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I'm giving a lot of thought to an air compressor for tools and airing up the tires on my trucks. The 12v/24v air compressors work, but they take forever when airing up and i dont think they are strong enough to support an impact gun. Those which are seem to cost over $1200.

Other options are the gas powered versions which I've found several different price ranges, or adding a pulley driven system to my Ford F250.

Has anyone gone through this exercise before? Can someone recommend a decent model gas powered air compressor? The unit will see action maybe 2 or 3 times a month.

Just bought a 10lb CO2 tank and regulator, total cost: $150.
Looked up the amount of work it can do (inflate tires quickly, run impact wrench etc..) on "Power Tank" and "The Source" web sites. It should do what ever I need it for, and run the kegorator to boot.!
Takes up little room and doesn't use up battery. Was highly reccomended to me by other Pinz and 4x4 owners. Lots of +'s and -'s to CO2 vs air vs nitrogen, so
we'll see how it works.

Where do you fill the tank when it empties and how much is it to fill?

Welding supply, fire extiquisher refill places, industrial gas places, etc..
Around here cost is $18.00/10lb. Depending on tire size, should fill
20-30, 33" tires. Best to gauge remaining co2 level by weight, since pressure won't drop until last minute. As long as it has liquid co2 in it, even a drop, it will maintain pressure (around 1500 psi.). My current kegorator 2.5 lb bottle lasts a year or so running cibntinuously two kegs (probably need to drink more beer).

I wonder if that would work for an impact wrench as well

Impact wrench:
1. use large diameter air hose to co2 tank.
2. 10lb co2 should last 20 min using 20second bursts fo wrench.
...according to their web site.

Have you looked at the largest viair package? $450 for the pump and tank. Difference is mobility I guess.

I used to carry a "blue tongue" (12 volt compressor) in my Pinny, but airing-up 6 tyres from 10+ psi took for ever! .... Everybody else on the trip was either gone or twiddling their fingers by the time I had all my tyres up to road pressure.
I was always on the look-out for a better alternative and looked at engine driven compressors's, very large 12 volt compressors (I think my mate in NSW got his from a military aircraft) etc, but eventually settled for a 5 hp petrol driven compressor. It is relatively compact and has a pancake style tank.....It's got a fairly small footprint, so it doesn't take up a lot of room in the back but it is great!
On trips nearly everbody uses it and I also carry a few air tools, including a rattle gun which speeds up tyre changes no end.
Definitely one of my better buys!

Would you be able to provide model and make, or any info on that item. I'm very interested in it, maybe I can locate one on my base.





V/R David

I'II take a few pics of the compressor and post ASAP.
Even though I'm in Australia and the particular Company that sold the compressors has gone broke I'm sure you'll be able to find a similar item locally, as it was most likely "sourced" from a Chinese compressor manufacturer's generic lineup.

I used a Powertank to run air tools and it worked great--this was for an air drill to assemble a shed. One 10 lb fill was all that was needed to accomplish this task--and that was a lot of drilling! I can't say what the usage would be for an air wrench, but I suspect it would be more. That being said, the CO2 tank has worked great for filling tires. A refill here is about $15 for 10 lbs. The only other expense is periodic hydro-testing, but that is about $20 every 5 years.

Cheers,
Greg

you might want to check out Viair air compressors they make 24v ones cost about 350$. i have looked into them but i don't have one yet. just made a front winch bumper that is also a air tank for mine so when i do get one i'll be ready. there are a few differant models from ones that use tanks to portable tankless.

Paul Gudmundson wrote:you might want to check out Viair air compressors they make 24v ones cost about 350$. i have looked into them but i don't have one yet. just made a front winch bumper that is also a air tank for mine so when i do get one i'll be ready. there are a few differant models from ones that use tanks to portable tankless.

I am looking at a Viair 325C-24v. The 450C-24v is $100 more. Is the 325C sufficient? My tires are only 31".

I use a Viair 450 and still went to the power tank. The power tanks run impact wrenches just fine. My 712 has a Thomas compressor and tank(waste unless you are running tools). Several guys run even the cheap harbor freight units and have decent results with them. It is all a matter of time. If it takes an extra 5 minutes to fill the tires, is it really that big of a deal? When it comes to the compressors it is more a matter of how much do you want to spend. More money would equate to more reliability and since using them to just air up the pinz tires it is not that big of a deal. Life expectancy of even the harbor freight units will be several years.

Last weekend we found an old upside down, nearly submerged, wrecked boat in the Snohomish river sloughs (at
least that's my story, and I'm sticking to it!). Grabbed the 5lb co2 tank, air angle grinder and impact wrench and went back to harvest the bronze 12 inch prop. Was able to cut the shaft and pull the prop. Judging by weight, used about 3/4 the 5lb tank for the job. Spent about 5 minutes or so on the angle grinder and some more on the wrench. Was very surprised how long it lasted. Multi use air source!