Yes I have a 3/8” line. I did have that suspicion as well when it would happen late at night/ early morning when it just started getting cold and obviously the temp would be the coldest at that moment.. is there a pre moisture filter catch I can throw on if that’s a thing? To prevent the build up to begin with? Or is that iso drip / replacing the line my only option?
It’s running right now sub 32f. Don’t know what the humidity is but I do think what y’all are concurring is my fear.. I probably won’t replace the line until spring
Yes, there are moisture traps that you can buy, they make them for industrial use for air compressors to keep moisture out of the line. Will they work well enough to keep the 3/8" line from freezing? I cannot say for sure because I've never used one for that application. They go in the system post compressor. One thing you do NOT want to do is add any oil to the airline, which is not the case for industrial applications for running air tools. If you are running air for paint guns, then you don't want any oil in the line.
I just looked up the price on dryers. The most inexpensive ones are a little over half the price of the Koenders ISO system. I'd just go order that now so you hopefully have it in place before the cold snap hits in a week or you will be fighting the ice. If you think you can use the dryer in another application once you swap to a bigger line, then go that route. But I don't know for sure if they'd work and I'd hate to see you spend your $$ on something that might or might not work and have to spend that same $$ all over again to get you through this winter before swapping out the line.
The ISO system from Koenders doesn't add any ISO to the line until it's needed. They say to fill it with 2.5 gallons but typically 1 gallon will be more than enough to last one winter. A customer has 5 of those for his ponds, and we've adapted them to run with the 1" buried line on 3 of the 5 systems. He still has 2 windmill systems that use 3/8" line and there are no issues with them freezing up if he remembers to put ISO in the tanks. The ones on the 1" line still have ISO in them from when we swapped out the 3/8" line to 1" three years ago.
Why aeration companies sell 3/8" line to begin with is beyond me. Going to a larger line will reduce the wear and tear on your compressor too. If you have a pressure gauge on it (which you should have no matter what) you will see a drop in line pressure when you switch to a bigger line - less back pressure.
I talked to one aeration company and asked why they didn't offer a larger air line to run to the pond and they said that the airline size didn't matter, We don't sell any of their equipment because I feel that if they don't know basic things like that what else are they not understanding about their aeration systems that they make?
We only use 1/2"-5/8" self sinking air line in ponds, and if we have to bury airline to a pond we just go 1" for almost all applications. We have installed a system where we had to use 1 1/4" black poly line to go from the compressor to the pond due to the length of run, but that was an exception.
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