When Accessories Become Essentials

In my almost three decades of home ownership, I’ve learned a great deal about maintenance in regard to dwelling structures. Among those lessons are:

The importance of the right tool(s) for the job.
Having the right materials on hand (I’m looking at you, every plumbing project I’ve ever attempted).
When it’s a one-person job, a team effort…or a call to the professionals is always in play.

When it comes to EXAIR Intelligent Compressed Air Products, the first and last concerns above are easily addressed. With precious few exceptions, basic hand tools are all that’s required for installation or maintenance, and they’re engineered & manufactured to be “user friendly”. One key aspect of the “user friendliness” is a comprehensive inventory of accessories.

Some of these accessories are unique to a particular Product Line:

Air Knife Plumbing Kits are great, especially for the longer Super Air Knives that need to be plumbed to multiple ports along their length. These consist of air hose and brass fittings (for Aluminum Super Air Knives) or Stainless Steel tubing and fittings (for the Stainless Steel models) that connect in to those multiple ports, allowing for infeed to just one (for Super Air Knives up to 54″ long) or two (for lengths up to 108″) 1/2 NPT fittings. These can actually be used on our Super Ion Air Knives as well.
Universal Air Knife Mounting Systems provide for ease of installation, and precise positioning of our Aluminum or Stainless Steel Super, Standard, or Full Flow Air Knives.
Coupling Bracket Kits can join Super Air Knives together for a continuous, uninterrupted curtain of air flow in any length that you need. They can also be used if you don’t always need air flow along the entire length of a Super Air Knife assembly. I had the pleasure of assisting a user once who had needed to blow off parts on a hanging conveyor. Some parts were a little under 2ft long; others were about 4ft long. They used the Model 110900 Coupling Bracket Kit to join two Model 110024 24″ Aluminum Super Air Knives together, plumbed them separately, and turned both of them on for the long parts, and just the ‘top’ one for the shorter parts.

Other accessories can be used for a variety of products:

Stay Set Hoses (with or without Magnetic Bases) make up instant Blowoff Systems when used with our engineered Air Nozzles. They come in lengths from 6″ to 36″, and can bent by hand to “stay set” (as advertised) to hold their position. They can repositioned, as needed. They’re also popular for use with our 3/4″ and 1-1/4″ Super & Adjustable Air Amplifiers, and can even be used with 3″ Air Knives.
Conveyance Hose is a great way to connect point A to point B in a Line Vac Air Operated Conveyor system. Bulk material conveyance really doesn’t get much easier than Line Vac + Hose = Instant Conveyor System (just add compressed air). It can also be used with our Air Amplifiers to duct or route the air flow on the inlet, or the outlet to, or from, one area to another.
Mounting Brackets are available for a number of our products:
- Atomizing Spray Nozzles
- Line Vacs
- Filters and Regulators
- Cabinet Cooler System Thermostats
Vacuum Cups are often used with our E-Vac Vacuum Generators for pick-and-place material handling applications. We stock fittings and push-in tubing as well, to complete the package. Those fittings and tubing can also be used for the liquid supply to our Atomizing Spray Nozzles (depending on what you’re spraying, you might want to verify chemical compatibility first; call me if that’s a concern).

Other EXAIR Compressed Air Product Accessories can be used with products that aren’t even ours, or, in conjunction with your compressed air system design for increased efficiency or flexibility:

Model 9500-60 60 Gallon Receiver Tanks can be installed near points of high air flow demand to prevent or limit fluctuations in supply throughout the system.
Compressed Air Hoses can be made to length, and a variety of Fittings (Hex or Close Nipples, Couplers, Reducers, Tees, Elbows, Crosses, and Bulkhead Fittings) are on the shelf in popular sizes.
Our 5 Micron water/dirt Filter Separators are a standard when needing clean, condensate free air to blow through and end-use product.
Pressure Regulators are an important factor to minimize compressed air consumption. EXAIR always recommends operating our products at the minimum pressure necessary for a successful application. For example, if using a Super Air Knife to remove dust and light debris, this could be achieved at 20 PSIG, a Pressure Regulator will provide that adjustability and keep the air consumption much lower than if it were operated at 80-100 PSIG.
Swivel Fittings, typically used with compressed air nozzles, provide the precision adjustability to focus in on the exact area you need to treat.

If you have any questions about how the above accessories can aid with your application, please relay on our expert team for answers and solutions. Having the right materials and accessories on-hand can simplify installation, enhance performance, save compressed air, and more!

Russ Bowman, CCASS