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Having a bad month!
Well talking to companies when you have a problem is like beating your head of the wall.
We bought a cascade system about a year ago and something malfunctioned and oil leaked into the air tubing and we did not catch the problem until after we had used and refilled our cylinders.
We do not know how long it was leaking but found it right before our warranty expired. So to be safe i called them to fix it and sent our s.c.b.a's to be inspected.
Today i got the bad news all of our packs are contaminated with oil and no telling how much of that oil we have breathed in, hopefully none but then the company told me that it is going to cost us $1,200.00 a pack to fix and we have six of them that need fixed.
So I tried to get the company that we bought the compressor from to try and help us pay for the cost to fix them and they are giving us the run around. they said this happened before and was a factory defect that they thought they had fixed.
So what I am asking is do you think they should at least pay half the cost or pay nothing.
We bought a cascade system about a year ago and something malfunctioned and oil leaked into the air tubing and we did not catch the problem until after we had used and refilled our cylinders.
We do not know how long it was leaking but found it right before our warranty expired. So to be safe i called them to fix it and sent our s.c.b.a's to be inspected.
Today i got the bad news all of our packs are contaminated with oil and no telling how much of that oil we have breathed in, hopefully none but then the company told me that it is going to cost us $1,200.00 a pack to fix and we have six of them that need fixed.
So I tried to get the company that we bought the compressor from to try and help us pay for the cost to fix them and they are giving us the run around. they said this happened before and was a factory defect that they thought they had fixed.
So what I am asking is do you think they should at least pay half the cost or pay nothing.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Joe Stoltz on
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Yes, exactly what Sean said.
There's a reason why we pay so much $$ for cascade systems: the product coming out is certified pure and safe for breathing purposes. The design should be such that no malfunction allow oil to contaminate the air, ever.
I just hope that you and your fellow FFs have not been physically harmed by this.
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Permalink Reply by turk182 on
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still no word on the company paying for the packs but they said they had the compressor fixed and for us to run it and get 6 hours on it and they would come and change the filter.
well we ran it for a total of four hours, 2 hours friday and 2 hours on saturday and it is shooting oil out of the fill wip already.
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How did you first notice the problem?
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I wonder if OSHA or the CGA would be interested in this. We had an oil pump problem with our Hypress system but I believe it's fixed now. I was wondering how you discovered the oil so I can look tonight. :o)
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noticed a puddle of oil on the floor under where the the fill wipe is hung.
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what happened was i was doing cylinder inspections and noticed a film on inside of the fill port. we have quick connect cylinders and the threaded port is for filling the cylinders so i take the cap off and inspect for dirt or debri and noticed the film in there. when i was walking back to the office i noticed the puddle of oil on the floor where we hang the fill wipe at. the the latest time iwas running the compressor and put down and absorbant pad and was letting air flow out of the wip onto it just to be safe and noticed it started to turn yellowish from the oil. so i called and e-mailed the company that we bought the compressor off of and have not heard from them yet.
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Saturday after the easter egg hunt for the kids I went home and emailed the company we bought the compressor off of and then e-mailed the manufacturer of the compressor it self wich is hypress equipment but have not heard from them on the issue yet either. Joe what kind of oil pump issue did you have with yours and did it get into your lines also. the model we bought was: HP-5500-NA3-E1 MAYBE THEY ARE RELATED SOME HOW.
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TURK! Ours is a HYP-5000-NA3-E1-1 system. Sounds close enough for me.
Our problem was that the low oil light was on. Investigation revealed that the internal oil pump shaft was broken, it had snapped somehow. It was replaced free of charge.
I know the rep who sold it to us and will be seeing him tonight. I will definitely ask him about it and also check our equipment to see if anything is amiss.
Thanks, and I'll let you know.
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no problem hope yours checks out okay would appreciate any info your rep could tell us. still do not know the oil is getting into the air lines. another thing you might want to do just to check is take a cylinder and blow some air into a bucket of water and see if you get that rainbow effect on top of the water it will let you know if any oil is sneaking by in yours.
Like I said we ran our almost a year and did not catch it until recently .
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Turk, I asked about the oil problem and there is no known history with any of the systems, Hypres or otherwise. It's just that sometimes compressors fail, and that's that. But if it's under warranty the manufacturer should stand behind their product.
I did study up on the manual, though and learned a few things. First, oil is used to lubricate the bearings and pistons in the pump, just like in a car engine. So there is always a small amount of oil present in the high pressure stage lines between compressors.
In fact, moisture is also present and the oil/water mixture is filtered out by the combination of the separator and purification filter. The separator is just a liquid trap while the purifier is more of an actual filter.
The output of the purifier should be Grade E breathing air.
Questions for you are: is the separator cleaned regularly? Has the filter been replaced on schedule? (I think every 50 hours or so for the separator and 75 for the filter is mentioned in the manual) Has there been routine maintenance on the unit per the operating manual?
If everything has been kept up to snuff then the manufacturer should be held up especially if it was within the warranty period. If it's a maintenance issue then you might be SOL (simply out of luck).
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Joe
the compressor only had 27 hours when it failed the first time and 32 hours when it failed the second time Kaza fire Equipment where we bought it told us we had to get 75 hours on it before they would come to service it and do the air quality test on the compressor again. so if i amd reading you explanation right the oil does come into close contact with the purified air.
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