[guru_florida]

Hi,

I was planning on branching the Loc-Line mister I have so I can have a tri-nozzle mister. When I took off the nozzle to add a Y I noticed isndie the Loc-Line is a 1/4" tube, and inside that a micro-tube. I had no idea that the mister had this embedded tubing. Now I am not sure how to add the Y adapters, or even if I can. I have confirmed that the air/coolant mixture is coming through the microtube and not the 1/4" one. I'd have to get microtube Y's as well I guess. Or do I have to buy new mist blocks and Y the air and coolant lines separately. Anyone know how to do this? Seems so easy but I'm stumped. haha

[dharmic]

If yours is the same as mine it has a brass or aluminium block at the other end from the nozzle where you can plug in your air and coolant. Mine came as an assembly all made up, they were only a few bucks from fleaBay. So I bought two and run the t-pieces for air and coolant feeds externally into those blocks which in turn feed their respective nozzles.

[guru_florida]

Thanks dharmic, I was thinking the same after I posted. Yes, I have the same setup and they are cheap enough. For a test I did a single Y branch right near the end of the line with about 4 segments to each branch after the Y. Although this will suffice until I get multiple mist blocks the air is imbalanced as I expected. For branching the air and coolant before the blocks I might use 2 manifold blocks...not for any reason other than it will probably look cool. lol

[dharmic]

FWIW I find it pretty difficult to balance both my nozzles using the siphon even with the Y connections before the blocks. I tend to get it coming out one side, with the other pushing air back up the inner tube into the Y so I end up with pulses of coolant from one jet and only air from the other.

I'm going to take another Y from the airline back on the machine (before I run air and coolant through the cable chains etc), running one through to the air inlet on the nozzles and the other through a needle valve to pressurise the coolant reservoir in the hope that some positive pressure will stop that issue and even things out. We'll see...

[guru_florida]

I was wondering that. I just bought 3 coolant blocks after my last message and decided I would run all 3 coolant lines back to the coolant bottle and would Y the air only. The air is pushing through the Y, but the coolant is being pulled via the Venturi effect so any tube could pull from the other tube through a Y causing it to back-draw (word?). If the three air/coolant mix dials were not exactly correct then that would cause enough imbalance for the more powerful line to draw from the weaker ones. You might be able to fix your situation too if you get rid of your coolant line Y and run the three back of them back to the bottle. I will let you know how I get along.

[dharmic]

Good thinking. That should work nicely, except: I am running the coolant along the cable chains of the router and there ain't room for three of them. It'd sure be the easiest way of getting them all to work, though, if you have the room to run independent hoses back to the reservoir.

[guru_florida]

I can confirm that leading the 3 coolant feeds back to the source but branching the air works fine. The coolant tubes I have are microtubes about 1/8th so they were pretty easy to route. My air (3/8") and two VFD cooling tubes (1/4") are rigid enough they basically act like a C-chain so all the tubes route outside the C-chain.