Compressed air is often hailed as the “fourth utility,” indispensable to manufacturing operations much like electricity, water, and natural gas. In this realm, oil-flooded rotary screw compressors reign supreme for their cost-effectiveness despite their operational and maintenance expenses.
The annual operating costs of rotary screw compressors stem from various factors: high energy consumption, pricey replacement fluids and parts, labor-intensive maintenance, and the handling and disposal of hazardous waste oil. Improving the efficiency of these compressors is paramount in curbing these costs.
The Predominant Issue
The primary adversary of rotary screw air compressors is fluid contamination, which spells doom for the oil and all components it interacts with. Solid and vapor contaminants are forced into the oil by the compressor’s design, hastening oxidation, generating acids, and degrading the oil’s properties and performance. This process leads to wear, corrosion, and fouling, resulting in expensive maintenance and repairs. The key to enhancing rotary screw compressor efficiency lies in preventing and minimizing fluid contamination.
The most detrimental contaminants in compressor oil are acids and ultra-fine solids, which evade removal by the compressor’s standard full-flow oil filter. These pollutants accumulate over time, impairing the oil’s ability to lubricate, cool, and protect compressor internals. The consequences are steep: unnecessary purchases of fluids and separators, heightened energy consumption due to increased separator pressure drop, frequent maintenance and repairs, unwarranted compressor downtime, and excessive waste oil handling and disposal.
A Forward-Thinking Solution to Reduce Compressor Operating Costs
Enter Fluid Metrics’ Compressor Oil Purifier (COP), a proactive maintenance contamination control system engineered to combat harmful acids and solids that accumulate in compressor oils. Employing ion exchange acid adsorption and ultra-fine filtration technologies, the COP ensures that your compressor’s oil remains pristine and operational.
Dow Chemical, a leader in synthetic air compressor lubricants and ion exchange liquid separation technologies, conducted extensive research on the efficacy of ion exchange technology at removing acids from compressor oils. After testing various types of compressor fluids, Dow determined that ion exchange technology was “extremely effective” at removing acids, controlling TAN and pH in compressor oils, and significantly increasing oil service life. Furthermore, Dow’s testing demonstrated that the ion exchange media “did not contaminate or otherwise harm the treated lubricants in any way”. Given these results, Fluid Metrics developed its revolutionary Compressor Oil Purifier specifically designed to remove harmful acids and ultra-fine solids from rotary screw compressor oils, improve compressor reliability, and reduce maintenance costs, oil consumption, and environmental impact.
How the Compressor Oil Purifier Works
The COP is a small filter-like device that installs easily in a bypass loop to the compressor’s standard oil filter. The COP utilizes patented dual-core cartridges that combine mechanical filtration with chemical adsorption technologies to remove both solid and acidic contaminants from the oil. As a small slipstream of contaminated oil flows through the purifier’s replaceable cartridges, corrosive and catalytic acids are attracted to and chemically adsorbed by the COP’s proprietary ion exchange media. This specially designed media acts as a one-way acid adsorber, efficiently removing both weak and strong acids from the oil. Subsequently, the oil passes through an ultra-fine (3-micron absolute) synthetic filtration media, removing the most destructive “clearance-size” solids left in the oil by the compressor’s coarse full-flow oil filter. By consistently removing these harmful contaminants, the COP retards oil oxidation, additive depletion, and oil degradation, preserving the oil’s original properties and performance, and dramatically extending its useful life.
Advantages of Oil Purification
Fluid Metrics’ Compressor Oil Purifier provides a wide variety of benefits for rotary screw air compressor users, including:
- Improving compressor reliability by reducing internal wear, corrosion, and fouling.
- Extending fluid life up to 3-5 times longer than the manufacturer’s rated life (5-10 times longer when using PuroLube and XTEND additive concentrate).
- Slashing oil purchases, waste oil disposal, and environmental impact by up to 80%.
- Increasing the air-oil separators’ service life up to 2 years.
- Reducing energy consumption by minimizing separator pressure drops.
- Reducing routine preventative maintenance labor and compressor downtime.
- Reducing expensive repairs to air-ends and coolers.
Fluid Metrics’ Compressor Oil Purifier with ion exchange acid adsorption and ultra-fine filtration technologies is The Best Practice in rotary screw air compressor maintenance. By proactively addressing the root causes responsible for most compressor oil and component failures, the COP increases compressor reliability while saving users time and money. For additional information, contact Fluid Metrics at (770) 393-8636 or via email at info@fluidmetrics.com.