BendPak Anti-Vibration Pads

Anti-Vibration Pads: the maintenance a compressor most quietly needs

A reciprocating air compressor spends its life trying to walk across your floor. Every stroke of the pump puts a pulse into the frame, the frame puts it into the feet, and the feet put it into the slab — which sends it straight back. Left on bare concrete, that loop loosens fasteners, work-hardens copper discharge lines, cracks fittings and eventually chews the mounting feet themselves. None of it happens on a day you would notice. All of it happens.

These pads sit between the compressor and the floor and break that loop. They are 1/2" thick, moulded from a high-quality elastomer compound, and supplied as a set of four — one under each foot of a BendPak compressor.

Why the compound is the thing to look at

Anything soft will damp a vibration once. The question is what the material is like after two years in a compressor room, and this is where an elastomer compound earns its place over generic rubber offcuts or a folded piece of mat. BendPak lists it as resisting aging, compression set, water and oil, and each of those is a specific failure you can otherwise expect:

• Compression set is the one that quietly defeats a home-made solution. A pad carrying a static load permanently deforms and stops springing back — and a pad that has taken a set is no longer damping anything, it is just a thin spacer. The compressor is still bolted down, the noise has crept back, and nothing looks wrong.
• Oil is the compressor room's own hazard. Condensate, drain-off and the general film that lives on a shop floor will swell and soften a material that was not chosen for it. A pad that has gone spongy with oil squeezes out from under the foot.
• Water is the same argument, in a room that produces condensate by design.
• Aging is the honest one. Every pad works when new. The point of specifying a compound is that it still works when the compressor is out of warranty.

The tread is not decoration

The pads are treaded, and BendPak's reason for it is slip: the tread greatly reduces the chance of the pad moving under the machine. That matters more than it sounds. A tank-mounted compressor sitting on smooth pads will creep, and a machine that creeps is a machine putting a slow steady pull on the very rigid pipework connected to it. Something has to give, and it is usually a fitting or a joint rather than the compressor. Grip is what keeps the machine where you installed it, which is what keeps its plumbing unstressed.

Will they fit your installation?

The dimension to plan around is the height. Each pad is 1/2" (13 mm) thick, so a compressor on pads sits half an inch higher than one on the slab. That is usually irrelevant — but check it if your unit lives under a bench, inside a cabinet or beneath a low pipe run, and check any rigid connection that was cut to length with the machine sitting flat.

Two more points worth settling before install. The set covers four mounting feet, which suits a standard four-footed compressor base; count the feet on your machine rather than assuming. And if your compressor is currently anchored to the floor, understand what you are choosing: pads are an isolation approach and anchoring is a restraint approach, and they work against each other. Follow the compressor manufacturer's mounting instructions for your specific model — the responsibility for a correct, stable installation sits with the owner, and a heavy tank on an unstable footing is not a small problem.

Perfect For

• Home and hobby garages where the compressor shares a building with people, and the vibration transmitted into the structure is the actual complaint.
• Professional shops protecting a serious investment from a wear mechanism that never takes a day off.
• Upstairs, mezzanine or shared-wall installations, where structure-borne noise travels much further than the sound in the room.
• Anyone who has already chased a leak back to a cracked fitting on a compressor that has been quietly hammering itself for years.

What's in the box

Four anti-vibration pads. No fasteners, brackets or adhesive are listed by the manufacturer, and none are claimed here — these are placed under the machine's feet, not fixed to them.

At a glance

Thickness is the only pad dimension BendPak publishes for this item. The pad's length and width are not in the information we hold, and we are not going to estimate them for you — if the footprint of your compressor's feet is the thing you need to check, ask us and we will get the figure from the manufacturer before you order.

Certification and compliance

These are isolation pads, not a safety-rated component, and no third-party listing is published for them in the data we hold. Nothing here should be read as one. Where a compressor installation is subject to an inspection regime, the requirements attach to the compressor, its vessel and its installation rather than to what it stands on — but if your insurer or local code has a view on how a machine is mounted, verify it before you buy rather than after. We will help you get the manufacturer's statement if you need it.

Delivery and pickup

Shipped to the lower 48 states, with the cost calculated for your address at checkout. Pickup for BendPak, Dannmar and Ranger equipment is available in Santa Paula, California and Theodore, Alabama. Check the package before signing and note any damage on the delivery paperwork at the time — it is a small item, but a clear signature closes the door on a claim just as firmly on a small item as on a large one.

Warranty

BendPak's warranty document for this product is in the Downloads section on this page and its terms govern; ask and we will send you the current version before you order. If a pad fails, photograph it in place under the machine before removing it. Do not trim, cut or bond the pads to alter the fit — a modified pad is no longer the product that was warranted, and cutting an isolation pad changes how it carries the load.