Filtering air in detail shop

S

StadiumDetail

New member
Hello all. I've been lurking around for about a year now learning a ton from all of you, but I have a question that i've never seen asked before.



I own what I've seen referenced here as a high volume shop. Thanks to the info here I feel I'm a cut above the rest and have higher standards, but the majority of my details are only wash, wax, interior, engine.



Anywho, enough background. I do about 25 car+ per week and come winter the roll up doors will be closed to keep in the heat as best as I can. My biggest concern, seeing what happened last winter with 5ish cars/week, is the airosol sprays I use (similar to Black Again) and my APC in a tornodo sprayer (look into one if you never heard of it. Simply awesome), putting a lot of filth and product in the air. The airosol is the worst, and I may just have to do away with it, but I'm wondering what the rest of the shop owners on the forum do.

Is there an air filteration system that works?

I've looked into putting an exaust fan in the wall to change the air in the shop. Anyone with experience here?



I'd rather filter than exaust the air since I don't want to loose my heat, but health is far more important. Price is also important. I'm just about caught up from inital start up costs and within a month or two of turning a profit after just over a year of business, the last thing I want to do is bury myself again.



Any suggestions are welcome. The shop has three walls exposed to the outside (basically a corner building), single story, family owns the building so improvements aren't an issue, and I know contractors/electricians that can do any work.



Thanks in advance guys.

Andy
 
That's a good idea WAS. Does it intake have a pretty strong pull or no? I'm asking because I did leave out an important piece of information. The shop is 60'x80' with a 12' high roof, so 4800sq. ft. or 57000cu. ft. The actual detailing bays are a little larger than the size of a Surburban with lighting all around, but there are no walls it is just a section in the shop.



If I were to hang a fan driven filter like you suggested above the car, would it have enough pull to draw the fumes in or am I wasting my time looking for a filtration system?





Let me also add that I'm not entirely stupid :) , I'm pretty sure I have to stick with an exaust fan to change out all the air in the shop to keep it healthy. I know this shop is larger than average and a little hanging filter from WalMart isn't really going to cut it, but there are a lot of shop owners from all around the world in all climates at this forum and rather than waste a bunch of money experimenting I thought maybe someone has this problem as well.
 
Finding it kinda funny that 2 guys from Canada are answering your post about exhausting warm air when you live in Texas.



Something that isn't thought about enough is personal health.



While HEPA is good for dusts, carbon is better for chemicals.



You could make your own HEPA with a 3M furnace filter, box and fan.



You could also make a carbon filter with a semi air filter, 15 lbs of carbon and a fan.



You could also exhaust the air into a different room, so you don't loose heat.



To make any system work you will have to think about quite a few things. Like positive/negative pressure, air flow, filter material and among other things fan noise.



Sorry for the vague answers, but the easiest way is the pull in fresh air and exhaust spent air.
 
Salty, thanks a lot! You gave me a few new ideas to work with that I hadn't thought of. Exausting into another room is an option, and I don't see pressures being an issue since that room is about half the size of this one, so more than enough air to compensate.



I'm also very intrigued about making my own filter system, it seems simple enough from what you described. I guess it's time for some googling now :)
 
salty said:
You could make your own HEPA with a 3M furnace filter, box and fan.
Click to expand...



Er...unless you're just throwing the term "HEPA" around loosely, you're not going to get HEPA filtration with a furnace filter. Real HEPA filters with 99+% efficiency are reallly big and have a lot of pressure drop, requiring big fans, strong housings, etc.



Even one of those big Aprilaire or similar whole house filters which is MERV 7 or 8 is no more than 70% efficient on 3 micron particles, and not rated for 0.3 microns. The HEPA - Definition from Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary states 99.97% efficiency for 0.3 micron particles.



I'm just saying ;)
 
True, just loosely used the term HEPA for his purpose, I don't think he needs to filter viruses etc.



Another way to clear your area is a ceiling fan sucking up or a fan blowing away from you.
 
salty said:
True, just loosely used the term HEPA for his purpose, I don't think he needs to filter viruses etc.



Another way to clear your area is a ceiling fan sucking up or a fan blowing away from you.
Click to expand...



The fan idea is roughly what i am going to try. Planning on buying a cheap fan from Wal Mart or something and attaching a carbon filter to the intake side. Going to hang the fan above and centered to the detailing bays (1 fan each bay) blowing up towards the ceiling. What kind of filter/fan combo I'm going to use is still up in the air, but I think I'm just going to start cheap and go from there. No reason to buy $50 filters if the $10 ones do the same work for my purposes.



Once winter hits and we close the doors I'll post results. I have a feeling if it works well and I can keep this under $100 many here will be interested. As for now it is just finding a little free time to experiment.
 
StadiumDetail said:
That's a good idea WAS. Does it intake have a pretty strong pull or no? I'm asking because I did leave out an important piece of information. The shop is 60'x80' with a 12' high roof, so 4800sq. ft. or 57000cu. ft. The actual detailing bays are a little larger than the size of a Surburban with lighting all around, but there are no walls it is just a section in the shop.
Click to expand...

The pull on ours is pretty impressive. Our new shop is going to be 18'x40'x12', which is much bigger than we have now, so I'm estimating we will need 6 units to adequately filter the air.
 
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