convert it to high pressure air.

Use
Compressors have a wide range of applications. Although there are many power tools for industrial use, the automotive industry relies heavily on compressed air to power pneumatic tools. Therefore, air compressors are found in every small local garage. Pneumatic tools are important tools that garages, workshops and body shops use with compressed air.

In the field of body painting, they are used to supply the various pneumatic tools such as sanders, polishers, presses, tire inflators, or blow guns, and especially for painting with a pneumatic gun.
In the field of model making and art, small silent compressors are used to supply air to the airbrush.

Volume flow or capacity
A compressor is mainly qualified by its ability to suck in and deliver air (in litres/minute) and the storage volume capacity for its air tank.
Motor speed is reported in rotations per minute (RPM).

Compressors for bodywork

In the field of body painting, the is led to take different sizes of parts, from a motorcycle helmet for example, to a truck. For this activity, it is necessary to have an efficient air compressor with sufficient capacity. This is allowed by the power of the engine but above all by the size of the tank of the air tank in which the compressed air is stored up to a pressure of 8 bars. Indeed, if the size of the tank is too small compared to the size of the vehicle learn, then very quickly the pressure of the air delivered to the pipes and the gun, will drop and become insufficient, because the consumption of the air is greater than the capacity of the engine.

Mini-compressors for airbrushes

For the use of this essentially artistic tool, the user needs a relatively small supply of compressed air since the surfaces to be painted never exceed 50 cm. Airbrushing is often done indoors, at home in a studio, for several hours at a time, and for this reason artists prefer to use a motor compressor placed outside in a soundproof area, or most often a silent mini-compressor in the workshop or the room where one works. These are small high-performance compressors whose noise does not exceed that of a refrigerator motor. There are small compressors with air tank or without tank. In the latter case, the pressure level is often limited to 1.5 or 2 bars and this type of compressor is reserved only for drawings or the painting of small parts or figurines?

Air quality

A compressor will suck in the ambient air available, to compress it in the cure. Inevitably the ambient humidity will condense and form water which will settle at the bottom of the tank. Some of these rates could be expelled when supplying air to the pneumatic tool. In the area of painting, this could be particularly problematic, but fortunately there are air filters. An air compressor is always equipped with a basic filter. It is necessary to regularly purge this filter, but also the contents of the tank thanks to a setting which is always at the bottom of the tank. The filter is also used to filter dust, rust residue, but also grease from the engine.

The two main operating modes

Piston compressors: You may be familiar with simple hand-operated bicycle pumps that fill small tires and balls with air. This is an example of a simple air compressor. Today, we use electric motor air compressors to fill the tires of all kinds of automobiles with air. For reciprocating compressors, there is a reciprocating piston that moves axially in a cylinder and it reduces the air volume/ga and increases its pressure. Depending on the outlet pressure requirements, we can have single or multi-cylinder and single or multi-stage compressors.

Rotary compressors
The next type of air compressor is a rotary compressor. They are generally small in size and produce relatively less pressure. For example, a dentist's suction system consists of a rotary compressor. There are two important types of rotary compressors: screw and vane. A screw compressor is an extremely popular type of air compressor in the industrial segment.