Question How can i buy a RIX SA compressor now?

[KAL0220]

some of my friends said rix sa compressor perform well, but i can't find any of them on amazon or ebay

 

[iain/hsm]

My SA-3 (Im the 3rd owner) started out life in a small rural fire department in Southern Oregon. Its a late serial number, do you have any speculation on how it was purchased?

The SA-3 is pretty much exempt as it was never really a military compressor.
Further It shares only two items with its bigger brother the SA-6 namely the air intake filter and only one of the two condensate separators. All of the other component items are specific to the SA-3 and cannot be used on the SA-6. How it was originally purchased and who the original supplier and owner/end user are would be available from the serial number. But as was originally a commercial item it's of little concern.

The current military versions similar to the SA-3 are again completely different and share no components with the commercial SA-3 they are 4 stage 6000psi and are in current production used within the airframe of the F/A-18 Hornet air frames A to F and the P-8A Poseidon among others

By contrast the SA-6 is a different kettle of fish by way of example I built a number of filling compressor for the RAF and NATO for the sidewinder missile over the last 30 years and these have used pretty much a SA-6 bare block with some modification to suit the specific application. Although I don't think any of the missiles were ever used in anger the anodising alone was a work of art.
In the scope of supply it was pretty much a platform for two missiles and with connections components together with a capability to manufacture liquid air and was used for the missile in one of its many target seeking and locking applications. When the contract expired a number of these compressors ended up on government liquidation sites and together with the platform and liquid generator were sold to the government scrap dealers on condition that they would be scraped. You can guess the rest.

The current SA if you have to call them with that designate would be nearer to a SA-2 and a SA-4
used for authentic ambient air sampling when atmospheric air is compressed and the compounds within the air samples are analysed in the parts per billion range and to the parts per quad trillion range.

Scuba diving applications would need a whole new chapter heading all of it's own and although all the original parts to make either the SA-3 or the 6 are still stock I guess just no real interest or market share for a new design reliable maintainable and serviceable scuba compressor.