Compressed Air System Costs Meet the Real World
There is an often-quoted ratio of 7.5 hp input to one horsepower output used to illustrate the inefficiency of the energy transfer in compressed air systems. What this is saying is that you receive the benefit of only 13 percent of the energy you put into your air compressors as mechanical output at the shaft of a typical compressed air powered tool. While this ratio is generally true for compressed air system awareness discussion purposes, you should understand that in the real world compressed air efficiency is usually much lower.