Copper Air Line Questions

[DC73]

Anyway, I thought the OP or someone had posted about the rapidair stuff and wanted to let them know about the sale.

I will be posting pics of my installation and general garage progress soon. It has been way too long...

Appreciate the posts. I did bring up RapidAir and it does have a place in this thread as even though I am leaning toward copper, I've not yet ruled out RapidAir. I don't mind at all if you want to post your experience with RapidAir in this thread.

I have ruled out black pipe. I've worked with it before and have the tools to cut and thread the pipe but based on the discussion and my reading, copper will be a better choice for me and much easier on my hands when installing.

DC

 

[coljar]

As I stated earlier, I have black iron in my buildings, but here at the plant, there are miles of galvanized air lines hooked to untold millions of dollars of machinery. They never have any problems related to these air lines and I don't think we'd have any problems in our little shops, especially if we had filters.

 

[robert_dean]

I don't agree.

If you want to tee into an existing system to add another point, with copper you can just cut a tiny bit out of the line. You can normally easily get enough movement in the pipes to insert a tee which can then be soldered up. It's a trivial task.

With iron, be it black or galv, there's a lot more work involved in threading, and the chances are you will have to add a union so you can rotate the pipes to screw everything back together.

BUT iron piping is stronger and far harder to damage, which in some shops may be important.

As someone who deals with this all the time, you would cut two new threads, period. A union, short ****** of any length, and a tee. Easy, no big deal. As far as black pipe and copper's " lack" of durability, if you've somehow damaged the copper to the point of failure, in a home shop you were either acting a complete and total tool, or you've had something else major occur and said damage could just as easily have broken the threaded area on black pipe as well. However, the OP stated he wanted copper, so copper it is.

 

[DC73]

http://www.copper.org/publications/pub_list/pdf/copper_tube_handbook.pdf

Thank you for providing the link to the Copper Tube Handbook. It turned out to be a very good resource. I was able to determine that Type M is more than sufficient for airlines and that solder of Alloy type Sb5 (95-5) would be a good match. The instructions for soldering are very good and were a good refresher.

My airline project is done. I ended up going with 3/4" copper all the way. I hadn't intended to do that. The plan was for the main line to be 3/4" and all of the drops to be 1/2" but economics prevailed in my favor.

I stopped at Sutherlands (regional box store competitor to Lowes and Home Depot) to pick something up and checked on their copper pipe while I was in the store. All of their 10' sticks of copper were $4 cheaper than the other places. I then noticed that every single stick of 3/4" was damaged on one end. Some were torn, some were bent but the damage only affected about 6" or less of each stick. The manager gave me a good discount on each piece so in the end, I have a complete 3/4" copper system for less than the cost of my planned 3/4"-1/2" hybrid system.

I hadn't soldered in quite awhile but I got the job done the first time with no air leaks. It was an interesting challenge to run the pipe through the attic and inside the walls. A low sloped roof and tight spaces made soldering overhead while standing on a ladder a bit tricky.

I ended up putting in 3 drops instead of just 2. I decided having one near the overhead door made sense as that door is within 25' or so of both the overhead door for the attached garage and the main driveway. Overall, it took a little over 90' of pipe for the whole project. No pics yet. I'll have to get some before I close up the walls.

Thanks to everyone who helped.

DC

 

[dkroth]

My airline project is done. I ended up going with 3/4" copper all the way.

And now your lines are good for the rest of your life.

 

[TAMPAGT07]

No. Just doesn't seem to be best match for your shop and what you want to do. In hot TX you will want cooling benefit of copper or black pipe steel, that you simply don't get with RapidAir. With proper planning & construction, your In-Wall copper will be LIFETIME system that you'll never have to worry about again. It could be easily added to later (which is major benefit of copper versus black pipe steel, which is my personal favorite).

Slight slope to your mainline up at top of wall would help direct moisture to drop that would have ball valve to dump moisture.

Below is typical airline system setup per TP Tools. Good luck.

One thing I noticed about your diagram that I would change (And I'm no expert), is I would put a drain at the bottom of the pipe where it connects to the compressor... Just to keep the water from going back into the compressor...