Portable regulated CO2 system at Lowes

Lowes now sells a portable CO2 regulator for paintball tanks:

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For $90 (plus a paintball tank you have to supply?) you get regulated CO2 on a 10-foot hose with quick-connect fitting. Meant for running air tools from your belt, but looks like it would work fine for beverage applications.

Anyone tried it or looked at it?

Reply to
Richard J Kinch
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I've noticed it in passing, but not investigated very far. I did notice that they sold the tanks as well.

Reply to
Pete C.

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One other note: I'd be concerned about using CO2 in my air tools with the greater cooling effect than air, unknown effect on tool lubrication and potential for accidentally feeding liquid. The solution is easy however, just get air fills from a SCUBA shop instead of CO2. It's cheaper as well.

Reply to
Pete C.

Make sure they don't give you 3000 psi though!

Reply to
Newshound

You can't get much compressed air in a paintball tank, compared to the expanded volume of CO2.

Depending on the delivery rate, the output CO2 gas should not be that cold. The tubing coil will warm it very effectively at low delivery rates. The tank is small enough that ambient heat will warm it directly.

Reply to
Richard J Kinch

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There's actually a product made for beer that uses one of these from Williams brewing:

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This is more pricey by far, but includes a keg and other stuff. The regulator (which is basically the main thing you need other than a tank and assorted hoses) runs around $85.00. I couldn't see what the range was on the Lowes regulator -- beer is usually dispensed at around 12PSI.

Might even be cheaper to get a bev regulator and DIY your own adapter (assuming you need one) for a paintball tank, but I don't know.

I think the only other problem is that iirc paintball fills tend to be expensive for the amount of gas you get.

Reply to
The Artist Formerly Known as K

I'd hope anyone at a SCUBA shop doing fills would understand tank ratings, particularly if they have purchased the adapters to do paintball tanks. Of course you could also get a SCUBA tank and regulator with the appropriate QC adapter and have a nice large regulated air source.

Reply to
Pete C.

Put a high speed cutoff wheel saw on it (or similar high consumption tool) on it and watch it freeze the regulator.

Reply to
Pete C.

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But, it's next to useless. The amount of air you can store at CO2 pressures is very small. CO2 is stored as a liquid. The volume produced is way higher than air at the same pressure. Just like water produces way more volume in steam when you boil it.

Bob

Reply to
Bob F

Yeah, but it isn't really expected to handle that. More for nail guns that are just using an occasional puff.

Reply to
Richard J Kinch

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Reply to
EXT

I'm just going to hire a SCUBA diver to through Pepsi at my paintball adversaries.

Reply to
mm

"Pete C." wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@snet.net:

you can get paintball tanks cheaper at WalMart.

Reply to
Jim Yanik

Yeah I saw these yesterday at Lowes. The "Rhino Power" tanks(9oz or

20oz) are by Blue Rhino, the same folks that do the propane tank exchanges. It looks like they are setting up the same system at Lowes where you return the tank for exchange. However it is so new that no one at customer service could manage to perform the proper incantation for the point of sale computer to divulge the actual cost, after the return credit, of the co2 cylinder. I figured I'd wait a couple weeks and go ask again.

Here is Blue Rhinos page

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and an alternative to the Kobalt regulator.
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Reply to
Chris

I was thinking about shooting an email to Blue Rhino and seeing if their CO2 is food grade or not.

Reply to
Chris

I've seen plans arround the net for that very thing and also for a filling settup that uses a 20Lb CO2 tank mounted upside down to dispense liquid to fill the paintball cylinder. I'm not sure I have a pair big enough to do that myself but the plans are "out there".

Reply to
Chris

"Bob F" wrote: (clip)Just like water produces way more volume in steam when you boil it. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Hey, why not just fill the tank with water and throw it in a bonfire? Watt do you say to that?

Reply to
Leo Lichtman

The water might be hard on the tools. And they might get really hot.

Reply to
Bob F

Have we just invented the steam engine?

Reply to
Bob F

And it comes at pressures much higher than a paintball CO2 tank is safe with.

CO2 at room temperature is in the 850 psi range, though it can get way higher on an overfilled tank.

Paintball High Pressure Air tankks (HPA) are a whole different kettle of fish, both in pressure capacity and price as well. Both are much higher than for CO2 tanks. HPA tanks will happily take a 4500 psi fill, if you bought the good ones. CO2 tank burst disks are rated at 3000 psi.

Filling a CO2 tank to it's rated pressure with air would get you about the same number of shots (nails, staples) as you would get from a CO2 fill without any liguid CO2. Not really worth the effort if you have to run to the fill station more times than you have to reload the nailer.

By the time the CO2 has travelled through the reg and hoses, (where the reg limits pressure to 100 psi or so) you can be pretty sure that liquid CO2 is not an issue. Hoses would blow if the liquid got that far. At least the ones between the reg and the tool, wher e you can bet they are not selling you a 3000 psi rated hose to feed a 100 psi rated nailer or stapler.

So. Air from the Scuba shop is about second in the list of bad ideas, right after using pure oxygen. :-)

Cheers Trevor Jones

Reply to
Trevor Jones

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