DAYSTATE T2 COMPRESSOR VS 110V

Is your breather tube full of oil or just a weird camera effect? If the former any ideas why? If the latter then apologies for the stupid ask.

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Mine looks like that as well. 

Thanks, interesting... here is mine just now; got done with bottle top-off #27 today. I was legitmately curious about the coloration and thanks for the comfirmation. Also thank you Alan as well, great share and pictures!

When you both filled the unit did you remove the crankcase nut prior to and during filling to allow for positive pressure air displacement? Thanks in advance!

I did remove the oil filling vent when filling. I also made a 3D printed wrench to reach that vent cap without having to get my regular tools out. 

I found the oil filling instructions were conflicting. My LC-110 has a sight glass, and one instruction said the sight glass was the range of the dipstick and indicated filling to the center of the sight glass. I filled to about 1/3 or so in the glass and checked the dipstick. It was slightly overfilled on the dipstick. I ran it for a few minutes (not building pressure) to distribute the oil. That's probably when the oil bubbles were forced into the tube. The level was still a little overfull on the dipstick. So I pulled some oil out till it was full on the dipstick. It was quite low in the sight glass. I corresponded with AoA and they said to use 330 ml of oil. So I drained, measured and refilled, and it is just visible in the sight glass, and just under full on the dipstick.

When the compressor was overfilled it also pumped a little oil back into the inlet filter area. Ray cautioned about running overfull, it does lots of undesirable things.

So measure your oil, go by the dipstick, and don't overfill or run low on oil. There are apparently a couple variants of the LC-110, so I've heard not all of them have the sight glass. Here is the sight glass after measuring the oil at 330ml. It is barely visible in the glass. Go by the dipstick, the sight glass is not very good at this low a level. If the oil gets lower some remains trapped in the sight glass so I don't trust it reading accurately at the low end.



The oil itself is not as dark as it looks in the tubing, perhaps it reacts with the plastic. It may also depend on lighting, the light in my garage can be LED, daylight or from the camera. The above photo is soon after the oil was in the tube and it is not as dark. In any case there is no oil in the tube now, it only happened at the start.

Thanks Alan, sage advice on the 330mL. I agree with you entirely about the oil level indicator level in the directions being a bit ambigious. With the dip fully inserted and snapped into place the oil level is just at the upper most "MAX" indicator line. With the dip cap resting on the top and not fully inserted it is exactly half way between the "MIN" and "MAX" indicator line. The oil window on mine shows it as level so I think I lucked out. To be honest I didn't even know this oil window existed until I read your reply.

Ignore the cloudy looking oil it's a product of the flash. The greenish tint on the window nut also appears to be a result of the flash.



Edit: I also noticed that looking at your picture it seems you have an oil drain extension?

I did some checking on the dipstick, and they want it read when fully inserted. Sitting it on the O ring changes it about half the range, as you found.

Your level is very different from mine. I really wonder how that can be. The mount for the sight glass must be cast into the chassis, so that can't easily change. The dipstick can easily be different. Makes me worry a bit. We should measure from under the cap where it rests to the full line and see if they are different.

My compressor came with the extension on the oil drain. There were complaints about the oil flowing across the lower coils, so they apparently added the extension.

I would think that line would be the full line, but it certainly isn't on mine, at least it doesn't agree with the dipstick.

Go by the dipstick or by measuring the oil. Of course the compressor needs to be level too.

I just took a couple measurements. The oil tower height is 64mm tall. Then from the underside of the cap that sits on that tower down to the "full" line is 154mm.

100% with you here Alan -- especially since our oil indicator windows appear aligned. My LC-110 sits on the basement poured concrete floor on just the rubber feet it shipped with. It is flat, smooth, and level.

Here is an image of my dip stick. The very top "red" circle is aligned exactly with the 1" mark. I took the photo overhead attempting to be directly vertical overhead of the min/max markings.

My compressor came with the extension on the oil drain. There were complaints about the oil flowing across the lower coils, so they apparently added the extension.

