Looking for a decent Dryer....opinions please!

[Bearded Lady]

I have a 2010 Fusion for sale.  4 panel. 36" wide/ 10ft long.  3 phase- electric.  I'm in Austin TX

[Sbrem]

get something with gas, for the savings in energy. We run mostly plastisol, a little discharge here and there, and the difference is hundreds of dollars a month... For our largest dryer, we used to have the same model in all electric, much more expensive to run.

Steve

[CBCB]

We sell the BBC series and we have a Air3610 we use here for direct to garment inks, which are waterbased. It works well for our needs but I haven't used them for screen printed waterbased inks. If needed, I can get you some feedback on that combo.

I'm definitely interested in how the BBC performs.


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[mimosatexas]

i definitely need a new wedding dress for my shop. thank you for the valuable and entirely on topic contribution to our site.

[Prince Art]

i definitely need a new wedding dress for my shop. thank you for the valuable and entirely on topic contribution to our site.

lol 

[alan802]

Too many people decide early on that gas is not an option for them.  I can tell you that our average monthly electrical costs went from around $1250 per month to $550-700 per month when we got our Sprint gas dryer.  We were using a combo gas/electric dryer before that was very good except it cost a ton to run.  What others have said, I don't trust WB/DC on an electric dryer, plus I'd literally do whatever it takes or at least exhaust every option before I'd rule gas out.  Being able to install a small tank that would run a dryer for a few weeks pretty much allows most everyone to go gas these days.  You'll save several hundred dollars a month at a minimum, or you could see $500 or more by switching from electric to gas, you'll not have to worry about a bottleneck if running WB/DC like you most certainly will running an electric unit.

[kingscreen]

Too many people decide early on that gas is not an option for them.  I can tell you that our average monthly electrical costs went from around $1250 per month to $550-700 per month when we got our Sprint gas dryer.

I'm sure it's been discussed, but what increase did you see in your gas bill?  Did the $500+/- difference just move from your electric bill to your gas bill?

[Frog]

Too many people decide early on that gas is not an option for them.  I can tell you that our average monthly electrical costs went from around $1250 per month to $550-700 per month when we got our Sprint gas dryer.

I'm sure it's been discussed, but what increase did you see in your gas bill?  Did the $500+/- difference just move from your electric bill to your gas bill?

I think that even though this calculator is used mostly for home appliances, it may help here as well if one has the values to enter.
http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/gas.html

[alan802]

Too many people decide early on that gas is not an option for them.  I can tell you that our average monthly electrical costs went from around $1250 per month to $550-700 per month when we got our Sprint gas dryer.

I'm sure it's been discussed, but what increase did you see in your gas bill?  Did the $500+/- difference just move from your electric bill to your gas bill?

The gas bill stayed relatively the same.  It went up slightly but it was so insignificant that I never paid much attention to it.  The new dryer was way more efficient, and had 2 more feet of chamber length and 12" wider belt.  The old dryer was 20+ years old, 10' chamber with 4 radiant panels along with gas.  We could have run the dryer as either gas or electric but using them both together allowed us to run a 48" belt with 10' heat chamber at a fast pace.  We had to lower the belt speed too much to run the dryer as an "either/or" and obviously running it with just the radiant panels was extremely inefficient.  And to be honest, at the time, my knowledge and understanding of how best to use that dryer was not good, and we could have probably run it as a 75% gas, 25% electric or some combination like that, and lowered our electrical costs.  But every time I tried to play around with the settings we were scorching goods or undercuring on the other end.  I also did not have a donut probe at that time and that could have helped a ton.

I have the exact numbers written down somewhere on how much money we saved per month when upgrading, but going off of memory from 4-5 years ago I think it was around $600/month.  Some months were more and some were less, but it was more than enough to pay for the new dryer.  Any shop out there that is running a good sized electrical dryer needs to do whatever they can to upgrade to gas, it will pay for itself.

[Steve Harpold]

The old dryer was 20+ years old, 10' chamber with 4 radiant panels along with gas.  We could have run the dryer as either gas or electric but using them both together allowed us to run a 48" belt with 10' heat chamber at a fast pace.  We had to lower the belt speed too much to run the dryer as an "either/or" and obviously running it with just the radiant panels was extremely inefficient.  And to be honest, at the time, my knowledge and understanding of how best to use that dryer was not good, and we could have probably run it as a 75% gas, 25% electric or some combination like that, and lowered our electrical costs.  But every time I tried to play around with the settings we were scorching goods or undercuring on the other end.  I also did not have a donut probe at that time and that could have helped a ton.


The above quote is referring to the emissivity of an object.  If you had a probe at the time you would have found that every object absorbs radiant energy at a different rate. If you set the dryer to use the radiant energy to a point and the air to hold that point you would have created the most efficient accurate dryer in the world. However every garment type and ink in the garments would require a different setting that would near impossible to track every time. The idea behind the concept (every dryer manufacturer tried) is because of your other statement you could run a much shorter dryer faster if you used the radiant energy.

Fast forward the dryer above is the Fire Fly using a thermal imager to write the algorithm making it the most accurate, efficient dryer in the world. However in the USA currently energy rates are very inexpensive and provide very long ROI's.  The ROI for a new dryer in not cases is accuracy, consistency and a faster through put for WAterbase, HSA and specialty ink types.

Below is the math behind energy rates:
To see a big saving you need a electric dryer that is currently more than 100 amps minimum. The ROI will still be almost 15 years!

The energy costs for most of you right now are irrelevant. Energy is at lowest point in history so your gas dryer would cost almost 3 time more 7 years ago than they do today simply due to energy cost. Cost per therm (to verify look at the cost of natural gas at the well head in 2010 vs the cost at well head in 2017).  You pay more than at the well head but the numbers will give you an idea of what it looks like.

By the numbers (I posted and energyncomparison sheet a while ago you can use to compare)
Dryer A electric (assumes 100% utilization which is likely close to 80%)
80 amps * 208 v =  16,640 watts or 16.6 KW
You pay by KW
It is likely in the us you KW cost is under .08
16.6 KW * .08 = 1.32 pr/hr

Dryer B gas
Electric (blowers and burners)
30 amps * 208V = 6,240 watts 04 6.2 KW
6.2 Kw * .08 = .49 pr/hr
Gas Usage
Burner 280,000 btu burner
Utilization 60%
168,000 btu pr/hr or 1.68 therms (most of you pay on therms some pay on mmbtu)
Cost pr/therm = in US likely no more than .70 cents per therm.
1.68 therms * .70 = 1.176

1.176 + .49 = 1.67 pr/hr

The Fire Fly is likely 60% more efficient that both models listed above but the numbers are significant enough to produce a ROI on energy efficieny (unless you have a 2 burner gas dryer or a electric dryer over 100 amps)

I can repost the spread sheet if it helps!