I’ve been assembling my new cyclone dust collector. It’s now assembled and ready to duct. Checking prices of ducting has put me in shock. If I’d known the ducting was so expensive, I’m not sure I’d have gone this route. But I have, so that’s that. Does anyone know of a good place to buy duct work at reasonable prices? My system has a 7″ main and pulls 1350 CFM. I want to run a 7″ main reducing down to 4″ at each machine, with 5 machines in the system. Help!!! This is putting me in the poor house!
Jeff
Replies
So, what do you consider to be a "reasonable" price? Quite frankly, I'm a little surprised that you've gotten this far without looking at the total cost of your DC system. - lol
That 7" ducting may be a problem. AFIK, ducting comes in either 6" or 8". The most commonly used duct materials are PVC, HVAC ducting, and flexible hose. They aren't free, but I've never thought their cost wasn't "reasonable".
Sewer and drain pipe will work fine if you reduce. Take a look at Bill Pentz' site for info on S&D, specifically, and all things DC in general:
Home Page
Ducting Specific (toward the end of section 5)
FG, been a while since I spoke with you. Hope all is well with you and yours.Yes, I spend waaay to much time on Mr. Pentz website. I am very thankful for his time and efforts to educate us in this subject.I hate to go PVC, and have just returned from HD with a truck full of sheet metal duct work that I hope will work. To my utter amazement, they had 7" with reducers from 7" to 6" with reducers from 6" to 4". I plan to run the system mostly at 6", all my "Y"s are 6" to 6", the main and distribution lines will also be 6" down almost to the machines, which I will tie in with very short runs of 4" flex hose. All my machines have 4" ports with the exception of my 24" double drum sander which has two 4" ports. This machine BTW, is WHY I upgraded my DC to a cyclone system. I plan to box in both 4" ports with melamine to flow into a 6" duct. My band saw also has two 4" ports but I plan to accomodate that configuration with a 6" to 4" Y duct. Hopefully this will all flow properly, I still have to run the numbers...Regards and happy holidays...Jeff
Jeff, please let us know how it works out, as I will follow in your footsteps if there is no disaster forthcoming. I can get S&D, but would rather opt for the metal ducting you're experimenting with if there's no downside.
Happy New Year!
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Edited 12/30/2007 11:07 pm by forestgirl
I used 26 ga. HVAC ducting for all my cyclone runs, no problem. Info I could find at the time I set up (4 years ago) was not to use anything lighter (28 or 30 ga.) because collapse was a possibility. I ran my lines with reducing TY's ( i.e. 6" through with 4" off at 45 degrees) and 45 el's. I was able to get aluminum blast gates through a small sheet metal shop. My 'old iron' jointer & planer and older General table saw did not have dust collection hookups, so I cobbled up some shrouds using floor register boots. This was done by finding something close & trimming a little here & pop riviting a little extra sheet metal there & figuring out how to secure it in place so it could be removed later for maintainence and sharpening. Biggest problem with register boots is the joints made when they are manufactured aren't very strong and need to be soldered so they won't fall apart.
FWW had an article several years back about using a current sensor and a relay in the shop wiring so that whenever you turned on a machine, the dust collector would come on. It's fairly confusing unless you really understand wiring and may be prohibitively expensive unless you're good friends with a Sparky but I really enjoy having all my machines set up this way.
Paul
Thanks for the additional info, Paul. As far as me building something electrical, welllllll, not likely, LOL. I have a Long Ranger remote that works just great, saves me a ton of time, so I"m OK there.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
A cyclone system is expensive, just throwing the switch. PennState has a line of economy metal ductwork. The length of the runs, size of pipe, elbows and fittings all effect the efficiency of the system. The ductwork can cost almost as much as the cyclone. I've included a link to an online planner.
http://www.airhand.com/designing.asp
http://www.pennstateind.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=DECO
Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
Jeff,
My system uses a 5" main reduced to 4" branch runs. I used 26 ga round galv. gutter downspout for the 4" runs to each machine. Cost was $11 per 10' stick at my local hardware store.
Best wishes for a great New Year.
-Jerry
I saved over 50% by getting most of my stuff from an industrial HVAC place. (up in the snowy north, Don Park has a fully stocked self serve warehouse in North York, but I bet any decent sized city has the same thing).
