Foam Brush Issues

[spf8298]

I've got a 3 bay self serve with a home-made foam brush set up. It's not ideal, but It was that way when I purchased. It does have two manifold blocks (air and product), two regulators with gauges (one controls pressure to flo-jet and one to the air mainfold), and a solution tank that the flo-jet pulls out of. The lines are all 1/4" poly and they are tee'd together in the equipment room with single 1/4" lines going out to the foam brush.

The set-up is very touchy. I usually set the air pressure to the flo-jet at 55-60 and the air pressure to the air manifold at 45-50 and most of the time this makes decent foam. Lately, I just can't get it set with out the product coming out liquidy.

My question is, what can be done to improve the product show? Would running two lines out to each bay and teeing above the boom help? My manifold blacks each have metering ajustability. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Keno]

Sounds to me like your solution isn't strong enough, dump a little straight soap into your hydrominder tank and see how it looks after that.

 

[Randy]

I'd probably do what Keno has suggested first and if that works go up one tip size to get strong solution. You might want to think about building a Foam generator. I have the same type of set up the air and the solution meet in the equipment room and I have one line going out to the bay. But I have a foam generator in the equipment room that the air and solution are tee'd into. I get shaving cream foam out in the bay.

 

[edredtop]

I've got a 3 bay self serve with a home-made foam brush set up. It's not ideal, but It was that way when I purchased. It does have two manifold blocks (air and product), two regulators with gauges (one controls pressure to flo-jet and one to the air mainfold), and a solution tank that the flo-jet pulls out of. The lines are all 1/4" poly and they are tee'd together in the equipment room with single 1/4" lines going out to the foam brush.

The set-up is very touchy. I usually set the air pressure to the flo-jet at 55-60 and the air pressure to the air manifold at 45-50 and most of the time this makes decent foam. Lately, I just can't get it set with out the product coming out liquidy.

My question is, what can be done to improve the product show? Would running two lines out to each bay and teeing above the boom help? My manifold blacks each have metering ajustability. Any help would be appreciated.

If you have a home made set up (nothing wrong with that) you may have some components are 10-20 years old or older. One thing to get rid of is any old aluminum mixing blocks out at the bays (if any) and replace any flex hoses after the mix occurs but before the brush boom. This is a common area where soap build up occurs and will significantly slow down, stop, or screw up a good brush soap show. Totally agree a good first test is to add some pure soap to the mix and see what happens.

 

[Greg Pack]

If your foam generators get clogged the product you can have that symptom. I've even had to replace the hoses going to the brush due to buildup so keep that in mind.

 

[Earl Weiss]

The lines are all 1/4" poly and they are tee'd together in the equipment room with single 1/4" lines going out to the foam brush.

T

I think trying to push foam any distance thru a 1/4" line is an issue. You could try making the line 1/2 Braided or go the route of T'ng above Boom and see which works best. Report Back.