60 gal compressor garage piping size.

[LONGHAIR]

Originally Posted by Kim57

I know you guys are not going to like this but I did mine with 1" PVC 20 years ago and have never had a problem.
Inexpensive and easy to do.
Kim

We had PVC in a shop where I worked many years ago. As many guys have said, it worked just fine for years.....until, that one time.
Someone banged into one of the lines and it exploded. There were shattered pieces thrown quite a distance. Luckily, no one was injured. It was replaced with iron pipe, but we weren't in the building very long after that.
The next building had iron in it too. We had a fairly sophisticated system with a drier and never had any issues with condensation, but modifying it to move or add drops was a pain.
The new shop has Rapidair aluminum tubing and it is fantastic. It is very easy to modify, which is always a thing in a new space.

[MikeB]

Originally Posted by LONGHAIR

The new shop has Rapidair aluminum tubing and it is fantastic. It is very easy to modify, which is always a thing in a new space.

Yes, I am very impressed with the 3/4" Rapid Air system that a buddy of mine has. He does have a tool to straighten the coiled aluminum line, which I think is essential to doing a good job.

[ChevyRacefan]

Originally Posted by MikeB

Yes, I am very impressed with the 3/4" Rapid Air system a buddy of mine has. He does have a tool to straighten the coiled aluminum line, which I think is essential to doing a good job.

Yes, the tool will make unrolling the pipe much easier.
I figure , buy it, use it, then ebay it. for 40.00 less than what it was new. and it only be a 40.00 tool rental.

[ChevyRacefan]

Originally Posted by LONGHAIR

We had PVC in a shop where I worked many years ago. As many guys have said, it worked just fine for years.....until, that one time.
Someone banged into one of the lines and it exploded. There were shattered pieces thrown quite a distance. Luckily, no one was injured. It was replaced with iron pipe, but we weren't in the building very long after that.
The next building had iron in it too. We had a fairly sophisticated system with a drier and never had any issues with condensation, but modifying it to move or add drops was a pain.
The new shop has Rapidair aluminum tubing and it is fantastic. It is very easy to modify, which is always a thing in a new space.

I think my problem with the black iron is, moisture and time between use.
It can go months, When you take the hose adapters off the pipe end and fire up the compressor, and get rust flakes out the pipe, ya. time to trash the iron pipe and redo it all. It lasted 20 years. It owes me nothing.

[LONGHAIR]

Originally Posted by ChevyRacefan

I think my problem with the black iron is, moisture and time between use.
It can go months, When you take the hose adapters off the pipe end and fire up the compressor, and get rust flakes out the pipe, ya. time to trash the iron pipe and redo it all. It lasted 20 years. It owes me nothing.

Yeah, that can happen, but there are things you can do to help. First of all is having the air line connections for your hoses above the actual end of the pipe.
Meaning that wherever you have a "drop", put a "T" fitting in it where your quick disconnect comes out and add a short section of pipe continuing down with a cap (or better yet a petcock drain).
This way any flakes or other junk in the lines drops below the fitting where the air is going out. This also allows you to drain any condensation in the lines themselves, rather than just at the tank.
Other things kind of depend upon how much/often you actually use the system. If it's not often enough, it might not be worth the time/trouble.

[Getter-Done]

I had a lot of water issues with my first set-up.
If I can even call it a setup

I run mine like TP tools suggests in the PDF below.

I don't have the moisture issues I had before.

I also put moisture filter from HF on my sandblast cabinet link below.

PDF Link: https://cached.tptools.com/Images/ai...ng-diagram.pdf

HF moisture filter link: https://www.harborfreight.com/indust...nit-68247.html









.

[franken]

Originally Posted by Getter-Done

I had a lot of water issues with my first set-up.
If I can even call it a setup

I run mine like TP tools suggests in the PDF below.

I don't have the moisture issues I had before.

I also put moisture filter from HF on my sandblast cabinet link below.

PDF Link: https://cached.tptools.com/Images/ai...ng-diagram.pdf

HF moisture filter link: https://www.harborfreight.com/indust...nit-68247.html
.

The trouble with that setup is you have 10 valves to open to purge water and can never forget. Or, paint the wall black in the area.
Of course, as I said, I'm just one fool in a 2 car garage so a more conservative flow through plan is ok. For several workers, that system makes sense.

To the OP, I should have asked more about the layout you have currently. Maybe it can be arranged to not pool water and create rust.

[ChevyRacefan]

Originally Posted by franken

To the OP, I should have asked more about the layout you have currently. Maybe it can be arranged to not pool water and create rust.

The problem with the way it is now. Is I bought house, and car was coming that week, So I needed the pipe, in and up. Along with moving everything I owned.
Silly me thought I could do it in a week end and not take a weeks vacation to move.
So pipe slopes and such was not even a thought, it was get it in before the car gets rolled in, and I have to try to work around it.
That was 20+ years ago. Black iron pipe is not going back in, The rusty water out the tools are doing them no favors either.
This time I have to work around a vehicle to install it, but time isn't an issue so slopes and such can be done right. But I plan on this being the last time, I have no interest in doing it again in 15-20 years.

[LONGHAIR]

Originally Posted by Getter-Done

I had a lot of water issues with my first set-up.
If I can even call it a setup

I run mine like TP tools suggests in the PDF below.

I don't have the moisture issues I had before.

I also put moisture filter from HF on my sandblast cabinet link below.

PDF Link: https://cached.tptools.com/Images/ai...ng-diagram.pdf

The extensions containing the ball valves is just what i was referring too. That's a pretty good illustration of a smaller shop set-up, except for one thing, which I am surprised a commercial designer left out. That is a "loop back" to the tank with the main line. When you have a "dead end" set-up like this, everything is fine when you are one guy in the shop. Add one more user and you will have a problem.
Using that diagram as an example. You are blasting in the cabinet at the end of the run. Now someone else starts up a sander, blows the dust off of something or even fills up a tire....you have a pressure drop. This happens because they cut you off. In a loop system, this doesn't happen because the air flows toward the place that it is being used from both directions. That way, you are never cut off.
The building where I work is 60k square feet, 50k of that is wide open shop space. It is plumbed for air virtually everywhere. There is a huge loop going around the outside, dropping down the walls where needed and at all of the columns that support the roof. These rows are connected to the loop at both ends, furthering the loops. This also means that these smaller loops can be isolated. That way any of these sections can be modified or repaired without draining the entire system. There are even more drops at specific places for the machines that need it. There can be upwards of 25 guys using air at any given moment, including a spray booth. Some of these machines are pressure and volume sensitive, so they will go into an alarm or just shut down. The design of the main layout was very important from the very beginning of the building planning phase.
This is waay overkill for a regular guy in a home shop, but the point of the loop remains. It will stop pressure drops from simultaneous users, at least as long as your compressor can keep up.