Portable (glove box) compressor

On Tue, 27 Sep 2005 10:13:46 +0100, Austin Shackles
<[email protected]> wrote:

>>Why are they <$40 in the USA and >£50 here though? Smacks of "because we
>>can" profiteering to me.

How heavy are they? Maybe worth carrying one back in luggage?
>>
>>Did you get yours here or in the US? If here, did you find a better
>>source than the ones I turned up on the Web?
>
>I've yet to get one at all. but I was thinking about it. I've also been
>thinking about a mains compressor.

I use all types except I no longer have one that works off the spark
plug.

As I am using a number of tubeless tyres I have now had to explosively
seat the bead, spectacular.

The small 10 quid ones are fine for topping up but wear out on a big
(tractor) tyre.

I have recently converted ( at some detriment to the atmosphere) a
fridge freezer compressor to run off my 70quid 2t generator, I have
yet to try it in anger but it should be less fiddly than my pto pump.
Even my 4kVA genset struggle to start the 2kW mains compressor unless
the reservoir is empty and these are too heavy to carry on a regular
basis.

AJH

AJH wrote:

> I have recently converted ( at some detriment to the atmosphere) a
> fridge freezer compressor to run off my 70quid 2t generator, I have
> yet to try it in anger but it should be less fiddly than my pto pump.
> Even my 4kVA genset struggle to start the 2kW mains compressor unless
> the reservoir is empty and these are too heavy to carry on a regular
> basis.
>
Compressors have to be started with "unloading" valves, these keep the
pump outlet open to atmosphere until the pump has actually started. THEN
the pump switches into the tank.

Steve

On Tue, 27 Sep 2005 13:23:13 +0100, Steve Taylor
<[email protected]> wrote:

>AJH wrote:

>> Even my 4kVA genset struggle to start the 2kW mains compressor unless
>> the reservoir is empty and these are too heavy to carry on a regular
>> basis.
>>
>Compressors have to be started with "unloading" valves, these keep the
>pump outlet open to atmosphere until the pump has actually started. THEN
>the pump switches into the tank.

The cheap Italian one I have has no such valve and the 50Hz mains
starts it even if the reservoir has 80psi in it, the genset won't. The
work around is to discharge the reservoir, connect the tyre hose and
then start the compressor.

The point I was trying to get across was that when mobile you need to
size your tyre pumping equipment according to need. I hope the
combination of cheap ~700W generator and freezer compressor ( rated at
150W) will give reasonable speed and portability (and durability
because it is lubricated although ~20 years old since I bought it),
this compared to the 12V cigar lighter socket fed compressor or
lumping 150kg genset and 2kW compressor around.

AJH