Shopping Cart

Your cart is currently empty.

How to determine if a make-up air system is required: It’s simple math

Anytime a paint booth is installed in a building, the amount of exhausted air must be a consideration.

For example, a booth exhausting 13,000 cubic feet per minute installed in a building measuring 50 x50 x 15 (37,500 cubic feet), the air will change every two minutes. This produces a negative pressure condition on the building that can cause safety issues. If the building is equipped with gas-fired unit heaters, the negative pressure condition can actually pull gas from the pilot valves and put raw gas into the room. NFPA-33 addresses this with a calculation.

NFPA-33 A.7.3 “If the volume of the room or building where the exhaust system is located is not at least equal to 20 times the volumetric capacity of the fans (three air changes per hour), then additional make-up air should be provided.”

Going back to the 13,000 cfm exhaust fan. 13,000 x 20 = 260,000 cubic feet. The room would have to be 110’ x 110’x 20’ (264,500 cubic feet).

The rule of thumb is to provide the same amount of air being exhausted with some adjustment in the unit to provide the customer with the proper pressure he requires. Some may want slightly more positive pressure while some may want a neutral pressure building.

Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit
Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit

Make-up air units can be placed outside or inside as long as the intake air is drawn from the outside. The control panels are mounted inside the building and can be interlocked to the paint booth to operate simultaneously. If you want more information on the Sure-Cure units from Standard Tools and Equipment, visit us online.

The ductwork is simple, the discharge duct should be equipped with a diffuser to help distribute air more evenly into the room.

If you have any questions, give us a call and we’ll gladly assist in determining if more makeup air is needed. 800-312-7488.

Baby Its Cold Outside!! — Air Makeup Units

A favorite song of the winter holidays is ‘Baby, Its Cold Outside’.  The crooners of the 1960s like Dean Martin, Andy Williams and Ann-Margret make this a fun song to hear.  The fellow in this song reminds his girl of all of the problems of a cold winter night as she keeps trying to talk herself into leaving.

As we are bracing for this “Arctic Blast” about to hit us on the East Coast, we’re thinking of all those painters that have to open the building doors when the spray booth is used … and Baby, Its Cold Inside Too!!

At Standard Tools, we make heated air makeup units that can be added to your current system.  Spray booths with intake plenums (or intake canopies) can be directly ducted to our Sure-Cure AMU system. Cross-flow or open-face booths can be supplied with Sure-Cure AMU systems designed to put heated air right into the building.

  • The Sure-Cure direct-gas-fired units can be heated with liquid propane or natural gas.
  • The units are ETL-listed to USA and Canadian safety standards and are designed to provide tempered air (for spraying) and up to 160-F for curing.
  • When ordering your unit, there are many options about power, layout and orientation.
  • Systems are available from 10,000 cfm to 26,000 cfm.
  • We offer ducting components and wiring harnesses.

The best part is that your unit can be built to your specifications and ready to ship to your facility in just a few weeks.

Stop opening the building doors to bring in the freezing air.  OSHA requires a permanent spray area to be at least 65-F.  Most coatings do not work well at colder temperatures, which can lead to poor quality and poor productivity.

Visit our website or call our Sales team for more information.

Air Makeup Units (AMUs) Are HUMMIN’

AMU production 1014 (2)amu production 1014It’s going to be 85 in Greensboro, NC today, but cooler weather is just around the corner!  How do I know that?  Well, I just walked through our Sure-Cure air makeup unit (AMU) production shop, and things are hummin’.  We have four units on the bench in process and several more in the queue this week. These Sure-Cure AMU’s are in big demand.  ETL-certified and tested, they are among the safest units on the market today.

The Sure-Cure will provide gas-heated warm air inside your spray painting booth to speed curing time, even on the coldest days!  With a guaranteed 80 degree rise over ambient air temperature, if it is 0 degrees outside it will be 80 degrees inside your booth!  No more waiting hours or days for dry time.  Plus you can put it into cure mode at the end of the day and go home.  The unit will shut off automatically when the paint is cured.

If you have an Air Makeup Unit that is more than 10 years old you may be a candidate for a new high-efficiency Sure-Cure AMU.  Many of the old style Air Makeup Unit’s contain heat exchangers that can crack over years of use.  This greatly reduces the ability of the unit to heat the air to the desired temperature.  It could also result in dangerous fumes being emitted into your booth or painting area!

Our units are popular because Standard Tools is committed to a 2 to 3 week turnaround in producing these units, even in the winter months.  Other manufacturers take 8 to 12 weeks to ship an AMU!  So get your order in today, and be ready for the cold when it gets here!

PAINT BOOTH AIR FLOW: HOW IT WORKS

During spray jobs in a paint booth, the exhaust system must draw substantial quantities of air out of the shop in order to operate. These volumes must be replenished with equal volumes of air coming into the booth.

STE_AMU Full CornerAIR MAKE-UP (AMU) is defined as…a mechanical means of replacing air that has been exhausted out of the booth.

It’s simple…. it’s all about paint booth air flow. How much air in being put into the booth and how much is being taken out. Airflow while spraying takes the over-spray away from the paint job and out of the booth.

