roots blower as an air mover??

Discussion on general flowbench design
ivanhoew
Posts: 954
Joined: Wed Feb 16, 2011 5:12 am
Location: oxford ,england .

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by ivanhoew »

pffft ,yes ,and we british get naff all !! :cry:

ps..... fuel here now 1.45/litre...$10.53a gallon
medusa assembled..first drive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKMvQQm7Cn4&t=5s
Beetle
Posts: 18
Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2012 9:53 pm

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by Beetle »

OK BOYS........I DID A MOCK UP TEST TODAY AT THE SHOP WHILE i HADE SOME FREE TIME...............AS YOU GUYS SAID, THE MOTOR DID NOT HAVE ENOUGH POWER TO SPIN THE BLOWER. I WAS KIND OF HOPING IT WOULD. LOOKS LIKE IM GOING TO GO THE VACUUM CLEANER MOTOR ROUTE. I HAVE 2 INDUSTRIAL CARPET CLEANER MOTORS AND AT LEAST ONE MORE NORMAL VACUUM CLEANER MOTOR. THANKS FOR ALL THE INPUT!! I WILL KEEP YOU ALL POSTED ON MY PROGRESS.
1960FL
Posts: 1339
Joined: Fri Jan 08, 2010 10:36 pm
Location: Maryland

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by 1960FL »

John,
Our uglies are more ugly than your uglies.
We can beat you at anything.

Tony, I think maybe you should try Man Grooming.... :mrgreen:
Tony
Posts: 1445
Joined: Wed Mar 03, 2010 3:40 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by Tony »

1960FL wrote: Tony, I think maybe you should try Man Grooming....
Wazzat ?
Also known as the infamous "Warpspeed" on some other Forums.
jfholm
Posts: 1628
Joined: Fri Feb 19, 2010 7:36 pm
Location: Grantsville, Utah 45 min west of Salt Lake City

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by jfholm »

Beetle wrote:OK BOYS........I DID A MOCK UP TEST TODAY AT THE SHOP WHILE i HADE SOME FREE TIME...............AS YOU GUYS SAID, THE MOTOR DID NOT HAVE ENOUGH POWER TO SPIN THE BLOWER. I WAS KIND OF HOPING IT WOULD. LOOKS LIKE IM GOING TO GO THE VACUUM CLEANER MOTOR ROUTE. I HAVE 2 INDUSTRIAL CARPET CLEANER MOTORS AND AT LEAST ONE MORE NORMAL VACUUM CLEANER MOTOR. THANKS FOR ALL THE INPUT!! I WILL KEEP YOU ALL POSTED ON MY PROGRESS.
Did you notice under "air flow thoughts" the video I posted on how a top fueler works? It makes a statement that the blower uses up 600 hp in parasitic drag. Now true these blowers are much bigger and have teflon seals so there can be a lot of drag. Even the older blowers took a lot of horsepower to turn them.

John
Darcy R
Posts: 63
Joined: Tue Aug 07, 2012 3:27 am

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by Darcy R »

Some years ago, I used to help out in making some custom cases, and end plates to improve the roots blowers that were used in Top Alcohol ...bout 18 years ago. A rig was put together to bench test the blowers by turning them with a healthy 350 chevy engine. We found the 350 to be a little weak for the job, even with some really good stuff in it.
Tony
Posts: 1445
Joined: Wed Mar 03, 2010 3:40 pm
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by Tony »

All very true.

But 1.6psi of boost (about 44 inches) and 200 CFM is only about one air horsepower.
A 5.0 Hp motor should do it easily.
What actually happened ?
Also known as the infamous "Warpspeed" on some other Forums.
Beetle
Posts: 18
Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2012 9:53 pm

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by Beetle »

i bolted the blower to a piece of plywood with a hole cut out the same size as the inlet to the blower, hooked up the motor and belt. wired it into my welder cord and plugged it in. the starter windings would come in and spin the motor, then it would try to spin up full speed and drop rpm's and the starter would kick back in. kept doing this surge thing up and down. you could tell it was moving a lot of air. im going to try some different size pulleys, see if possibly i was trying to spin it too fast. that might be the whole problem, i was overdriving it pretty good. 4" pulley on the motor and 2" pulley on the blower . the motor spins at 3450 rpm.....if it did my math properly....i was spinning it at 27,600 rpm. this could be the whole problem.
Beetle
Posts: 18
Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2012 9:53 pm

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by Beetle »

just did some research....looks like i dont need to spin the blower any faster than 8,000 rpm. at that speed it will flow about 300 CFM, which is more than enough for my needs. back to the drawing board.
1960FL
Posts: 1339
Joined: Fri Jan 08, 2010 10:36 pm
Location: Maryland

Re: roots blower as an air mover??

Post by 1960FL »

Beetle,

The ratio of the 4" to 2" pully is 1:2 thus your were spinning the blower 3450 X 2 or 6900RPM.

That is if it is a direct drive blower.

Rick.
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