Air compressor advice

friscosc

We are upgradkmg our shop and adding a sportsman ex 10/8. I was wondering what somebody else who is running one's recommendation would be for a good reliable air compressor and chiller that is reasonably prices.
I'm considering rotary, and have a requirements of 100psi and 9 cfm.
I'm also running single phase.

Suggestions?

5103Ventures

Single phase is going to limit you to 5hp for the most part.. maybe 7hp with some special ordering. Money is probably something you are concerned about, so I'd recommend going reciprocating. Quincy makes a very good compressor that can be had for $1299 with shipping on AirCompressorsDirect.com and they sell a Quincy made, other branded chiller for $850 that will match it's 15.7CFM at 90 PSI, which ought to be acceptable. The big question is if you are running air or servo index. The second question is how many colors you usually print. A 6 or 7 color job is going to probably slow you down, but it depends on how it prints. If you use revolver alot you won't notice with a servo index machine. M&R rates the air requirements for all heads running at maximum speed and then some apparently. I had a pair of 10/8 servo index and they ran just fine on 15HP air compressors. Never once had an air issue. We parallelled the compressors and ran one on one day and the other on the other day.

Screw is nice, but they are $6500 for a new one in the same size ranges... used isn't much cheaper unless it has 20K hours on it. Reciprocating is easy to work on.... screw can't be worked on without special parts and tools. Very close tolerances.

If money is tight you could try getting by with a Harbor Freight 5HP compressor for $799. I have one that I used for several months to spray foam. It's a good machine, but loud. I'm buying a Quincy when I'm ready to setup shop later this month.