My little hobby compressor tank sprung a pin hole leak.Has anybody tried that iron putty or sealer to patch it,one advertised, as good to 900 psi,will try something before getting a new one,just wondering if anyone has had success in patching up a hole.
Is it in a seam? Either way, bleed the tank first.
No,itâs a pin hole in the middle,and yes the tank has bled down,no psi or water,which probably caused my problem.
Bleed and drain (on the tank bottom) all the way. JB Weld or similar. Make sure to get the surface degreased first.
Certainly worth a try. Good luck!
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Thanks,will give it a shot
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You guys are going to laugh at me butâŚ
Flex tape??
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Hey the stuff works. We have a bird bath that cracked about 3 years ago. Not wanting to shell out $50.00 for a new one I bought some flex seal in the spray can. Still using the same birdbath. The stuff hardens and cracks but that might be because we we store the birdbath in an outdoor shed in the winter. In the spring I just scrape off the old stuff and reapply.
Nope,tried some Flex-Tape,it blew it out
But it did seal the windshield on my old pick up truck.
Flex Tape didnât perform as advertised for me either. Small leak in drain pipe from sink (no water pressure when sink was off). The stuff couldnât seal the pipe. It did slow it down but that wouldnât make a good TV ad.
Sheet metal screw with rubber grommet.
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Good one too
My concern is why there is a pinhole leak. Is it rusting out from the inside?
If it is rusting, there may not be enough good metal at that spot for a good purchase by the screw.
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Pin-hole leak usually means a larger rust area on the inside.
When the tank shows the first pin-hole it is usually good-bye tank.
I have secured two empty dry-powder fire extinguishers, rated for at least twice the pressure that our compressors can deliver.
Some piping work, drainage valves et.c and I have a refurbished compressor.
If you have an expensive silent compressor you could buy an El Cheapo noisy one and swap out the tanks (or motors/pumps).
If your current compressor is a noisy El Cheapo then just get a new one.
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Since there are no pin hole sized sheet metal screws, youâll need to drill out the hole anyway. Just drill it out until you have good metal all the way around.
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If it has rusted in a larger area the drilling out to fresh metal could result in a half inch hole.
The threads for such a large screw would not get a good hold on thin metal, even if the sheet metal in that tank is 2.5 mm thick (1/10th inch) it will not be enough to provide a good hold.
A screw pushed out by 100 psi is probably not a deadly projectile but it would probably scare the âbrown stuffâ out of a modeler focusing on the airbrush work being done.
Screw the screw idea, get a new tank
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Since there is probably more rust on the inside and it is only going to get worse, I would just replace the tank.
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Someday folks will realize I donât just toss ideas out there. Iâve done this. Hence no â?â after my statement. Yeah, you could buy a new tank as well, but if I can save a modeler a few bucks so that he can add to his stash, why not?
Personally Iâve got no dog in the hunt. OP can use whichever method he wishes. Hell, he can try ramen for all I care. And yes, that is actually a thing.
Best bet, if you do want to buy a new tank, get the kind that holds CO2. Problem solved forever.
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I had a pin hole in my tank.
It was built to lie down so the bottom was a narrow line of the cylinder wall.
The pinhole appeared in the middle of this line. I decided to replace it before cutting it to pieces with the angle grinder. I found more pin-holes in waiting.
If I had fixed the first pin-hole I would very soon have had to fix the next one, and the next âŚ
âI donât just toss ideas out there. Iâve done thisâ : Me too âŚ
Sometimes one catches a lucky break and can fix it easily, sometimes it is time to bite the bullet.
I prefer to avoid playing games with pressure tanks, even if the pressure in our airbrush compressors isnât âindustrial gradeâ
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Itâs a small cheaper compressor,probably a decade old, I even had a small session this morning with the tank pissing a little,it was able to msintain psi just ran the whoke time,probably gonna try the epoxy as a temp fix then look at getting a new one.
And I will need to make sure to bleed the moisture out after each session,not doing that probably accelerated the problem.
Thanks everyone for the responses
Not draining the tank was probably the root cause in my case.
There was never a drop of water in the oil/moisture trap so I disregarded the instructions about draining the tank.
Maybe you could pour epoxy into the tank? Tape over the pin hole and then pour slow curing epoxy âŚ
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