Drip Coolant system

[jimglass]

Several years ago I ran a search on how to make a spray mister coolant system since they cost over $80 to buy. Someone suggested a drip coolant system. From the description I figured out how to make one. They consist of a small pressurized tank and two air nozzles. One for coolant and another for air. The object is to drip coolant then propel the coolant with a stream of air to the tool. This weekend I made a second Drip coolant system for my home built CNC mill.

Below is my air tank made of 2" PVC pipe. The bottom end is capped and the top is fitted with a clean out plug. The plug is removed to refill the tank with coolant. The plug and the cap are both tapped 1/8 NPT. The top of the tank has an air regulator set to 5 or 10 PSI. The air forces coolant out the bottom of the tank to the coolant nozzle. At the top of the regulator is a "T" where shop air pressure goes to the second nozzle. Note the solenoid valve to the left of the regulator.



I could have used petcock valves or flow control valves the set the amount of air and the amount of coolant flow. Since I do everything on the cheap these days I made my own flow control and incorporated it in a piece of brass that also holds the two nozzles and a place to mount the air line fittings.


Below is the coolant system working. The top nozzle is set to drip a small amount of coolant. The lower nozzle is a stream of air that propels the droplets of coolant to the tool.


All coolant and no air


There are a number of advantages to this type of coolant system over the spray mister system. First, all I needed to buy was some pipe fittings. The regulator, brass air line fittings and copper tubing was on hand. Second, the drip coolant system uses far less compressed air. Third the solenoid valve will be controlled by the CNC program with the M07, M08 and M09 codes where the coolant can be turned ON and OFF as needed saving both compressed air and coolant. Finally the drip coolant system does not atomize the coolant into a cloud of fog that can fill and entire shop with the cloud. About 80% of the coolant is delivered to the tool and very little to the air.

I can run production almost all day on a quart of coolant. Such a small amount of coolant is used the chips absorb most of the coolant so there is no need to have a coolant recovery system.

How the CNC mill was made:
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v3...20%20Mill%203/

Hope this was of interest,
Jim

[Mcgyver]

Jim, interesting, thanks for posting it. I'm in the process of making a system with pressurized coolant and air, mainly to experiment with controlling the speed of the droplets; the idea being to lay they down on a grinding wheel by approximating the surface speed. Big challenge with mist systems is fog which you've avoided.

One thing that strikes me though is that PVC is NOT something to make any pressure vessel out of. If/when it lets go it tends to shatter sending shards flying. make it out of ABS. An old propane bottle is what i'm going to use.

edit; oh, i see, its regulate down to 10 psi before the tank...probably ok, but in general PVC isn't used for pressure stuff because of how it shatters

[jimglass]

The other drip system I made was all steel.

I'm aware of the hazards of PVC pipe and compressed air. However, in this application there is only 5 or 10 PSI of air in the PVC pipe. I'm wondering how WD40 may affect the PVC pipe.

Jim

[coolantman]

Jimglass,

Sounds like you really are an innovator. Just by looking at your pictures, seems like there are several advantages to your system, not to mention you probabaly use less coolant.

Have you thought about putting it on the market?

Nice Work!!

-Coolantman

EnviroServe Chemicals, Inc.
www.enviroservechemicals.com

[riche543]

Nice Setup,
Do you think this small air compressor would deliver enough to run this setup, ?
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Thanks
Riche

[jimglass]

I think it would. It takes a very small amount of air if set up correctly.
Jim

[riche543]

Thanks Jim.


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[osphoto]

I could really use a drip method for what I do. I need little fluid.

I'd spend $80 for a drip system. I'll start looking for one.

[riche543]

Osphoto for $80 you could surly build something , the feedback has been great on this topic , I'm happy with my air at the moment but would like to apply the odd drop of coolant now & again for tool life & finished edge.


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[osphoto]

I can build lots of things. I can spend time building the tools I need to build the one thing I WANT to build. This holds true for many things.

However, if I can purchase the tool, install it, works, I can get back to my quality build time. Sure, I can make (some) tools, but if I can purchase them already made, that would be my choice when I can afford to make that purchase. Money vs time.