Cactus Juice getting into hose line

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Bucks

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I have just realised that I am getting Cactus juice in hose line from my vacuum pump to my stabilising chamber :-( Does anyone have any recommendations/advice on how I can prevent this? I was wondering if one of the water filters you get for compressors would be any good?
It's pretty much the same chamber that Curtis@Turntex makes.
 
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How have you noticed the CJ getting in there? Is it the discoloured oil?
I try and make sure that the Stickfast (preferred choice although just purchased cactus juice to see if different) comes nowhere near the hose. If the bubbles rise and get close o remove vacuum until they subside and then build up over time.
I guess some resin will be in the air being drawn and as such my oil becomes discoloured too bit I change oil regularly to save any issues with the pump seizing.
As for the water trap idea I would guess it may work although unsure how it would attach etc.

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I removed the hose from the stabilising chamber & there was quite bit of I'm certain it's the CJ & not oil in the hose! As far as I was aware I didn't let the resin get anywhere near the top of the chamber though, but my wife was also stabilising so I can't vouch for her!

I will change the oil in the pump, but this has made me want to come up with some sort of failsafe to prevent the same happening again, hence wandering about the compressor water filters.
 
Well, you may need to identify correctly what that liquid found in the hose is, if is "oily", that means that you have oil coming from the pump and that also means that you have a good chance that oil went into the Cactus Juice and spoil it, unless you filter the CJ with some coffee filters and see it water is present.

The most common reason this happen is when you have the oil sump level far too high, this will make oily fumes to come out of the pump breather but also allow oil to the sucked into the vacuum chamber, how..? when you are at full vacuum and turn the pump off without realising some vacuum from the chamber, what happens is, the suction power from the inside the chamber is sufficient to suck oil from the pump.

There is only one think that will prevent it and that is an electric non-return valve at the pump outlets HOWEVER, if you get CJ into the oil, that means that you have allowed the CJ to be sucked from the inside the chamber and yes, a compressor water filter system will prevent oil to get past that point unless the amount of CJ being sucked is enough to fill the water reservoir of the filter, in that case the CJ will continue its travel to the pump sump.

If this happen, you need to "flash" you system with petrol, from hoses, joints, filters and pump, after removing the contaminated oil, put the bleeder back on and poor some petrol into the top sump opening, put it back on and shake the pump the best you can, removed the liquid out and you can assist the cleaning by using the air blowing gun to blow air from that top opening forcing the petrol to come out, after that, fill pump oil to level (only), reconnect everything else and turn the pump for a minute, check if oil is still level or need a little more.

You can also use those petrol filters found in motorcycles, quads, etc., they will catch whatever comes into the pump or goes into the vacuum chamber, these are efficient for small "accidents" after the filter is full/soaked, the damage will still happen.

I have had all possibilities happening to me, more in the beginning but, the one that I could not control was when I have the pump/chamber at full vacuum and remember that I have a 16 litre capacity chamber and the power/electricity goes down and I'm not near the pump, the amount of sucking pressure inside that big chamber is such that, it will such half of the pump oil reservoir into the chamber, spoiling everything.

This has happened a couple of times before I found a similar type vacuum pump that comes with an electric non-return valve, not costing me a fortune, in fact, the cost of an electric valve alone was twice the cost of these regular pumps, these pumps are installed with this valve from factory at a very affordable price, and everything has been working well...!

Hope this helps...!

Cheers
George
 
The pump was sat on the table with the vacuum chamber, so certainly wasn't above the chamber, in fact it was below the top level of the CJ, I'm going to change the oil in the pump tonight!
Just had a quick look (before I go to work) into these filters designed for compressor airlines, hopefully as a failsafe, any thoughts on these (metal bowl/not polycarbonate) I was also thinking that if this would work, the auto drain might prevent the filter overflowing if there was a major problem as George mentioned.

Any thoughts & recommendations much appreciated, as I'm pretty new to stabilising
 
Bucks said:
The pump was sat on the table with the vacuum chamber, so certainly wasn't above the chamber, in fact it was below the top level of the CJ, I'm going to change the oil in the pump tonight!
Just had a quick look (before I go to work) into these filters designed for compressor airlines, hopefully as a failsafe, any thoughts on these (metal bowl/not polycarbonate) I was also thinking that if this would work, the auto drain might prevent the filter overflowing if there was a major problem as George mentioned.

Any thoughts & recommendations much appreciated, as I'm pretty new to stabilising
Click to expand...