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I have a hypothesis -- but it doesn't logically make sense. If the drain extension increases the oil holding capacity and if your dip stick is the same length as mine it should read low with 330mL of oil. If your dip stick is longer than mine it should read as it has done. I think your crank case, because of the drain extension, can hold more than 330mL of oil? If that's the case I would assume it's about levels not capacity so I can't logically think of a reason to increase the dip stick size.

I haven't tried to estimate the capacity of the extension, but it is probably negligible. I'm not expecting that to be a difference. 

One thing that does make a difference is the number of stages. Mine has three and is the MCH3 which has the sight glass. Ray told me that the MCH6 has no sight glass.

I took some measurements of the oil tower and the distance down to the full line and edited them into my last posting above.

Yours seems to be what I would expect - oil in the sight glass at the line marked on the casting.

Mine seems to be different. I was not even that high on mine when it was above the dipstick full mark.You'd think the level on the casting would be the definitive one, based on where the crank is. I checked with AoA and they were very clear to go by dipstick or measured oil and not the sight glass. The only way I can imagine that my dipstick reads so differently from the sight glass is some mechanical difference there. The drain tube makes a small difference to the measured oil, but not to the sight glass to dipstick comparison.

Anyway, I measured 330ml so it should be fine. And lowering the level did seem to reduce the bubbles in the breather and the oil in the inlet particulate filter housing. So the compressor seems to be happy.

I'll look at the photo in a bit, need to run some errands. Thanks.

When you both filled the unit did you remove the crankcase nut prior to and during filling to allow for positive pressure air displacement? Thanks in advance!

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Yes, I followed the Nuvair Oil Change Video and used 300ml of oil. No sight glass and dipstick inserted all the way down shows oil level in middle of min. and max. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxmjRydJB7Q&t=9s

The distance that matters is from the underside part of the cap that sits on the tower rather than the top. And of course the height of that tower from the casting.

In terms of the dipstick itself, I see about the same, 7-11/16 from the top end to the full line (with the top at 1").

Awhile back I started getting tape measures that have both inches and metric on them. Very handy, much easier to measure most things in mm, but both scales are there when the need arises.

One thing that does make a difference is the number of stages. Mine has three and is the MCH3 which has the sight glass. Ray told me that the MCH6 has no sight glass.

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I'm on a LC-110 from AOA, it's indeed an MCH3. What I find interesting is the evolution and changes on yours. If others think it useful I might scan my manual too because the images of the LC110 in the manual don't exactly match up with what I've got. I also saw no mention of run times and cool times in any of the documentation I received. Either way very much appreciate your images and sharing, great stuff to compare and constrast.

We know the product has evolved a bit since introduction. 4 Stages to 3, probably started with MCH6 frame and went to MCH3, 15.2 amp motor went to 14.5 amp. The 4500 psi auto shutoff was added. as was the oil drain extension. 

Tidbits from the Manuals

I found the MCH3-low consumption manual on the web, it is very close to the Daystate paper manual I have. I'm not shure if this link will work: https://en.calameo.com/read/0045936549f35c2cd2816, but searching for "coltri mch3 low consumption manual" should work.

Just looking through my Daystate paper manual and the online Coltri MCH-3 low consumption pdf manual I noticed a few interesting things. There is so much in the manual, seems like I find something new each time I look.

The stated capacity of the oil sump is, in both manuals, 0.35 liters. The text of the Daystate letter that came with my compressor says to add 0.33 liters of oil. The text of the Daystate paper manual and the Coltri online pdf say to put in 0.30 liters of oil. Perhaps the 30 ml is the difference for the extended drain tube, but this seems like too much. It was mentioned that 0.30 brings the level to midrange, my experience is that 0.33 brings it to the full line. Either way it is nice to get 3 oil changes per liter of oil. I think the four stage MCH6 uses 0.5 liters of oil.

They mention under storage to run the compressor for 20 minutes every 15 days when stored. They also mention fogging with oil into the intake when storing, but they don't specify which oil. 

