Warning

 

Close
Confirm Action

Are you sure you wish to do this?

Cancel Confirm
AR15.COM
10/21/2015 10:10:36 PM EDT
At work we have been randomly getting small fisheyes in our paint work. It's really been frustrating since it doesn't happen often enough to nail down a cause. Despite all our efforts, it still happens. On Tuesday we had a rep out from the local air compressor place. His thoughts were that we are having small amounts of oil entering our air system. The solution offered was to install a refrigerated air dryer  between our compressor and the filter setup we already have.

Anybody have any other ideas as to the cause? I would really like to know for sure before we drop a few K on a dryer unit.

Compressor is similar to this


The filter we have is like this
10/21/2015 10:15:49 PM EDT
[#1]
Rings wear, oil gets by.  Fact of life.
10/21/2015 10:19:56 PM EDT
[#2]
If it was ring wear, you would think that it would bypass oil constantly. We may go days or weeks without issue.
10/21/2015 10:20:42 PM EDT
[#3]
You could also get some filters that go on the air fitting at the gun.

Maybe install an oil trap before the filter.
10/21/2015 10:23:25 PM EDT
[#4]
Fish eyes are usually caused by oil, he's right on that point.  A refrig dryer will help remove some of the liquid oil, but only as a byproduct of removing the water.

I'm not familiar with that CamAir system, but it appears to be an inline desiccant filter dryer - again, not an oil removal device unless it has oil coalescing filters in the package.  If oil is reaching your paint, you should assume that the desiccant is saturated and needs to be replaced.  Since you already have a desiccant dryer of sorts, adding a refrig dryer is not a good solution.    

When was the last time the inline filters were changed?  Most should be changed annually.

I'd take a look at the compressors first, and determine if they've lost oil.  After that, I'd replace all the inline filters and desiccant, and check all the drains.  There should be drains on any tanks or inline filters.

I'm in GA, but I can point you towards a competent compressor shop in your area - just PM me.
10/21/2015 10:27:16 PM EDT
[#5]
Oil/water seperator, way cheaper than a dryer.  I don't think humidity is your issue.  I have one about the size of a soda can mounted at the highest point of our system.  Also don't have QDs at low points, always 5" above the low point.
10/21/2015 10:27:41 PM EDT
[#6]
Quote History
Quoted:
You could also get some filters that go on the air fitting at the gun.

Maybe install an oil trap before the filter.
View Quote


Those little filters that mount near the gun are just small desiccant packs. I have a big desiccant filter on the wall. One of the little filters is supposed to filter oil down to 0.01 micron. I have never seen anything the slightest bit oily come out of that filter.
10/21/2015 10:32:47 PM EDT
[#7]
I did a bunch of research into the cause of fisheye when I was having them show up on my Marvin wood windows despite my meticulous wood prep.

Two things I came across were silicone contamination and poor environmental control.  The issue I encountered due to poor glazing installation and QC from the factory was silicone contamination.  A little goes a long way and it was everywhere. When I sanded the windows, it spread the unseen smears all throughout the wood pores and drove me batshit.

Is there any chance of prep work being done on something that had silicone on it and the dust contaminated your new substrates to be finished?

The second was a worker at a cabinet shop would take a break, eat some chips snack that had grease on his hands and then contaminated the surfaces to be painted after not washing his hands.

The random nature of your fisheye problems leads me to believe it's a localized environmental issue. If it was your equipment, you'd see it more regularly.  Has anything with silicone been used in the shop?  That shit is the devil.

Good luck, but I'd do a lot more digging into the root cause before dumping the scratch on upgrading the equipment.
10/21/2015 10:36:12 PM EDT
[#8]
Quote History
Quoted:
I did a bunch of research into the cause of fisheye when I was having them show up on my Marvin wood windows despite my meticulous wood prep.

Two things I came across were silicone contamination and poor environmental control.  The issue I encountered due to poor glazing installation and QC from the factory was silicone contamination.  A little goes a long way and it was everywhere. When I sanded the windows, it spread the unseen smears all throughout the wood pores and drove me batshit.

Is there any chance of prep work being done on something that had silicone on it and the dust contaminated your new substrates to be finished?

The second was a worker at a cabinet shop would take a break, eat some chips snack that had grease on his hands and then contaminated the surfaces to be painted after not washing his hands.

The random nature of your fisheye problems leads me to believe it's a localized environmental issue. If it was your equipment, you'd see it more regularly.  Has anything with silicone been used in the shop?  That shit is the devil.

Good luck, but I'd do a lot more digging into the root cause before dumping the scratch on upgrading the equipment.
View Quote


This is exactly what I thought except I didn't know about the silicone. With it being random, I would look to the prep.

