Quite an air compressor

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Ive got a 60 gal. Air Compressor in a garage. This is also a work space for cnc machine tools. I need to make this compressor quieter. Im thinking about building a platform just below the working top end and the setting a box over the top end that will rest on the platform. Of course I’ll have to leave room on the box for ventilation.
I am looking at acoustic tiles and the box will either be a frame that I would attach the tiles to or a physical box which i would glue the tiles to the inside of the box.
I have no experience with any of this.
I dont know how much sound deadening to expect, if it will even be worth the effort.
Im hoping someone on here will have some experience with this and may have some pointers.

Heres a pic of the air compressor if that helps

[Lex Luthier]

Ive got a 60 gal. Air Compressor in a garage. This is also a work space for cnc machine tools. I need to make this compressor quieter. Im thinking about building a platform just below the working top end and the setting a box over the top end that will rest on the platform. Of course I’ll have to leave room on the box for ventilation.
I am looking at acoustic tiles and the box will either be a frame that I would attach the tiles to or a physical box which i would glue the tiles to the inside of the box.
I have no experience with any of this.
I dont know how much sound deadening to expect, if it will even be worth the effort.
Im hoping someone on here will have some experience with this and may have some pointers.

Heres a pic of the air compressor if that helps

Not sure about acoustically isolating the compressor portion; you'll have to experiment. You will likely have to dampen the resonance of the tank to really muffle it. Right now it's a large echo chamber.
I bet 1/2 of a water heater insulation blanket wrapped around the straight wall portion would work well.

[baddean]

Foam ear plugs or gun muffs? A friend of mine does this when he uses the blast cabinet.
Another friend moved his outside behind his garage and built a small roof overhang over it and ran a pipe through the wall with an air hose attachment inside.
Or completely enclose it in the garage with a louvred opening to the outside so it can draw air in.
JRB beat me to it while I was editing. What he said.

[JRB]

I've been down this path a few times. Get some simple plywood sheeting or any other wood sheet really and just build a whole enclosure for it. Line the inside of the enclosure with cheap knockoff dynamat or similar sound deadening material. Cheap thick heavy stuff that would suck for a car works great here. Cheap hinges and a cheap latch for access on one side, and put a garage vent or similar into the bottom for airflow and duct the heat exchanger to outside the cabinet using the same wood and knockoff dynamat.
Ideally, put this outside your garage with some cheap shingles and 'roof' and then run a PVC pipe into the garage along one wall with suitable fittings to act as air supply. You can even hang a reel or two if you want - but don't hang them from the ceiling or another out of reach spot, it's a bitch to untangle or get them if they reel all the way back up.

In my experience, the water heater jacket thing doesn't work so well, as it retains heat inside the cylinder and the cylinder often acts as a heat sink of sorts for the compressor.
Good old PV=nRT also tells us that keeping it hotter reduces the amount of air mass in the cylinder for a given pressure, meaning the compressor will have to run more with a high-load air tool(s).

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All good info for more thought before i actually start cutting wood and ordering material. I also just considered a fan on a timer so when the compressor quits running i could force air over the fins for a set amount of time to aid in cooling.

[Lex Luthier]

I've been down this path a few times. Get some simple plywood sheeting or any other wood sheet really and just build a whole enclosure for it. Line the inside of the enclosure with cheap knockoff dynamat or similar sound deadening material. Cheap thick heavy stuff that would suck for a car works great here. Cheap hinges and a cheap latch for access on one side, and put a garage vent or similar into the bottom for airflow and duct the heat exchanger to outside the cabinet using the same wood and knockoff dynamat.
Ideally, put this outside your garage with some cheap shingles and 'roof' and then run a PVC pipe into the garage along one wall with suitable fittings to act as air supply. You can even hang a reel or two if you want - but don't hang them from the ceiling or another out of reach spot, it's a bitch to untangle or get them if they reel all the way back up.

In my experience, the water heater jacket thing doesn't work so well, as it retains heat inside the cylinder and the cylinder often acts as a heat sink of sorts for the compressor.
Good old PV=nRT also tells us that keeping it hotter reduces the amount of air mass in the cylinder for a given pressure, meaning the compressor will have to run more with a high-load air tool(s).

This is gold, JRB. Thanks for proving me wrong! (I will be setting up an air system myself in the future and this is all good to know.)

[Welder]

Especially if you're starting out fresh, I wouldn't recommend PVC as an appropriate material for any part of a shop air system, although plenty of people use it. There are also BOOM! stories because PVC doesn't like to be whacked under pressure. A boom at 175 PSI is a big one. My favorite material for air lines is copper. No rust, easy (for me) to add onto or modify, and simple. There are other options that allow you to build your own system without soldering or special tools, but I'm old school.

You will lose a fair amount of your compressor noise if you pipe the intake outside. The intakes are often just NPT so you can adapt and do whatever you want with it; you don't have to use the provided filter. I've seen people use snorkel-type air cleaners on them like the old carbureted and TBI engines used, I've seen Donaldson industrial air filters used, etc.

[UNK]

Especially if you're starting out fresh, I wouldn't recommend PVC as an appropriate material for any part of a shop air system, although plenty of people use it. There are also BOOM! stories because PVC doesn't like to be whacked under pressure. A boom at 175 PSI is a big one. My favorite material for air lines is copper. No rust, easy (for me) to add onto or modify, and simple. There are other options that allow you to build your own system without soldering or special tools, but I'm old school.

You will lose a fair amount of your compressor noise if you pipe the intake outside. The intakes are often just NPT so you can adapt and do whatever you want with it; you don't have to use the provided filter. I've seen people use snorkel-type air cleaners on them like the old carbureted and TBI engines used, I've seen Donaldson industrial air filters used, etc.

When you say fair amount is there a way you can quantify that? Like % wise. Not expecting noise meter readings accuracy.
I piped an intake for a certified fresh air supply machine at Donaldson once. It was like artwork following the contours of the building took me all night to do it. Then found out too many turns and loss of air flow caused the unit to alarm.
This was for a huge blast room you could have driven a tractor trailer into. There were augers under the floor to return the silicone media for re use.

[Welder]

When you say fair amount is there a way you can quantify that? Like % wise. Not expecting noise meter readings accuracy.
I piped an intake for a certified fresh air supply machine at Donaldson once. It was like artwork following the contours of the building took me all night to do it. Then found out too many turns and loss of air flow caused the unit to alarm.
This was for a huge blast room you could have driven a tractor trailer into. There were augers under the floor to return the silicone media for re use.

Well....it's not going to be whisper quiet...but a lot of the noise from the compressor is actually coming out of the intake. It'd be worth trying if your compressor is right beside your outside wall and the intake can easily be made to aim the right way. I'm talking about a run of pipe 2' or less, full diameter, straight shot, no elbows.

I can't really quantify as I've sold my big shop compressor and now just use a pancake inside. The only big compressor I have left is on one of my trucks. But I think if you read on garagejournal some, you'll find this discussed in detail there and there might be some % changes discussed in there.

[UNK]

Well....it's not going to be whisper quiet...but a lot of the noise from the compressor is actually coming out of the intake. It'd be worth trying if your compressor is right beside your outside wall and the intake can easily be made to aim the right way. I'm talking about a run of pipe 2' or less, full diameter, straight shot, no elbows.

I can't really quantify as I've sold my big shop compressor and now just use a pancake inside. The only big compressor I have left is on one of my trucks. But I think if you read on garagejournal some, you'll find this discussed in detail there and there might be some % changes discussed in there.

Headed there now to take a look. Thanks.