The Daystate paper manual has a schematic that is marked MCH6. The Coltri MCH3 pdf manual has a slightly different schematic which is marked MCH3. They differ in small details and symbols but are essentially equivalent. The online MCH3 low consumption manual schematic clearly shows the pair of four connector blocks and the connection of the "Contaore" to a spade lug on each of the blocks. On my LC-110 these blocks each have an open lug. They are connected to the hot and neutral of the 120V AC after the control switch/relay. "Contaore" is hour meter in Italian, so this is where an AC hour meter can be connected. I don't see much space in the housing to fit one, but the connections are available.

In the Daystate paper manual on page 25 section 6 "Using the Compressor" it says 100 minutes continuous use, 30 minutes cooling. This table also is found in the same section in the Coltri MCH3 low consumption pdf manual. It is hard to find, even though I knew to look for it and have seen it before. The print is very small in these manuals, and it is half in Italian, so it makes for a lot of pages that are not easy to look at. I did translate the oil level section and the English talks about the dipstick where the Italian talks about the sight glass.

Sorry to ramble, so many useful tidbits. I'm preparing an "Operational Summary" for my compressor to work from. A one page cheat sheet with some specs and procedures all collected into one place.

Here's a 3D printed a first article (in draft mode) of the filter top I designed. I cut off the top of an exhausted filter tube and this new top slides into the remaining cartridge tube. It looks like it will work, however I have not function tested it yet. There's a built in grid at the bottom and it uses a lower O ring whereas the standard top is glued into the tube. The plan is to use a filter pad below it and molecular sieve material under that. The resulting column of MS will be a few mm longer than the stock cartridge was. A pound of first-rate molecular sieve material costs about the same as the whole filter cartridge, and will repack it a half dozen times. Drying the MS material would save even more, however is not all that easy to do. MS holds onto moisture much more tenaciously than silica dessicant, MS needs 200-315C for hours to dry it, and cooling it without re-saturating it with water is not all that easy unless you have a vacuum oven and inert dry gas to flood it with. Note that the binders in MS may be carcinogenic, minimize exposure.

The simple plan is to buy pre-activated 13X Molecular Sieve (8x12 mesh) material a pound at a time and store it (in the packaging) within an airtight steel military ammo can, fill a cartridge right before use on a cool morning to minimize exposure to moisture in the air. These cans hold a slight pressure or vacuum for years when changing altitudes, so they must have a pretty good seal. Note that cheap MS may have some issues, but good stuff is about $25-30 shipped from reputable sources. It can be much cheaper if you buy quantity but this is one case where buying more may just mean that you have more going bad before you get to use it.

Just checked the strip on my filter and it's nearly all white, so It's time to place an order. 

How much air have you pumped through that filter?

My first filter came pre-saturated, probably a leak in the packaging. The second filter was fine.

They replaced the first with a direct from the factory shipment. I won't open that till I'm ready to use it. I will try one of my refills next. When I put it together with activated MS the strip should turn back to blue.

I put the empty tube into the ammo case with the package of fresh MS for awhile. After a week or so it started to turn back to blue, even though the package of dessicant is unopened. I've read that the plastic bags don't stop moisture for long. It has to be metal or metal foil or a thick plastic bottle. Next time I buy MS I'll probably buy the type that comes in a plastic bottle with screw-on lid, and still store it in the metal sealed ammo box.

Perhaps when I open this MS package I will transfer it into some type of bottle.

I checked the filter strip in my LC-110 with Coltri filter tower today, and it is still blue. I haven't done many fills so would be surprised if it were otherwise at this point.

Only a couple hours on mine. I think the Coltri hour meter would be a good investment, I do not trust the vibration hour meter that I have. Good info on the filter storage, I would not have known the plastic bag was not sufficient. I like your home rolled filter.

Here's the 3d printable case I designed for an Amazon AC type hour meter. 





Save the old filters for later conversions to refillable.