ChrisA
Contributor
Just thought I's share this...
I got my tank filled the other day and one of the guys at the shop said. "you want to see the compessor?" Having not much to do, I said "yes."
Well guess what? The shop has a single stage, one piston compreesor. It was salvaged off an old submarine in the early 1950's and has been in service at the shop for over 50 years now. It looks a lot like those pistons on the sides of steam locamotives built in the 1800's. The crank shaft is connected to a 5 foot iron flywheel and turns rather slowly. You can follow the rotation by eye, maybe 100rpm. The whole thing is maybe 12 or 15 feet long and solid cast iron. It does 3300psi and backs up maybe 24 fill whips. There is no way on Earth anyone could afford to build something like that today. It has a nice sound, not the whine of a modern multi-stage compressor, this piston moves at about two strokes per second,. Itlooks like about an 18 inch stroke and a 6" bore.
I don't know much about WWII vintage subs but I guess they stored air at 3000PSI in big tanks and likely used a lot of air, given the size of the crews
Has anyone else seen something like this in use? Is this unique.
I got my tank filled the other day and one of the guys at the shop said. "you want to see the compessor?" Having not much to do, I said "yes."
Well guess what? The shop has a single stage, one piston compreesor. It was salvaged off an old submarine in the early 1950's and has been in service at the shop for over 50 years now. It looks a lot like those pistons on the sides of steam locamotives built in the 1800's. The crank shaft is connected to a 5 foot iron flywheel and turns rather slowly. You can follow the rotation by eye, maybe 100rpm. The whole thing is maybe 12 or 15 feet long and solid cast iron. It does 3300psi and backs up maybe 24 fill whips. There is no way on Earth anyone could afford to build something like that today. It has a nice sound, not the whine of a modern multi-stage compressor, this piston moves at about two strokes per second,. Itlooks like about an 18 inch stroke and a 6" bore.
I don't know much about WWII vintage subs but I guess they stored air at 3000PSI in big tanks and likely used a lot of air, given the size of the crews
Has anyone else seen something like this in use? Is this unique.