What city are you in?
10/21/2015 10:43:14 PM EDT
[#9]
When I get fish eyes its usually water contamination in the tank. It passes through as rusty water. Even with a canister filter and a small filter at the gun I had some the other day when painting. I know my canister filte ris old and the tank needs emptied out.  I tried to do a small job and had some fish eyes.
They werent really bad but I know thats what it is mines an oiless compressor.
10/21/2015 10:47:53 PM EDT
[#10]
kinda need more info...I'll expound... I'm a former bodyman/painter, now I work for a jobber selling stuff to shops. I recently had a shop start having issues with tiny fisheyes. It was random and it only happened in the sealer (solvent) never the color (waterbase) or clear (solvent)...My boss went to take a look and assumed it was oil from the compressor as well. We went through their filtration system, replaced hoses etc. didn't find a solution. The next step was a new filtration system. The painter figured it out accidentally by running out of the disposable stirrers he used for the sealer and color. The solvents in the sealer were breaking the stirrers down, the larger amounts of sealer would get stirred more and cause issues. It might be a good idea to take a step back and look at your process and try to figure out if there is anything that could cause your issues.
10/21/2015 10:50:15 PM EDT
[#11]
Quote History
Quoted:


This is exactly what I thought except I didn't know about the silicone. With it being random, I would look to the prep.



What city are you in?
View Quote View All Quotes
View All Quotes
Quote History
Quoted:
Quoted:
I did a bunch of research into the cause of fisheye when I was having them show up on my Marvin wood windows despite my meticulous wood prep.

Two things I came across were silicone contamination and poor environmental control.  The issue I encountered due to poor glazing installation and QC from the factory was silicone contamination.  A little goes a long way and it was everywhere. When I sanded the windows, it spread the unseen smears all throughout the wood pores and drove me batshit.

Is there any chance of prep work being done on something that had silicone on it and the dust contaminated your new substrates to be finished?

The second was a worker at a cabinet shop would take a break, eat some chips snack that had grease on his hands and then contaminated the surfaces to be painted after not washing his hands.

The random nature of your fisheye problems leads me to believe it's a localized environmental issue. If it was your equipment, you'd see it more regularly.  Has anything with silicone been used in the shop?  That shit is the devil.

Good luck, but I'd do a lot more digging into the root cause before dumping the scratch on upgrading the equipment.


This is exactly what I thought except I didn't know about the silicone. With it being random, I would look to the prep.



What city are you in?


I can't stand silicone. It's in so many cleaners and polishes, it reads havoc trying to refinish old wood that has been lived with. Tire dressings and the like are loaded with it. One of my buddies has a body shop and goes nuts about anything in his shop that he knows has been treated.

My cousin also has a cabinet shop and they had to start declining work on refinishing cabinets and furniture due to the silicone issues.

10/21/2015 10:51:14 PM EDT
[#12]
Do you do solvent wipe downs?  I swear the rags are contaminated nowadays.  I have better luck using a
degreaser wash down and leaving the solvent / tack rags out.
10/21/2015 10:59:10 PM EDT
[#13]
If there is a can of silicone anywhere in the shop, throw it in the dumpster. Also as mentioned above,tack cloths can be the culprit.
10/21/2015 11:06:12 PM EDT
[#14]
Quote History
Quoted:


This is exactly what I thought except I didn't know about the silicone. With it being random, I would look to the prep.

What city are you in?
View Quote View All Quotes
View All Quotes
Quote History
Quoted:
Quoted:
I did a bunch of research into the cause of fisheye when I was having them show up on my Marvin wood windows despite my meticulous wood prep.

Two things I came across were silicone contamination and poor environmental control.  The issue I encountered due to poor glazing installation and QC from the factory was silicone contamination.  A little goes a long way and it was everywhere. When I sanded the windows, it spread the unseen smears all throughout the wood pores and drove me batshit.

Is there any chance of prep work being done on something that had silicone on it and the dust contaminated your new substrates to be finished?

The second was a worker at a cabinet shop would take a break, eat some chips snack that had grease on his hands and then contaminated the surfaces to be painted after not washing his hands.

The random nature of your fisheye problems leads me to believe it's a localized environmental issue. If it was your equipment, you'd see it more regularly.  Has anything with silicone been used in the shop?  That shit is the devil.

Good luck, but I'd do a lot more digging into the root cause before dumping the scratch on upgrading the equipment.


This is exactly what I thought except I didn't know about the silicone. With it being random, I would look to the prep.

What city are you in?


I'm north of Ft.Worth over by TMS.

We have a whole list of common chemicals that are not allowed in the building. No WD-40, LPS-3, Kroil, or Varsol. Even popular aviation window cleaners are kept away. If I even think that a neighbor has bought a bottle of Amorall I'll beat his ass. Even when things have just been cleaned with a quality wax and grease remover we have had issues.

I feel that if we had this problem every day that I could solve it just by process of elimination. As it is now, how do I know if what I did differently fixed things or am I just not having issues that day?
10/21/2015 11:15:45 PM EDT
[#15]
Did somebody borrow an air hose?  Maybe hooked it to a lubricated line?