I'm not talking about the stuff you buy from Home Depot for central heating, I'm talking institutional components. All the spiral piping, etc., is exactly the same as what the DC companies sell. Many of the fittings are the same, but they tend to have a narrower variety. They have unions, elbows, and the odd Y, but not everything you'll want will be in stock. They'll make anything, but unless you are a commercial customer, you pay through the nose for 'special orders'.
So I made my parts list, bought as muat as possible from the HVAC place and then picked up the few missing parts, plus blast gates, etc., from a DC company.
I put everything together, and sealed it with aluminum pipe tape. Works swell.
Well...hush my mouth!!!I just returned from the Big Box Store (BBS) and have a pickup full of ducting. They had EVERYTHING I needed in ALL THE SIZES I needed in ALL THE CONFIGURATIONS I needed. For once (and it's been a LONG TIME) I was able to get the components I required for a project from the local BBS.Now then...a good buddy of mine, a young fellow who is very sharp and who's opinion I usually trust without question, claims this duct work WILL NOT WORK for my application. He claims using these duct components will cause the sky to fall, and catastrophic implosion of my dust collection system. Life, as I know it, will cease. Seriously, he claims this duct material is not suitable for my dust collection system. For myself, I think it will work just fine so long as I don't do something stupid like TURN ON THE SYSTEM WITH ALL THE GATES SHUT. Can anyone out there give me their experience with BBS ducting in a cyclone dust collection system with 1350 CFM flow?As always, many thanks for your time...Jeff
"I think it will work just fine so long as I don't do something stupid like TURN ON THE SYSTEM WITH ALL THE GATES SHUT. " That has always been my thought, though I dastn't voice it here. ;-) As long as you maintain a habit of opening whichever blast gate you need before turning on the system, what are the chances it will implode? Don't know what other drawbacks the lighter system might have. Surely someone here will expound with horror stories.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
What about 90's and Y's? A standard elbow will knock your efficiency down significantly compared to a long radius elbow. One work around is to use 2 45's to open up the bend.
Y's are not common fittings that I have noticed.
I had also thought about wrapping the pipe with a hose clamp every 18" or so to add a little reinforcementDon
I bought two 'Y's that merged at a 45 degree angle, as opposed to a 90 degree "T". Y's didn't seem to be any problem, in fact they even had Y's that reduced as well. I even asked if I could design my system, then come back to the store with a list of my components required, which I would then order. I was assured this was not a problem, I only had to go to the contractor desk to arrange for ordering my components, which I could then either pick up at the store, or have shipped directly to my shop. I couldn't have been more pleased at the success I had at Home Depot....for a change.Jeff
"For myself, I think it will work just fine so long as I don't do something stupid like TURN ON THE SYSTEM WITH ALL THE GATES SHUT."
You have it backwards, do not turn on the dust collector with the gates OPEN. Because of the large load the motor will draw a lot of amps and possibly burn up. Think of air as water being pumped. Their is a large load when all gates are open. It is stated in some manuals to not start the dust collector without ducting and one blast gate closed.
Life is what happens to you when you're making other plans .
Edited 12/31/2007 9:42 am ET by JerryPacMan
Edited 1/1/2008 8:01 am ET by JerryPacMan
"You have it backwards, do not turn on the dust collector with the gates OPEN. The motor will try to go as fast as possible since their is no load, draw a lot of amps and possibly burn up."
That makes absolutely no sense. If there is no load, the motor won't draw very much current at all. And unlike a universal motor, an induction motor has a built-in "speed limit"; it can't turn any faster than the phase rotation, which is generally only about 5-10% higher than the full-load speed. A 3450 rpm motor is limited to 3600 rpm, a 1725 rpm motor to 1800 rpm, etc.
-Steve
"That makes absolutely no sense. If there is no load, the motor won't draw very much current at all."
Their is a load with the gates open. Think of the air as water being pumped. Their was a good discussion about this at Sawmill Creek a while back.. A picture is worth a thousand words. Click on the link below and scroll down to post #22 for pictures of current draw with the gates open and closed.
http://sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=39497&highlight=current+draw&page=2
Life is what happens to you when you're making other plans .
"Their is a load with the gates open."
Okay, I agree with that. But I was responding to your original statement: "...because their is no load..."
Most of the discussion in the Sawmill Creek thread misses the mark, however. If the motor current goes up when the gates are opened (and it won't necessarily do so--it depends on the characteristics of the system as a whole), it's because of restrictions on the downstream side. In other words, the blower is working harder to force the additional exhaust air through the filtration system.
