Screw Compressors – Finely Engineered for Performance

The easiest way to picture the operation of a screw compressor is to imagine the rotation of a standard household drill bit. If you’ve ever seen a drill bore through a wooden board, you’ve witnessed the way a thin channel of wood is drawn through the groves of the drill, pulled from within the board and moved towards the base of the drill bit.

Screw compressors operate in the same fashion, but to be even more effective, they use two interlocking screws so finely engineered that they whirr along in complete synchronicity. Instead of channeling wood along their grooves, these screws – known as rotors — move gas from their suction end through the compressor, creating the required pressure for the system to operate efficiently.

Advantages

A benefit of screw compressors’ smooth, consistent motion, is the elimination of the pulsing and high-impact methods of other types of compressors. This provides quieter operation and less chance of surges in the system. (Note that screw compressors aren’t vibration free – they still use rapidly moving parts. They simply avoid the impact vibration of piston-driven compressors.)

Because of this smooth operation, screw compressors tend to be less prone to energy loss, and their stable output leads to greater energy efficiency for the system as a whole. While this is an advantage across the board, it’s especially beneficial for larger systems, which can see the savings scale up as well.

When screw compressors were a new technology, the especially tight tolerances required meant they carried a higher manufacturing cost. Over time they’ve become easier to produce, and this price gap has closed. This lowered cost combined with increased energy efficiency has help to make them a popular choice among industrial and large application buyers.

Replacement Parts

Of course, no system is invulnerable to wear and tear. If your screw compressor is under-performing and needs to be remanufactured or given replacement parts, National Compressor Exchange has you covered. Check out our catalog for screw compressor replacement parts or contact us if you have questions or would like to be put in touch with a local distributor. We’ll be glad to help you pick out the right parts for your compressor and will ship them promptly to your job site.

Remanufactured Screw Compressors

The tight tolerances involved in screw compressors make them especially difficult to remanufacture correctly. National Compressor Exchange is an industry leader in the remanufacture of screw compressors, and stands behind their products.

Our skilled technicians use digital depth gauges and backlash tooling to verify clearances for each male and female rotor pair. This must be done with great care, as any deviation outside the tolerance will cause the compressor to fail at quality check. Each make and model of screw compressor has its own set of specs which must be met in order to function properly, and we take the time and care to make sure these standards are met.

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