Ive had my eye on those Husky 60 gal air compressors for a while. They goin for $400, me and a buddy were gonna go 50/50, but hes tight on money now with a new house, and hes gonna be tight for a while. So I was at Home Depot lookin around and I saw a used compressor for $319! From the looks of it the motor seized or something, had a recon motor on it (dual piston). I really wanna get it sinceI can just buy it outright, but Im lookin for personal opinions about this compressor. Ive heard that Campbell-hausefield (sp?) had some descrepencies on their labeling, bsaically the motor "can" make 7hp, but usually runs at 2hp. They seem pretty stout, cast iron compressor, dual piston, oiled, all that good stuff. What chall think? And how can you tell the difference between single and dual stage compressors? Not the motor, the compressor. Someone told me a while back that just because it has 2 pistons it doesnt mean its a 2 stage compressor. But what exactly does this mean?

I am not fond of the cheap stuff, but if you don't work it hard it can be ok.

If you look around one thing you will notice is that the ratings are often stating as "running" HP. On some of the bigger compressors you will notice they list an HP rating and a "peak" output. I think they are all pretty much required these days to put something on the rating to state if the HP is a peak or running rating.

Another way to check this out is to look at the power requirements, but then you have to have an idea as to what a true 5HP motor draws versus a 5HP running motor. The 5HP peak motors I have seen usually ask for a 220V 20A circuit.

It is true that a two cylinder compressor could be a single or dual stage compressor. A single stage compressor has the air go in to a cylinder, compress, and go directly to the tank. If there are multiple pistons they all work this way, they are just in parallel so that each is pulling from the atmosphere and pumping in to the tank.

A dual stage compressor has one (or sometimes two in parallel) cylinders that compress air from the atmosphere. Rather than the compressed air output going in to the tank it goes in to another smaller cylinder. There the air is compressed again to a higher pressure. The output from this smaller cylinder goes in to the tank.

The single stage two cylinder compressor has more displaced pump volume and therefore can pump more air at low pressures. As the pressure in the tank rises the single stage compressor loses out to the two stage compressor. The two stage compressor is more efficient at pumping air in to the tank when the tank pressure is higher. For most applications the two stage compressor ends up providing more air for the same HP rating.

Two stage compressors also tend to have higher tank pressures. This helps provide more air when the output pressure is higher, and it allows the same size tank to store more air.

well that reman compressor is gone, but they still have a few new ones still goin for $400. IIRC the Husky compressors are made my Ingersol Rand, can anyone vouch for this? Ive been trying to find reviews on this damn thing for over a month now and nothing!!!

Another thing that Im confused/wondering about is the compressor. They have 3 compressors at the store, all with the exact same part# and price. However, one of them has a 2 piston compressor wereas the other 2 have a single piston compressor. Should I be picky and get the 2 piston compressor, or does it really matter? I dont remember it saying that it was a 2 stage compressor, so I was wondering if having 2 pistons would possibly make for longer compressor life....?