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Monday, October 07, 2019
10 Benefits Of Air Powered Tools
Gear Hungry: If you're a savvy manufacturer, you might have considered investing in some air powered tools. Here are all the benefits of air powered tools.
This article makes a pretty good case for air-powered tools. I first encountered air-powered tools working in a mechanic shop where the central compressed air system was used for inflating tires and all of the handheld power tools and I certainly don’t disagree with any of their points. However, the big downside from tools that get plugged in is the power cable wrangling. Those cables are small enough, but accidently cutting your cable is a running joke in construction. Air-powered tool hoses are even thicker and more annoying. Doing a repetitive task in one location certainly lends itself to the efficiency of air-power, but having to constantly move around the shop, whether it be to screw in lug nuts or staple a flat, the thick power hose gets in the way. This definitely isn’t a drawback that should discount air tools, but shouldn’t be forgotten when purchasing tools for your shop.
Pneumatic tools are a game changer in scenic construction, especially at Carnegie Mellon. We have the facilities in our scene shop for air hoses to come from multiple sides of the room and even in the theatres. In my personal experience with power tools, specifically battery powered reciprocating saws, difficult tasks can kill a battery in a means of minutes. To be fair, cutting through a tire is probably not what that battery was meant to handle. Even corded power tools are more environmentally unfriendly compared to air powered tools. This article does a good job at stating their claim followed by easy bullet point esque paragraphs to support their claim. I really enjoy how they even note that pneumatics are less likely to be stolen as they require extra tools such as an air compressor to use. That was not even a factor I had considered. I do not agree completely with their point on ‘lightweight’. If you’re holding some of the big boy staplers for a long time, your arm starts to hurt. Some of the smaller tools, I can see how they would be lighter, but the article should not have generalized them to all be lighter.
Pneumatic tools certainly play an important role in manufacturing and construction but still have their pros and cons. Using air as the working fluid powering these tools does have some significant advantages over other sources as the article points out, specifically being more lightweight (although it is worth noting this is basically counted twice on the list in comfort and lightweight). Additionally, we can have the added advantage of having a relatively portable yet high power supply by charging a tank and then moving it to where we are working. At the same time, though, there is a reason we switched to using battery operated tools from their 120V counterparts, even if that meant sacrificing power: cords get in the way. As Owen points out, there seems to be a running issue with cable wrangling and puncturing cables and there also becomes the issue of sharing the same supply pressure. Even for Rinaldo, we found that either we were blowing through the thin 1/8" paneling or we weren't sinking staples into our framing depending on where the supply pressure was set. Pneumatics aren't going anywhere because of the points listed out here, but it is worth noting where they fall short.
I am not really used to using pneumatic tools. At my high school, we always had battery powered tools for every application. We did not have a scene shop with any compressed air access, so we were forced to build the set on stage with battery operated power tools. Coming to CMU was enlightening. I used a pneumatic stapler in the prop shop to help with my upholstery stagecraft project. This ensured that the staples would not pull out easily and that we could lay down many staples in a short amount of time. Air tools save a ton of time because they have so much force, and they are so interchangeable. It does become an issue, however, when you do not have a central pressurized air system like CMU does. It is not practical to carry around air compressors in order to use pneumatic tools on stage. They make a ton of noise and are very heavy depending on the size of the tank. Pneumatic tools definitely have a lot of pros, but there are still cons that make them difficult for lower scale productions to use.
The only pneumatic tools that I've used extensively at this point are staple guns in my high school's scene shop, which are very satisfying to use. Everything else, from the screw guns to the jigsaws to the table saws to the chop saws, were all electrically powered, by cable or by battery. This article really makes a case for air-powered tools. Most desirable for me is its light weight and the safety that comes with not having electrics in damp or flammable areas. Both air-powered and electrically powered tools have their advantages and disadvantages, however, as many people have said before me, cable and hose wrangling is a problem for both. Hoses are often thicker than cables and less flexible because they have no wire within, regardless, having cable trailing from tools is always difficult to manage. Both are with pros and with cons, and shops will decide what their trade-offs should be.
