Wood shop, Dust Collection

meledward23 · Jul 28, 2006

Intro: My woodworking days are increasing as I have a 3000 sq ft home and furnishings from a 1200 sq ft aparment lifestyle. I am filling the void, slowly but surely. I have over 12000 Board feet of lumber in my barn that I had milled from fallen trees in a storm a few years back.

Most of my equipment is mounted so I can roll it out and use it, and put it away later. My wife for some reason really likes to park her car in my workshop. Gets rather annoying. Anyway, I want/need a dust collector.

I have an ambient air cleaner. Had 13 different filters and is about 15 years old. Works like a champ. I don't have much of a problem with small dust floating around that I have noticed. So I am thinking of just getting a 30 micron type bag collector. You know the Harbor Freight 2hp $199.00 or the Delta basically same type of thing for $199.00. I am jsut not sure if I am really missing out by not upgrading to the models that are in the $399.00 range with smaller filtration and such.

Comments ? / Experiences with these?

Glenn9643 · Jul 28, 2006

A couple of links:

http://www.billpentz.com/woodworking/cyclone/index.cfm

http://www.clearvuecyclones.com/

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/index.php

Dozernut · Jul 28, 2006

I have a Grizzly that runs on 220v, my son-in-law has the HF unit which runs on 110v. They both work well and we have no complaints with them other than the fact that my 20" planer will fill up the 30 gallon pre-collector in about two minutes. I am going to lose the bags and pipe the exhaust directly outside to a holding box that can be cleaned up with the front end loader on the tractor. I will lose some shop heat in the winter but it should be on par with opening garage doors to haul out collector bags. Look at the Delta and see what the CFM is rated at. When the son-in-law looked at them at Lowes they were I believe around 600cfm. The HF was 1500cfm and will handle larger and multiple machines. Use the largest diameter pipe or hose that you can and do not put any 90's or T's in the system or it will plug up. A more expensive unit usually means higher cfm's and additional bags with the smaller micron size. With your tools being portable and having an air cleaner, the cheaper smaller machines should work fine for you.

dubba · Jul 29, 2006

I second the motion to have it just blow outside with no bags. the bags fill up far to fast & cut into production time. Even in my old shop in NH, we blew the shavings outside into a bin.

LC Brewing · Jul 29, 2006

Been running an Oneida Super Dust Gorilla in my basement shop since about April (moved in last year and have the same problem - 1200 sf of furniture in a 3000 sf home). I've always used a shop vac (or nothing) before, and this thing has been awesome compared to those.

TMcD_in_MI · Jul 30, 2006

If you want to collect wood chips, buy almost any system you want. If you want to collect dust, I would urge you to do your lungs a favor and check out the Bill Pentz site that Glenn9643 listed. He has done a lot of research into dust collection and I wish I had seen that site before I put in my system.

Tom

meledward23 · Aug 1, 2006

After reviewing and reading the Bill Pentz information, it appears that I will buy a pretty strong collector, get the chips and blow the air and dust outdoors.

Now I just need to decide how exactly I wnat to do that and with what.

But this information as been useful, in that I had never considering venting outdoors and I am no 100% convinced that is how I will go about it.

kennyd · Aug 1, 2006

I bought and installed the ClearVue system about 6 months ago, all plumbed with 6" ASTM 2729 S&D pipe.
This system is nothing short of unbelievable!

Venting outside is a great option for those in the milder climates, But pay careful attention to any gas flues or chimney's in the area so that you do not pull make-up air down through them. Also, when the DC is running, it will be sucking your conditioned air out of the room and you will nee to provide for make-up air.