At EXAIR, you’ll often hear us refer to laminar vs turbulent flow when discussing our blowoff products. In any blowoff process or application, laminar airflow is going to be much more effective at cooling or drying than the turbulent airflow delivered by blowers or commonly found homemade blowoff devices or cheap knockoffs. To read more about the math behind it, check out my colleague John Ball’s previous post here.
A fan “slaps” the air, resulting in a turbulent airflow where the airflow particles are irregular and will interfere with each other. A laminar airflow, by contrast, will maintain smooth paths that will never interfere with one another. All the air molecules have the same vector and velocity, which greatly adds to the qualities of a laminar airflow stream. In the video below, we demonstrate the impact of using a blowoff device delivering a laminar flow of air compared to that of a fan. We demonstrate that a Super Air Amplifier is dramatically better at cooling the steel block which you can see side-by-side with the fan on the right:
Utilizing a laminar airflow is also critical when it is being used to carry static-eliminating ions further to the surface of a target. Static charges can be positive or negative. In order to eliminate them, we need to deliver an ion of the opposite charge to neutralize it. Since opposite charges produced by our AC ionizers attract to the charges surface, having a product that produces a laminar airflow to carry the ions makes the net result much more effective, which results in quicker decay times. This result equals faster production rates, which are generally an improvement for most processes.
Within a turbulent airflow, the ionized particles will generally swirl around and neutralize one another before they make contact with the target surface. This reduces the overall effectiveness of the ionized stream. With a product such as the Super Ion Air Knife, or any other EXAIR Static Eliminator, we’re using a laminar airflow pattern to deliver the positive and negative ions. Since the flow is laminar, the total quantity of ions that we’re able to deliver to the surface of the material is greater. This allows the charge to be neutralized quickly, rather than having to sit and “dwell” under a less impactful, ionized airflow.
When looking for the best method of cooling, cleaning, drying or static elimination within your processes, we encourage you to reach out to EXAIR for help. We’re available Monday-Friday 7am-4pm ET to help you determine the best solutions for your application.
Tyler Daniel, CCASS
Application Engineer
E-mail: TylerDaniel@EXAIR.com
Twitter: @EXAIR_TD