How is Compressed Air Used in Vehicle Body Painting

Vehicle body paint Refrigerant dryer Air compressors Air filter

October 10, 2017

Requirements for compressed air for a great vehicle body paint job?

Contaminants in compressed air

An illustration about spray paint in the chicago pneumatic expert corner

The compressed air produced by the compressor, contains the same substances as the ambient air. This means, among other things, that the water vapor contained in the air, is compressed and the compressed air therefore has a high humidity. Compressed air from an oil injected screw compressor also contains small oil residues from the compressor lubrication system. The average value, for screw compressors oil content, is about 3ppm. When the compressed air is to be used for eg body painting, there is a higher demand for air quality, than in many other applications. The requirements referred to above apply in particular to what is accepted in terms of contaminants such as water, particles and oil.

Removing contaminants for vehicle body painting

We recommend that the humidity is always to be reduced by drying. This is easiest and cheapest done with a refrigerant dryer that gives a pressure dew point of about 3 degrees Celsius. We also recommend installing particle filters, to reduce the amount of particles that come into the compressed air. In addition to particle filters you should also install an oil separating filter, that removes the residual amount of oil, that always comes with compressed air when you have an oil injected screw compressor. If you want to be absolutely sure, that no oil will be included in the compressed air, you can complete the filters above with an activated carbon filter. When supplementing other filters with an activated carbon filter, one achieves a quality called "technical oil-free" compressed air.

Please contact us directly if you have questions or need for compressed air that will be used for all types of paint jobs, and we will help you, improve your existing installation or give recommendations for a new installation.

Products to consider for vehicle body painting

Chicago Pneumatic Refrigerant Dryer CPX 60

Refrigerated dryers - CPX series

Chicago Pneumatic Refrigerated dryers from 350 to 84.000 l/min reliably provide dry compressed air and dewpoint up to +3С. Read more

Chicago Pneumatic USA - Filter Group June 2015

Line filters

Atmospheric air contains impurities like: dust, hydrocarbons and water in form of humidity, which once sucked by the compressor is compressed and delivered to the line together with eventual oily particles. See how our filters take care of this issue!