5 comments:
This article makes a pretty good case for air-powered tools. I first encountered air-powered tools working in a mechanic shop where the central compressed air system was used for inflating tires and all of the handheld power tools and I certainly don’t disagree with any of their points. However, the big downside from tools that get plugged in is the power cable wrangling. Those cables are small enough, but accidently cutting your cable is a running joke in construction. Air-powered tool hoses are even thicker and more annoying. Doing a repetitive task in one location certainly lends itself to the efficiency of air-power, but having to constantly move around the shop, whether it be to screw in lug nuts or staple a flat, the thick power hose gets in the way. This definitely isn’t a drawback that should discount air tools, but shouldn’t be forgotten when purchasing tools for your shop.
Pneumatic tools are a game changer in scenic construction, especially at Carnegie Mellon. We have the facilities in our scene shop for air hoses to come from multiple sides of the room and even in the theatres. In my personal experience with power tools, specifically battery powered reciprocating saws, difficult tasks can kill a battery in a means of minutes. To be fair, cutting through a tire is probably not what that battery was meant to handle. Even corded power tools are more environmentally unfriendly compared to air powered tools. This article does a good job at stating their claim followed by easy bullet point esque paragraphs to support their claim. I really enjoy how they even note that pneumatics are less likely to be stolen as they require extra tools such as an air compressor to use. That was not even a factor I had considered. I do not agree completely with their point on ‘lightweight’. If you’re holding some of the big boy staplers for a long time, your arm starts to hurt. Some of the smaller tools, I can see how they would be lighter, but the article should not have generalized them to all be lighter.
Pneumatic tools certainly play an important role in manufacturing and construction but still have their pros and cons. Using air as the working fluid powering these tools does have some significant advantages over other sources as the article points out, specifically being more lightweight (although it is worth noting this is basically counted twice on the list in comfort and lightweight). Additionally, we can have the added advantage of having a relatively portable yet high power supply by charging a tank and then moving it to where we are working. At the same time, though, there is a reason we switched to using battery operated tools from their 120V counterparts, even if that meant sacrificing power: cords get in the way. As Owen points out, there seems to be a running issue with cable wrangling and puncturing cables and there also becomes the issue of sharing the same supply pressure. Even for Rinaldo, we found that either we were blowing through the thin 1/8" paneling or we weren't sinking staples into our framing depending on where the supply pressure was set. Pneumatics aren't going anywhere because of the points listed out here, but it is worth noting where they fall short.
I am not really used to using pneumatic tools. At my high school, we always had battery powered tools for every application. We did not have a scene shop with any compressed air access, so we were forced to build the set on stage with battery operated power tools. Coming to CMU was enlightening. I used a pneumatic stapler in the prop shop to help with my upholstery stagecraft project. This ensured that the staples would not pull out easily and that we could lay down many staples in a short amount of time. Air tools save a ton of time because they have so much force, and they are so interchangeable. It does become an issue, however, when you do not have a central pressurized air system like CMU does. It is not practical to carry around air compressors in order to use pneumatic tools on stage. They make a ton of noise and are very heavy depending on the size of the tank. Pneumatic tools definitely have a lot of pros, but there are still cons that make them difficult for lower scale productions to use.
The only pneumatic tools that I've used extensively at this point are staple guns in my high school's scene shop, which are very satisfying to use. Everything else, from the screw guns to the jigsaws to the table saws to the chop saws, were all electrically powered, by cable or by battery. This article really makes a case for air-powered tools. Most desirable for me is its light weight and the safety that comes with not having electrics in damp or flammable areas. Both air-powered and electrically powered tools have their advantages and disadvantages, however, as many people have said before me, cable and hose wrangling is a problem for both. Hoses are often thicker than cables and less flexible because they have no wire within, regardless, having cable trailing from tools is always difficult to manage. Both are with pros and with cons, and shops will decide what their trade-offs should be.
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