after a ton of research on here and reading about the importance of clean dry, i am going with an aftercooler (Derale 15300) with a auto water seperator before the tank inlet, then into a Harbor Freight Refrigerated air dyer, then a desiccant bead filter, then into a motor guard filter right before plasma inlet.
question is what type of filters and models do i need for the desiccant bead,motor gaurd, and water seperator??
can the water seperator just be a cheap auto drain off amazon?
Well, Motor Guard is the brand of the actual filter so you named that already.
As for desiccant, there are various sizes in which people will chime in. If you have sufficient air volume at your disposal, then you won’t have to worry about going “too big”, but something to consider if you’re in the realm of say 8cfm or less.
Depending on where you live, will determine how much filtering you may need. Not to mention budget/efficiency.
I’ve seen some really nice copper tube setups with plenty of drops, and those users have really dry air with minimal filtering.
I’m in Central CA, so for me the HF refrigerated air dryer is enough. But I do have a desiccant filter after as well as a motor guard filter (as it’ll keep crud from my desiccant dryer out).
but i dont know what model of motor Guard. i see the model i believe m-45 but also seen M-60 and just curious what i need, im in Lower Alabama in Extreme Humidity so i need a good setup,
do i need a regular water seperator before the tank inlet like a cheap single stage or just a $50 doller auto drain water sep. will do?
Most of the motor guard filters are basically the same, except for the inlet/outlet size. They use the same filter, but have larger or smaller inlet/outlet threaded ports for different sizes of air lines.
FWIW I use a passive radiator that I put in between my pump and the tank and it attaches to the protective cage of the belt drive. I put a water separater in line as well and it has never captured water. I have an auto drain on the tank and when it goes off there is no moisture from the tank. I do powder coating and the sand blast cabinet uses are at way higher capacity than the plasma table with two 60 gallon tanks spread across my air system and I never get moisture at the blast cabinet. I went with the radiator just because it uses no additional maintenance or service other than blowing a little dust that has settled on the fins over time. I used softer copper tubing to go in between the connetions and fittings along with some compression adapters.