A friend of mine called me about an old craftsman compressor on CL for $30 earlier today. Needless to say I was at the guy's house before I got off the phone. It had oil that may or may not have ever been changed (certainly was very dirty), and a small leak in one of the fittings.

Mysteriously at some point the fitting reseated itself properly and now there's a TINY leak on either side of the water trap. I now have a 1HP, oiled compressor to drive the air tools I bought and I paid only $30. I'm a very happy 914 owner right now.

Clicky pop image now.

So now you can USE your air tools but they won't last as long this way.

Ait tools are the best. I can't believe I waited as long as I did.

T.C.

Replace the filter and water trap, and run it to see how it works. You are probably going to be limited to less demanding tools with this compressor. Sanders and such will tap it out pretty quick. However, its not a bad find for $30. It will run lots of stuff just fine, and even grinders and such if you go slow.

Zach

Nice looking compressor. Mine finally went out after 28 yrs about2 weeks ago. I was looking around and found one one craigslist for $75. 5HP, and a 20 Gallon tank. Got there, worked really well, so decided to get it. Got it home, got it up to pressure, and noticed a leak. looked under the tank, and saw rust.

Log-Story short, added the motor and compressor unit from the new one onto the old tank, and now it works great!

So the morale of the story is, when you have air tools, and no compressor, get a NEW compressor.

What Sww said to me was, "Even if you only ever use it to inflate tires, it'll be worth it." The most demanding thing I'll ever ask it to run is probably an impact gun, and I'm willing to wait a bit and use air strategically.

I've managed to fix every leak I can find and it's now held pressure as long as I've had it primed. I cleaned it off, cleaned out the filter and reassembled it. Also changed the oil.

Ow, my ears. I just decided it was a good time to take a compression tester and see how high the thing can go, the gauges read up to like 200 PSI. I screwed with the relay setup a bit until I figured out how it worked, adjusted it to off at some unknown high quantity. Turns out the dump valve gets stuck open at 140 PSI and won't close til about 100 without being pushed back in.

I've calibrated the regulator to 90PSI which is the max recommended for my air tools, but I figure tank pressure should be as high as I can get it to increase initial longevity. Any suggestions as to how to make the relief valve seal for longer? Am I risking blowing up the tank? Gauges read to 200 PSI and are high by about 5%. Relief sticks open at like 115 actual pressure.

Do not try to get it to hold more air then the relief will take. Especially since you don't know the condition of the tank. The gauges may go to 200psi, but the tank may only be rated for 130.

Kinda like using a 150 MPH speedo on a 1.8 914. Just cause the gage is on there, does not mean the car can go that fast.

Zach

YES YES YES! My brother-in-law blew two tanks up on compressors. On one, the relief valve stuck closed and overpressurized the tank. On the other, accumulated water in the tank rusted a weld. In both cases he was lucky enough to avoid injury but the overpressure incident blew the entire end cap off the tank and took out a rear quarter panel on his car and knocked his garage door frame off the sill plate. Had he been in the way, it would have been a very serious injury and worse.

Lesson here? Don't f**k with the relief valve and drain your tank regularly. Good luck with your new compressor and stay safe.

Tom

Find a local compressor shop and by a fresh relief valve to put in there. Then keep your eyes open for another $30 compressor... daisy chain them together with a T-hose fitting and you'll be styling with double the capacity to make you airtools un-new in no time.

I disagree with the girly men above. I say epoxy the relief valve and crank that baby up and let's see what lets go first!
Film it for youtube.

New compressors come with a warning to "drain the tank after EACH use" because of rusting issues and the potential for the tank to "explode". Of course the first thing that goes bad on compressors is the dang drain plug. It rusts, then strips or snaps. Best to drain every time then leave it open.

I opened what, as far as I could tell was the drain and nothing came out when I tipped it on end.

Thanks for the responses above, it's reasonably to assume the gauge goes higher than operating pressure, but I was just wondering about wear to the relief. I guess I've proved it works by deafening myself.

Just out of curiosity why should I replace the water trap?

Nice deal.

That's a rather interesting setup; it looks like Sears was using Fairchild regulators back then. They are really nice even today.

I too wouldn't mess with the relief.

I've put uploading the video into my will, we'll see what happens.

good deal. Def don't test the limits though, like everyone else said.

Very nice, I have a small pancake compressor that is in storage while I am overseas. Question for those in the know; SCUBA tanks and fire extinguishers require hydrostatic testing about every year to 5 years. Does anyone know if compressor tanks have the same requirements or, because of the relief valve, they don't fall under that safety standard.