Anyone know where I can get some cheap compressed air? Maplin want £10 for a can, which seems a little OTT to me. Thanks.
I think £10 is about right. Air is more expensive than you'd think. My sixth form actually gets scented oxygen from hippy internet sites because it's cheaper than buying it from a scientific supplies shop.
I disagree about that price. Around here, I can go into a CompUSA or even a Best Buy and find those cans for $2.50. I don't know what similar stores you have over there, but I can't imagine canned air costing ten times as much in the UK as the US.
eBay? Ummm I get my compressed air pretty cheap; but I have tanks for paintball markers which I can get filled to 3000PSI 0.7l for £1 or get a small SCUBA tank filled at a dive shop and bulk from that. But you're talking about the little air duster things, right?
Depends what you want it for - I do a bit of modelling, and have a little compressor for an airbrush which was ~£50, perfect for its use, on the other hand, it'd be useless for dusting because the pressure's too low once it's regulated properly...
For dusting, my p180 is pretty hard to get around inside, and dont wanna have to take out the Sycth just to clean it... So some strong compressed air would be good.
i believe you can buy a small tin of the stuff from jessops, the camera shop. they use it to clear lenses. it's about £5 the last time i checked. but yes, it is stupid, paying for a tin of, well, air!
Jessops do 360ml 'refil' cans that require a re-usable valve (screws on top). I actually checked today and they don't have any of their own-brand ones (were about £6.99 a can, and less than half of that on a staff account..) and alas, their order of 3600 from suppliers seems to have been caught in the Bermuda Triangle en route, like so many things did. Anyway, they still have the more expensive (branded) versions. Essentially the same thing, but without being own brand. They're £8.99, and the staff discount is pretty minimal (if anything at all, given that my memory's serving me correctly.) HTH
You can buy a can of compressed butane for 50p, not that it'd make a great substitute, just an interesting comparison. BTW, a froogle for air duster throws this up, pretty cheap from the looks of it. Edit: Postage is a killer, don't bother
Get a can of lighter gas, cheaper and lasts longer. Which is inherently wierd. Do clean outside the house tho.
Buy some Dust Off XL on ebay, its perfect for cleaning PC's you get directional straw thing too. DustOff XL - £4.99
No no, the re-fill cans aren't refillable - they are refils .. Not that they re-fill anything either! It's a bit mis-leading, but the way it works is you buy two parts; the re-usable nozzle that screws on top, and the can. Then you just change the can when it runs out, hence why they're dubbed as re-fills. It was about the same at any point within the 18 months I worked for them. Technically they haven't gone bust either..
True, but closing all your shops and flogging your stock off is practically there as far as consumers are concerned. Shame though, they're a great company tbh.
A cheap and nasty solution is to get yourself a car inner tube and a small tyre inflator (typically about £5) or you could use a track pump (a bicycle pump with footrests and a T shaped handle used for pumping bike tyres to very high pressures). You then fit a suitable bit of tubing over the valve on the inner tube and stick a small nozzle on the other end, put a valve in the tubing for controlling the flow - if you use a gate valve for this and you can have some control over the pressure coming out of the end. This will give you a means of getting compressed air into nooks and crannies and its infinitely renewable - as long as you don't mid the smell of rubber and don't have too big an inner tube. It goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway, make sure the inner tube is in good condition, especially if you're using a second hand one and be careful you don't over inflate the inner tube because if it does go bang the results might be quite spectacular.