An industrial component manufacturer had a system of five compressors located in an interconnected system spread between two buildings. The system pressure of the system was constantly running near 120 psi because of some critical high-pressure applications. Most of the production machinery was rated at 90 psi pressure.
The facility manager was sure something could be done and called in a compressed air professional to study the system. The expert did a thorough machine-by-machine inspection and found only two applications required the higher-than-normal pressure.
Inside the machine, he discovered, were undersized components. A filter and regulator assembly, rated for only 25 cfm, was passing higher than rated flows during short duration peak demands inside the machine. This overloaded ¼-in. regulator had excessive pressure drop during these peaks (Figure 1), causing the machine to go down if the compressors weren’t set to deliver 120 psi compressed air.
The expert worked with the manufacturer to find a suitable precision ½-in. regulator for the job, once installed the compressor discharge pressure was turned down to 100 psi. At this level the air compressors consumed about 10% less energy, and as a secondary benefit the plant consumed about 5% less flow due to the lower pressure. Total savings in resizing the regulator $28,000, considerably more than the cost of the correctly sized components.
