Any experience with Craftsman compressors?

Hello all,

In the market for a portable air compressor. It will be used for occassional trim carpentry (NO framing nailers), utility type crap around the house (inflating bike/auto tires, etc.), and most importantly, blowing woodchips out of mortises while I'm drilling them on the drill press.

It will be used in the woodshop, so one of the primary needs is for a relatively quiet compressor.

Sears is running a CC sale next week, and they're putting a 3-gallon oil-lubed portable on sale for $89. (Regularly $129)

I know, at this price point, that I won't be passing this tool down to the kids, but can anyone give me any recommendations either way on this one? It's model # 15310.

I'd post a link, but it's about 175 characters long.

TIA for any help.

Reply to
wood_newbie
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For those types of use, any compressor will fill the bill. I had a Craftsman 33 gal compressor for years and got a lot of use out of it that went well beyond its design intent. If you don't anticipate any significantly greater use than what you've iterated above, just go buy the cheapest thing you can find and you'll do ok.

Reply to
Mike Marlow

Just look at the SCFM at pressure to see if it has enough guts to do what you want. Unless you're talking of small brad nailer, the air requirements for a trim nailer aren't much different than the framer, for example.

But, as Mike says, it'll probably be adequate if your expectations aren't too high, but I'd not expect the noise issue to be solvable w/o some additional actions.

Reply to
Duane Bozarth

I have a 30 gallon oil-less Craftsman that has done fine for me in the shop. However, it is both loud and cumbersome to take places and into the house. Thus I have had my eye on the same one you are considering and am interested in any info you get on it. Being oil-cooled I assume it will be quieter than my shop compressor. I have to go look at it and pick it up to see about portability & weight. I think it has a fairly high pressure rating (135 psi or 150 psi, I forget). It definitly has sufficiemnt CFMs for what you were talking about. It won't do much painting, air sanding, die grinding, impact wrenching, air chiseling, etc. due to a small tank and small CFM ratings.

Reply to
Dave Hall

I bought a large (60 gallon I think) Craftsman compressor a number of years back to use in my companies photo lab. It was an oil free model and was loud as can be. The motor actually disintegrated after only a few days. We were lucky nobody was in the room when it happened. It was a mistake choosing this compressor for the heavy duty use that we were going to put it to but I didn't know any better at the time. For limited duty use as you're aiming for they are probably just fine and the oil lubed model should certainly be much quieter than the oil free.

Reply to
Jeff P.

Thanks Jeff. And by the way...good luck today with your dog. I've got a two-year-old retriever myself, and I know how attached you can get to those knuckleheads. Fuck the guy that carped about melodrama...when/if that day comes for me where I have to make the decision on my boy, it ain't gonna be a good day for me either.

Hell, it won't be a good year for that matter.

Reply to
wood_newbie

it withstands a reality check when compared to

which is a little less compressor for a little less money.

here's your compressor:

I'd say if you think it will work for you it's a decent price.

I can't comment on the noise factor of thet particular machine, other than to say that air compressors are loud, and small ones are louder than big ones, certainly per performance and sometimes absolutely.

Reply to
bridgerfafc

Hey...how'd you to that thing with the URL??? Excellent!

Reply to
wood_newbie

you talkin' to me? it'd help if you included enough of what you're replying to to make it clear where you are in the thread.

I used

formatting link
to turn an awkward machine generated url into a crisp short machine generated url.

doing so has it's advantages and disadvantages. in short:

advantage- the url doesn't word wrap.

disadvantage- it'll expire in a week or so.

Reply to
bridger

Thank you very much. It's not easy but even hurting as much as I do right now it was still worth it. The 12 years of joy and fun were worth this pain. She was a blessing to us. People that don't understand or feel this bond are missing out on one of lifes pure pleasures. I've started typing a reply to bh several times and ended up just deleting most of them. It's not worth it, he wouldn't understand.

Anyhow, thanks again.

Reply to
Jeff P.

I had one of those it was so loud and slow I got a small compressor to replace it because it was horrible when I ran. well it died and my little guy can fit it's own 4 gal tank and the crapsman tank faster then that sucker could do on it's own. Knight-Toolworks

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handmade wooden planes

Reply to
Steve knight

I was lucky Steve - mine wasn't really so bad for what it was. It wasn't too loud, all things considered, and it filled quickly enough. I think DeVilibis makes (or made) these for Sears. Like I said - I used mine for things it was never intended to do and I really can't complain about its performance. I painted a lot of cars with that compressor. The only thing it just couldn't handle was a DA, but those just suck the air out of any compressor.

Reply to
Mike Marlow

I got it for free so I can't complain much. but when I took the motor off it was 15 amps Hey were was the 5.5hp motor?? (G) and the piston was small. I bet it was atleast 400 bucks new. my little guy is 150 and is a far better machine. Knight-Toolworks

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handmade wooden planes

Reply to
Steve knight

wood snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com wrote in news:1127486156.878168.31380 @f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com:

Speaking from experience, get yourself the biggest (highest CFM) compressor you can afford and fits your other requirements. You'll find there's some air tool that would be just really neat to have but you've got to invest another $150 in a new compressor just to use it rather than another $40 more.

Puckdropper

Reply to
Puckdropper

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