I just bought a Gast 1022 series pump off of Craig's List. It is mounted on a 20 gal. horizontal tank. I am going to use it for a vacuum chuck. Is there any reason to keep the tank? I really don't need to give up that much floor space in my already cluttered shop.
The pump is a 10cfm 3/4 HP unit. I probably will use a lot of bleed air to keep from sucking the bottom our of my bowls. Will a tank mitigate surges in pressure, will it make it harder to manually regulate vacuum?
The short answer is, "Nope!"
I have a similar Gast pump and run it direct. Made a transfer bearing with a block of wood and a sealed bearing. Used a piece of 3/8" metal brake line to run from the actual cork plated "chuck" through the headstock. Then a short piece of 3/8" brake line, attached the transfer bearing with a piece of the metal line epoxyed into each side and then a length of 3/8" brake hose from the trnasfer joint to the pump. Control of the vaccum is by means of the off/on switch mounted on the wall. You can install a valve, guage, water separator, etc. You could, but you will not have anythign that actually works any better.
Oh, yes, the face plate for the cork covered disk is a 6" Harbor Freight face plate (1X8).
Deb
Tanks and hoses act to limit surge pressure and even lack of pressure in a cycle. They Integrate change - like a capacitor in parallel to a circuit.
The tank can stand on it's nose or hang from a rafter if needed. It sounds as if you have the pump planned in another place.
If you have a tank, it will hold pressure and the pump stops. Without a tank the pump runs 100% and it may not be rated for that life.
I use a lot of air on my plasma machine - 70psi and 25 to 30 cfs. It cools and forces metal away. I had to get a larger tank because a smaller one could not keep up with the work. The big one cycles on and off but has time to rest.
Mart> I just bought a Gast 1022 series pump off of Craig's List. It is mounted on
"Martin H. Eastburn" wrote: (clip) If you have a tank, it will hold pressure and the pump stops. Without a tank
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ It sounds like you are adapting a pump/ pressure tank to vacuum service by reversing the connections. The tank will not offer the same surge capacity that it did when used to hold pressure. It probably ran up to about 100 psi formerly. It can now run down to less that -15 psi, about 1/7 as much. You also have the issue that your pressure on/off switch will be working backwards. A 3/4 HP Gast pump will handle all your needs without the tank--I say save the space and ditch the tank.
What you could do is hook up the tank so you can use it for compressed air when you're not using the Gast for vacuum. Of course, that brings us back to space question. To me, it seems like a big plus to have compressed air in the shop for just the cost of a valve or two.
Please take the time to understand pressure/area relationship - there is a table near the front of the articles, as I recall.
I have a similar unit, you will find a photo there somewhere of it affixed to my lathe -
Thanks for the advice. The pump came from an injection molding operation where they needed a big burst of vacuum when the valve on the machine opened. That is not my situation, so I now have a 20 gal. 200 psig coded tank for which I have no use. I already have a vertical tank upon which my air compressor is mounted.
It had been my intention to make vacuum chucks from mdf with threaded nuts fabricated from hard wood glued to them. However yesterday I blew up a 16" platter, a portion of which still resides in the sheet rock behind the lathe. That has forced me to rethink the strength of threaded hardwood nuts. You can expect an order for some of your face plates today.
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