Air in – Air out. Air in – Air out. Air in – Air out. Air in – Air out. That’s it. With the Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit, you control the amount of air pushed into your booth. Why would you need to push air into your booth?

NEGATIVE AND POSITIVE BOOTH PRESSURE
When the exhaust fan of the booth is turned on, it creates a “negative” air pressure in the booth cabin (taking out more air than is being put in). When there is a negative air pressure, the booth will try to suck in as much air as possible, including dirt and debris from outside the booth. THINK VACUUM CLEANERS.

To counter this “negative” pressure, an Air Makeup Unit (AMU) unit is used to supply air to replace the air being exhausted. If the AMU is designed to force more air into the booth than is exhausted…the booth is said to have “positive” air pressure. In this case, the booth has more air than outside the booth and when a door is opened, dirt and debris is pushed away from the booth. THINK STANDING IN FRONT OF A FAN. Continue reading PAINT BOOTH AIR FLOW: HOW IT WORKS

Do I Need Paint Booth MakeUp Air? What the heck is it?

Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit
Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit

Since we have announced the arrival of the Sure-Cure AMU to the market, we have been getting a lot of questions from customers about what an Air Makeup Unit does, why it is needed and how it works. Here are the simple answers to all of those questions. We’ll try not to make it too complicated, because it’s really simple…. It provides lots of air to the paint booth.

Now, why would anyone need all that extra air? Well, it’s not really ‘extra’ air, it’s replacement – or makeup – air for air that has been used and expelled out of the booth. Booth exhaust systems use up large volumes of air from the space that it is installed. If this air is not replaced at the same rate that it is expelled, the booth, or the building, will experience negative pressure (the air pressure outside the building is greater than the air pressure inside the building).

Why is negative pressure bad? At the risk of sounding like a bunch of engineers, some indicators of negative pressure include the suction pressure that makes booth STE-AMU_Fulldoors difficult to open, exhaust fans that don’t work properly, drafts around doors and windows that cause a poor paint job and poor indoor air quality.

What does this have to do with your painting? Pressure problems make it difficult to paint in a booth and achieve proper coating and curing. When you are able to control the booth pressure and temperature, you are able to effectively remove particulates from the air that can negatively affect the quality of your finish. These problems are more pronounced during the cold season when windows are kept closed, reducing the natural pressure-balancing effect.

When you have an air make-up system, like the Sure-Cure AMU, the unit replaces the air that is expelled by a building’s exhaust system, maintaining the proper balance between inside and outside air pressures.

Some Cool Things About Air Makeup Units:

  • Replacement air can be heated in the winter months or to improve curing time. You can choose to not heat the replacement air in warmer months.
  • Cure your paint job in under an hour, increasing your daily productivity by up to 10X
  • Greatly reduce infiltration of cold outdoor air and drafts through opened booth doors
  • Encourage proper operation of booth exhaust systems
  • Improve the booth’s air quality
  • Eliminate suction pressure at doors
  • Decrease load on existing HVAC system
  • Lower energy costs by as much as 35%
  • Maintain a more comfortable and productive working environment

There are many individual benefits and features that differentiate AMU models and makes. It’s in our Sure-Cure air makeup unit features that make our unit safer and easier to operate. Now that you know why you need an AMU, check out all the benefits of having our AMU.

Want to see the video that launched it all? See the Sure-Cure AMU, in action, from all angles in just 55 seconds!

 

Introducing the Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit from Standard Tools and Equipment Co.

We have always been the innovative type; it’s kind of a given if you’re in the manufacturing business. In today’s market, businesses must adapt and change to endure. Through Standard Tools and Equipment Co, Tools USA (since 1979) and Eagle Equipment (since 1953), have continued to grow and expand, remaining a leader in the industry.

Have you ever found a product and it was so genius and so simple, you thought to yourself, “Why didn’t I think of this?”

We find that our most successful endeavors come from looking around the industry that we know best and noticing that we can create something better than anyone else out there. For us, that’s exactly how Standard Tools and Equipment began making paint booths in 1997. We noticed a need, we heard customer after customer asking and we had all the right elements to make a better booth ourselves. Since then, we have become an industry leader in paint booth systems. We use our knowledge and experience to develop unsurpassed products for our customers.

The Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit, STE-AMUWe are proud to introduce you to our latest successful adventure, the Sure-Cure® Air Makeup Unit.

We started developing plans for our own air makeup unit in 2011. This plan came from a couple apparent needs:

  1. There was a great need in the market for a safe and reliable unit that had all the bells and whistles included in the marketed price.
  2. Customers were fed up with the lengthy wait times that were currently associated with Air Makeup Units. They didn’t understand how we could design, customize, build and ship a paint booth in less than 10 days but they had to wait months, for their air makeup unit. We didn’t understand it either.
  3. We researched and decided that we could make them ourselves. We would do it better, safer and quicker. After all, we are a leading paint booth manufacturer and we know what it takes to heat a booth properly. It only made sense to build them ourselves. Continue reading Introducing the Sure-Cure Air Makeup Unit from Standard Tools and Equipment Co.

Sign up to our newsletter & Receive Savings In Your Inbox

Sign Up

Copyright © 2024 Standard Tools and Equipment Co.. | Ecommerce Shopping Cart Software by Miva, Inc.