Fresh Air Hood

[Stretch Cab]

Read a lot of the posts about painting and the need for a fresh air supply for the painter. I think this is a very good idea but kind of spendy too. I was wondering why you couldn't use a good quality mask filter/respirator under a painter's hood with just an air supply line from your compressor giving positive pressure under the hood that you would breath in through the good standard painters respirator?
I know the air from the conpressor isn't the best but wouldn't the good respirator take care of cleaning that before you breathed it?
Sure would be a lot cheaper for us once in a while painters......

[tudoor]

Air compressors produce co2 not good air. You would need an oiless air compressor and an air monitor to be safe.

[2manycars]

I use an air tight face shield and air from an airless compressor in the other part of the barn. Much better than just a respirator.

[Donvito]

You need proper ventilation in the place where you are doing the paint work, if it is not a paint booth. You have to get the fumes out. If there is too much air flow, and no filters, you will get dirt in the paint. If you paint with poor ventilation, in heavy fumes, any exposed part of your body can cause you to become sensitized to the harmful chemicals in the paint. I was doing complete paint jobs in 1976, at age 15. I used a respirator and painted professionally until 1993. I had been working at a small, family owned shop for six years, without a paint booth. The fumes would be very heavy at times. One day, after completing an all over paint job on an Olds 98, I was sensitized. I had burn marks on my face, where the respirator straps touched. The skin on my face and arms would feel like pins and needles if I was exposed to paint fumes after that. I enjoyed painting, and I was very good at it. I couldn't do it anymore. I am still allergic after all these years. When I became allergic, I had been exposed to the body and paint environment for 20 years. It doesn't have to take that long to be sensitized. It can happen at any time. Once it does, other chemicals can bother you more easily. I recently had a problem with floor stripper, used to take wax off a commercial floor. I can't be around that now. If you are going to paint, take the necessary precautions, and be safe.

[Curt Campbell]

Reasonably priced units...work great. Check it out. Nothing takes the place of proper protection for your lungs. Using anything else is not smart...even occasionally. Ask a throat cancer survivor...me.

www.turbineproducts.com

[Kurt in NJ]

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My father bought one of those Tip turbine spray outfits --it worked ok until he painted latex paint with it and tried to fix the spray gun--never worked the same, but the turbine compresser has worked well for air supply under the hood when sandblasting, if it is hot take a tub and put ice in it and a few turns of the hose, still need the respirator but it stopped the fogging up of the glass window in the hood, the end of the hose is just tied to the back of the hood and blows up over the shoulders---very low tech but it works, the turbine unit is placed a good ways upwind and away from the Smiths compressor so it is in clean air.

[Logan]

If you're only painting every once in a while I wouldn't worry about it to much. A regular respirator will be fine. It's people like me who are pretty much in the booth everyday that need it. But unfortunately we can't afford one that would hold up to the constant use it would be getting. We use 3m respirators and I feel okay about using them. Obviously not the best solution, but they work good. You just have to make sure to get a good seal on the mask around your face.

[Mike V. Florida]

The exhaust from a shop vac?

[Curt Campbell]

The non-fresh air masks do not block the isos in todays paint. Even 3M recommends fresh air supplied for isos....not their charcoal masks.

How much is your health worth?

[BILL WILLIAMSON]

Years ago I worked 40 HRS a week sandblasting small parts while using a head & shoulders leather mask thing & breathing oily, humid, compressor air! Maybe that's why I seem KOOKY at times???? Is there a REAL Doctor in the Barn? Bill W.

[Keith True]

In the mid 70's I first started using Centari/Imron/Durathane.Both Dupont and Ditzler told us how important it was to use charcoal masks because of the isocyanates in them.They're nothing new,we've had them in paints for 40 years or more.Are they different now? More powerful? Do we just know more about them? Did people suddenly start dropping and the paint companies got nervous? Or,did people just get smarter? I have a fresh air system,I like it but use it mostly for sandblasting.I bought it cheap as a defective unit,the motor was bad.It takes a vacuum cleaner motor so I see no reason not to build one using a vacuum.I tried taking air from my compressor while blasting,that was a bad idea.I use a 175 CFM Dresser compressor,you will get pretty dizzy trying to breath that air.Then I rigged up an air motor driven by compressor air.That worked nice but the air was too hot and I had to run the hose through a cooler full of ice.

[gweilbaker]

Originally Posted by Mike V. Florida

The exhaust from a shop vac?

Don't use a "used" vac, buy a new small unit that exhausts thru the hose and pick up extra hose. Also consider light weight pool filter hose too. Before someone goes poo poo on this, I have a Neoterik fresh air system, it's a vacuum motor (same turbine as shop vac) with air filters, that's it. The extra with vac is one can cool the air with ice in the bucket part

One has to get a good hood though.

[gweilbaker]

I should have looked a Curt's link before posting, for the money those look like a good deal, one stop shopping. You can use it for more than paint, who knows what's in the dust from sanding.

[RichPA]

I heard it was common practice years ago to breath compressor air but it was stopped when guys were developing very bad lung problems.

[Curt Campbell]

Gweilbaker....I have the Turbine Products unit with the vinyl hood for painting and also their sand blast hood. It works great...when you sandblast or paint its like having fresh air air conditioning. I for years had an industrial Bullard setup...worked fine but was too heavy and bulky for my use. Make sure you use hearing protection when using it. Theuntil sandblast hood comes with built in headphones. I use ear plugs with the paint hood. When properly worn and adjustd you cannot even smell paint.

Damage to your throat, lungs and other organs including your brain is progressive in nature. That means that occasional use that some believe doesn't harm you is not true. Damage occurs in large doses or on the "installment plan". I wish I had paid attention to what I was told about the harm years ago....but I knew it would never happen to me....I was nearly fatally wrong. Thank God I am cured....I was LUCKY.

Be safe and enjoy this hobby.

[Allanw]

buy an old CPAP on ebay of something, with a long hose. Even the mask can be used - they are constant pressure and will out flow your breathing if you are calm... but you probably aren't running while painting anyway. They have a vent built into the mask to keep fresh air flowing and stopping any "dead" air in the hose.

[Stretch Cab]

Thanks for all the good info..................

[Tom Wesenberg]

When I first saw the statement "FRESH AIR HOOD", my first thought was a Model A hood scoop. LOL

[Curt Campbell]

Dang Tom....you are a mind reader! I think one would look great on each side of my hood...bring out the panel cutter!!!!! Model A Tunnel RAM.... (NOT) ;-)

[BILL WILLIAMSON]

Originally Posted by Tom Wesenberg

When I first saw the statement "FRESH AIR HOOD", my first thought was a Model A hood scoop. LOL

T.W, my crowd made hood scoops/blisters/bubbles from a slice off a headlight shell. Small ones from a slice off a teardrop tail light shell.
A buddy made a "bustle" for his "T" bucket from two top, rear corners from a Model A coupe roof. The bustle lid was made from a heavy duty baking sheet with a 1/2" raised area around the edge & used a Model A trunk lock & handle. Wrecking yards were like a PARTS DEPT. FROM "HEAVEN"!
An artificial inseminator's "cold can" was too tall for his old Volvo's trunk, he cut a large hole, laid a pith helment on top & fiberglassed it in BEAUTIFULLY and painted it. George Barris would have loved it!! Bill W..