addicted to power

[Jroettger]

Yesterday I came into my studio and when I flicked on my Lindsay foot controlled unit discovered the air compressor was dead! I have a six gallon Silentaire compressor as I work in my jewelry store and can't have the racket of an inexpensive compressor. It's five years old now. So I got out the manual and referring to the wiring diagram proceeded to follow the power into the machine. At a place called the terminal box I found a completely fried hot wire connection. I cut of the burned end off and solder spliced on an extension wire and reattached the screw down connector. It fired back up thankfully.
I realized though that there was no way I wanted to engrave without the power. I had a silver cup to engrave with about 20 letters and realized just how much more work hand pushing would have been at that point in time. I spent 20 years hand pushing but couldn't imagine trying to make money doing it that way anymore. It was like being in the lawn care business and having your power mower go out when you have a 4 acre yard to mow and nothing but a non motorized push mower to do it with. I called the Silentaire manufacturer but they had no explanation other than maybe a weak connection to begin with.

[Roger Bleile]

I understand where you are coming from. When I engraved with a Gravermeister I still did a lot of hand pushed detail. Since I got my Lindsay PC I have no use for anything else.

CRB

[jack]

A Linsay classic PC will do that to a engraver every time:[1]: Jack

[Dave London]

How about a CO2 back up source, Steve has regulators for the paintball cylinders and welding supply stores carry several sizes of CO2 at reasonable fees, Just my 2cents Dave

[Jroettger]

My foot controlled unit seems to require quite a large volume of air to maintain power. The 6 gallon tank goes on frequently (about every 30 minutes) during use to maintain tank pressure. CO2 would probably not be practical for the foot control unit. I would probably run out and get a $125 rackety compressor in a pinch and use that as back up.

[SVD]

I get the standard 8 - 10 hrs run time on a 20oz CO2 tank with my foot controlled Classic. I don't even have the hook up to run it off of my compressor