For example, if you have a total of 1,200 gallons of compressed air storage, 800 gallons should be dry storage and 400 gallons should be wet. The ideal ratio of compressed air storage for most applications is 1/3 wet to 2/3 dry capacity. This reduces the risk that the air dryer will become over-capacitated during high-demand events.įor most applications, it makes sense to have a combination of wet and dry storage. Dry compressed air is ready to use right out of the tank.

This also reduces pressure drop on the air dryer side of the system and provides a steadier pressure signal to the compressor controller. Wet storage increases the efficiency of your air dryer and prolongs the life of the pre-filter element by allowing excess water and lubricant to condense out of the system before it hits the filter and dryer.Wet and dry storage have different benefits for your system. It is not necessary to flow the compressed air through the tank for dry storage. “Dry” storage tanks are located after the air dryers to store compressed air that has already been dried and filtered.Air flows through the tank in this configuration, entering through the bottom port from the air compressor and exiting out the top to the dryer. “Wet” storage tanks are located before the air drying system.The difference is in the location of the air storage tank in your compressed air system there is no difference in tank construction or design. When shopping for an air receiver tank, you may be asked whether you want “wet” or “dry” compressed air storage. For systems with pipework of two inches or greater diameter, it may be worthwhile to consider that volume in the calculation. The pipes also store air for your compressed air system, and the larger the pipes, the more storage they provide. The final consideration in determining compressed air storage requirements is the size of the pipework in the system. Testing to determine cfm at peak demand will be needed to calculate air storage requirements. This extra capacity will ensure that the system will be able to keep up with periods of high demand. Facilities with high variability in airflow and large peaks in demand may require larger volumes of stored air.All storage should be wet storage in this case. In this case, air storage can be reduced to two gallons per cfm of air compressor capacity. That’s because they don’t have frequent high bursts of demand that rely on stored air. Facilities with very steady airflow, such as robotic facilities, typically don’t need as much stored air.Flow consistency has a large impact on storage requirements. While the standard rule works well for many applications, you will also want to consider other variables in determining your compressed air storage needs. As we’ll explain in more detail below, 1/3 of the total storage capacity should be wet storage and 2/3 should be dry storage. So if your air compressor is rated for 100 cfm, you would want 300 to 500 gallons of compressed air storage. Peak cfm requirements at moments of maximum demand.Ī good rule of thumb for most applications is to have three to five gallons of air storage capacity per air compressor cfm output.The air compressor capacity in cubic feet per minute (cfm).The volume of compressed air storage capacity needed by a facility depends on several factors:

Asme tank volume calculator