I have one of those but without the auto drain, in fact, I never saw one before and I'm sure, that is the ideal option, the price difference to the one I got from the same brand isn't much but I don't think they had them on sale when I first got mine otherwise, I would have purchased it, instead.

The one thing you need to be careful about when adding stuff between the pump and chamber is that the more joints you make, the easier is for the leaks to happen so, every thread use tape, use quality hose clamps and make sure the seal on the filter glass container is tighten properly, it doesn't take a big leak to prevent the pump from reaching the maximum vacuum possible.

Altitude plays an important role of the maximum vacuum you will be able to get from the pump, 29.7Hp would be at sea level, I'm at 270 feet altitude and I still get about 29.4Hp when the oil is fresh, anything over 28Hp is good, the higher the better...!

I'm going to find a supplier that is willing to ship the filter you're suggested into Australia, the one from that link doesn't ship that item to Australia, for whatever the reason...!:confused::mad:

Any other questions you may have, just ask...!:wink:

Cheers
George
 
The compressor moisture trap will not work because the valve in them is designed to hold the pressure inside the bowl until it is opened. With vacuum you will suck air into the bowl through the valve. If anything look for one that you have to open a little petcock or tap.

You can also make a simple version of an oil/moisture trap from a strong jar. It's what all the vacuum tables had on the milling machines to trap the coolant used on the metal.

Liquid Traps - Labconco
 
Curly said:
The compressor moisture trap will not work because the valve in them is designed to hold the pressure inside the bowl until it is opened. With vacuum you will suck air into the bowl through the valve. If anything look for one that you have to open a little petcock or tap.

You can also make a simple version of an oil/moisture trap from a strong jar. It's what all the vacuum tables had on the milling machines to trap the coolant used on the metal.

Liquid Traps - Labconco
Click to expand...

+1 What Pete said. In fact. Either Curtis or Stickfast showed one of these in their setup.
Lin
 
Curly said:
The compressor moisture trap will not work because the valve in them is designed to hold the pressure inside the bowl until it is opened. With vacuum you will suck air into the bowl through the valve. If anything look for one that you have to open a little petcock or tap.

You can also make a simple version of an oil/moisture trap from a strong jar. It's what all the vacuum tables had on the milling machines to trap the coolant used on the metal.

Liquid Traps - Labconco
Click to expand...

Thanks for that Curley
Do you mean the manual drain version? Maybe I might be better off looking into making something similar to the liquid trap as I do have pvc pipe I could use, is it just a airtight container with a inlet & outlet & nothing else like filters etc inside?
 
For a compressor water separator you want a manual drain with a tap or valve not an automatic or pull to the side valve as a drain.

For a trap you could use the PVC but you won't know how much if anything is in it. A glass jar with a screw down lid is all you need. Like the wide mouth ones for jam etc. That is all i ever saw on the ones at work.

These will work if you want to spend some money.
3/8" Particulate Filter Water/Milk Trap Vacuum Pump Air Compressor Milk Machine | eBay

GAST:AA675C-Vacuum Trap | eBay
 
Hi Paul - That's happened to me and all I did was to effectively do what Ed suggested. Specifically what I did was put a vertical loop in the vacuum line, it was that simple.

By putting a vertical loop in the line you are forcing the fluid in the line to travel up and over the top of the loop, but the fluid falls back to the bottom of the loop and won't "go over" the top, keeping it from moving to the pump.

Another way to do it is to lift the vacuum line up above your vacuum chamber, then the fluid will fall back into the chamber.

It's easy to fix without buying anything.

Happy Turning - Tom
 
You do need a trap to catch the juice. What I've seen as used with stabilizing with a vacuum bag is a jar with a hose that reaches the bottom coming from the tank or bag, and another going to the pump that ends at the top of the jar. This lets the juice collect at the bottom of the jar during drawdown and when the vacuum is released it will pull the juice back into the tank. This is very useful with the vacuum bag to keep air from entering while the juice is soaking in.
 
Thanks for all the advice guys, I'm starting to think that it might have been oil in the line from turning the pump off with the chamber still under vacuum.
To start with I'm going to put a vertical loop in the hose line & keep an eye on it to see how we get on.
 
On a slightly different note, I notice that commercial vacuum chambers with quick connect fittings, always seem to have the quick connect at the pump end! Is there any particular reason for this? Or could I have the quick connect fittings at the vacuum chamber end? as I plan on having a couple of vacuum chambers plus a degassing chamber & wouldn't need a hose on each chamber.
 
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