How to keep a bottle of shielding gas warm enough??

[AthlonAJ]

Hello, first time on here so I hope to learn from everyone! Here's the situation, the place I am living at now has no heat in the garage and I've asked about installing a heater but that's a no go. So since I'm only renting this place for less than a year I need to find an economical solution for keeping my sheilding gas from getting so cold it causes problems. I use my welder quite a bit and to run the portable LP heater I have long enough to warm up the bottle is just a real pain. I was thinking of using some sort of heating pad to wrap around the tank, such as what is used for livestock since they are cheap and easy to get around here. Someone else told me that they actually make a bottle warmer for this very purpose but I have yet to find one.

Any ideas or solutions? Again, keep in mind I'm just renting this place for under a year and it needs to be fairly economical. Thanks!

[Guest]

Welcome to the forum, AthlonAJ...you will find your answer here, I'm sure...sorry I can't be of much help.....I'm in CA never snows where I am. You might try a search, as I think this has been discussed before....Enjoy

[jimic]

warming bottle

Check into a bottle warmer like the ones used for nitrous bottles in cars any speed shop should carry these I've never used them but would figure they would work since you have to keep nitrous warm for it to even work.

[Arc Burn]

My shop is only heated when i'm in it,that being said,i have gone in there in the morning(or anytime for that matter)and welded with no problems,sometimes it's not worth turning the heat on for a 20 minute job and yes it gets cold here,wind chills were -15to-25 below just last night,i have never had any issues with my bottles being cold,hope someone here has some more insight on that for you.

[AthlonAJ]

Dang, I was hoping to use this as an excuse to move to a warmer climate. So maybe the cold isn't as big of an issue then? Arc Burn, are you using a mixed gas? I guess my thinking was that with a mixed gas that the properties being slightly different, with extreme cold one might become heavier than the other or some goofy thing like that and cause a "richer" mix of one from the other. Did that make any sense?

[Arc Burn]

I run C-25 for shielding gas and as far as cold is concerned it can give false tank gauge readings from cold to warm with oxygen,not sure about mixed gases,i really never thought of an effect on the C-25 i just know i have never had any problems using it cold.Sorry for the bad news

[Franz]

Arcbrun, it ain't a problem in Iowa, and it ain't a problem in New York. If you're working on the North Slope, it can become a problem.
Are you becoming concerned because the outside of your bottle is freezing up or frosting?
What sort of problem are you encountering?

[Arc Burn]

Franz,our pal AJ was asking about the cold bottles,i was telling him i have not had any problems with them here in New York,he is from Iowa!

[AthlonAJ]

Yeah I was just wondering about the effects of cold weather on a gas mix such as CO2 and argon, that is all. Thanks guys.

[Roger]

100% CO2 in full cylinder is 830 PSIG @ 70 F. Most of the gas will be liquid in that bottle so only way to tell how full is by weight. In a full cylinder of C25 shielding gas the CO2 partial pressure is 562 PSIG. At at temps lower than 70 F the CO2 will change to liquid at pressures lower than 850 PSI. When CO2 gas in your cylinder changes to liquid it it lowers the % of CO2 in gas mix untill the CO2 starts changing back to gas. Then your CO2 gas % will be higher. Your gas dealer can charge cylinder to lower pressure to keep your CO2 in Mix in gas state for expected temps. He should have charts showing for given temp co2 will liquify at what pressure.

I'm in Florida and don't worry about it.
Not good to weld real cold steel.

[Will]

Roger is right on with his comments about the C25 mix. The partial pressure issue is the reason you sometimes see the gas go "bad" near the end of the bottle.

[Roger]

CO2 vapor pressure is temperature related. As long as HP cylinder contains both liquid and gas, CO2 cylinder's pressure gage indicates vapor pressure at that temperature.

Quick down load. Vapor pressure chart is in box on left upper corner of graph.

http://www.warpig.com/paintball/technical/gasses/co2pv.gif

Metric CO2 Vapor Pressure Graph.

http://www.airliquide.com/en/business/products/gases/gasdata/images%5CVaporPressureGraph%5CCarbon_dioxide_Vapor_Pressure.GIF

Nice CO2 Vapor Pressure Calculator at bottom of this web page.

http://www.eatel.net/~amptech/elecdisc/rifledemos.htm

If CO2 pressure in cylinder is below the vapor pressure all the CO2 in the cylinder is in gas state. If the Partial Pressure (PP) of CO2 in cylinder is below vapor pressure all CO2 in cylinder is in gas state.

If a CO2 or Propane tank was filled beyond its full weight then not enough gas space might be left for liquid expansion with temperature increase. So I think this link's opening statement is a little misleading.

http://www.reefscapes.net/articles/breefcase/co2_tanks.html

[ampdog]

Hey guy's, what about Argon? A month or so ago when we were having that really cold spurt (teens/single digits) I had a new tank of Argon that had been sitting for a couple of weeks while I was welding steel. The CO2 tank was fine, but when I went to hook up the Argon tank I had no pressure. Could that have been because of the cold?

[Will]

Argon is stored differently. Is is pressurized, but not enough to make it a liquid in the bottle (at any reasonable temperature). The pressure in the tank is dependent on both the volume of gas left in the bottle and the temperature of the gas. The colder your tank is, the less pressure it will have. So if your tank is getting low, it may not feed any gas when it gets too cold.

[Roger]

Yes you will have Argon pressure changes in a gas cylinder with temprature changes but much less than what happens to CO2. I have jumped into c c c cold salt water within sight of Diomede Islands with full scuba tank before and after entering water. I could s s see no p p pressure change due to temprature change. That was with 1/4 inch wet suit in July right after ice melted.

If your Argon gas was close to running out at 32 degree F it was almost as close to running out at 70 degree F.