Respect Compressed Air

MrDan

Registered
Registered
Joined
Feb 16, 2017
Messages
50
This one happened back in the 70's, when I was a green kid out of high school. I worked in a auto body shop. We had a huge compressor with a 120 gallon receiver. It was a 2-stage compressor and so the cutoff pressure was 175 psi.

I needed another air line, and the tank had a 2" galvanized steel plug on one end. I decided to replace the plug with a bushing reducer down to 3/4" pipe and hook my new line in there.

I shut off the compressor and opened the little 1/4" drain valve on the bottom of the tank to relieve the pressure, but it was taking forever.

I loosened up the 2" plug a little, so that some air was leaking past the threads to try and hurry things up. Still slow as molasses.

Finally the pressure was down to around 25 psi. That didn't seem like much at all to me, figured I could just finish unscrewing the plug and catch it as it came off. :dejected:

Fortunately I was standing to the side, as the plug shot out of the end like a cannonball. It went right through a doorway and into the field next door. We never found it.
 
Where did the wrench you were using wind up.
 
I did something along those lines when I was a kid, with my uncle's compressor. Wanted to put a new gage on it, and it was in that end port, bushed down to 1/4 NPT. Pressure was low, as I was thinking at the time, so I proceeded to unscrew it by hand. When it turned loose, I managed to keep hold of it, but the my hand was filled with tiny pieces of rust and debris, like it was shot with rat shot or something. I picked out all I could, and had to keep iodine on it for a few days. And I will always remember that. I was about 10 I guess, but even a few PSIG can do some damage. Yep, respect your air pressure.
 
Another dangerous thing to do can be to spin up a ball bearing with an air hose nozzle. It can be done safely with care
but don't try to see how fast it can go as it can fly apart with disastrous results.
 
I can attest to that one, just a little to much air on the bearing and all of a sudden there is an explosion of parts, and those little balls hurt, How does a ball that size go through such a small hole in the skin.
 
I was working on a townhouse project and the plumbers air tested the water lines at about 100 psi. The apprentice went around to drain the air and remove the test caps. He got the order wrong on one or two units and just put the torch to the cap. It blew across the small kitchen and stuck in the dry wall. He was lucky the hot cap didn't hit him.
Airless sprayers can inject paint into the skin also.
 
Yup, learned this one the hard way!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
Yes, air can be dangerous, and compressed gas bottles, and hydraulics even more so, not to mention angry wives and girlfriends . So lets all be careful out there. Mike
 
Back
Top