In any case, however, if running your DC with all the gates open--or under any other condition short of placing it inside a furnace--causes the motor to burn up, it means that you had a poor quality motor to begin with. Any decent induction motor these days should have enough protection built in that it will turn itself off before it gets hot enough to cause damage.
-Steve
"Their is a load with the gates open."
I have corrected the above statement thanks for pointing out the mistake.
The motor will shut off if it's gets too hot but if it continues to do this it could possibly fail. I have seen people at Sawmill Creek have motor problems and hot running motors. Closing some gates will help with motor reliability.
Life is what happens to you when you're making other plans .
This does illustrate a point that is important to home-brew DC builders: For optimal performance, not only do you have to ensure that the upstream ducting is properly sized, you also have to ensure that the downstream components, especially the filtration system, are properly sized as well. Too small, and they will constrain the overall performance just as much as too-small inlet ducting. Too large, and you're just wasting money on capacity that will never be used. This shouldn't be of concern to those who buy prepackaged DCs, since in that case the manufacturer has hopefully sized the downstream components appropriately.
-Steve
"You have it backwards" Whatever the deal is with load/no load, amps, etc., the primary reason cited for not using light-weight (thin) metal ducting for dust collection is the possibility that it will collapse if turned on with all of the blast gates closed.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Thanks for pointing out the obvious FG.
Why anyone would think that running a DC system with all the gates open is a resonable thing to do or the proper way to use a DC system is beyond me.
So that I don't further confuse anyone else, let me be clear. I don't believe that running a DC system with all the gates OPEN is any smarter than running a DC system with all the gates CLOSED. Either condition invites system failure.
In my shop, assuming I design my system to flow properly to begin with, running the DC system with only one gate open at the machine in use, should effectively move the chips/dust away from the machine and into the collection bin. All other gates will be closed at any given time. I'll see what happens, it may prove necessary to open TWO GATES to keep the air speed high enough to keep the particulate matter suspended and flowing thru the system.
Hopefully that clears up any misconception I may have inadvertantly caused...some how?!
To the person who offered to sell me some blast gates, many thanks, but I've already ordered the self cleaning gates sold by Lee Valley & recommended by Bill Pentz...Jeff
Edited 12/31/2007 10:39 am by jeff100
Sorry Jeff I really thought I was making an informative post. Do you have a Grizzly cyclone dust collector?
Life is what happens to you when you're making other plans .
Jerry, I went back and re-read your post. The thing about how, with all the gates open, the motor would try and "run as fast as possible" and maybe blow up threw me for a loop. Don't the motors have a set RPM? My Jet 1.5HP has 3450RPM listed on the motor plate. I'm realtively clueless about motors, but I would assume that it runs at that RPM unless slowed down for some reason (the way a table saw motor might slow down under heavy load, just before the ciruit trips), but would not go faster for much of any reason.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
The no-load speed of an induction motor is always a submultiple of the line frequency, so in North America it's generally either 3600 rpm (= 60 Hz) or 1800 rpm (= 30 Hz). Occasionally, you'll see a 1200 rpm (= 20 Hz) motor.
The speed listed on the nameplate is the full-load speed, and is always a little bit lower than the no-load speed. So a full-load speed of 3450 rpm corresponds to a no-load speed of 3600 rpm, and so on.
The way the motor works is that the current through the coils creates a magnetic field that rotates at the no-load speed. The rotor tries to rotate at the same speed, but can never quite "catch up" to the magnetic field. The greater the load, the greater the discrepancy between the rotation of the field and the rotation of the rotor. Disregarding losses from friction, etc., this discrepancy is directly proportional to the amount of power generated by the motor and transferred to the load.
So, as you increase the load from no-load to full-load, the speed of the motor decreases from its no-load speed to its full-load speed. If you go past the rated power output, the speed decreases even further, but not for long, as the motor will eventually overheat and one of the various safety devices will trip.
-Steve
Just the way I remember it from one of my engineering classes back when the earth was just beginning to cool.
The bottom line is that an induction motor may run slower than it's no load speed, but it sure as hell can't run faster (unless the line frequency goes up). - lol
It's also unlikely that it could ever overheat due to zero air flow thru the impeller. The motor doesn't need that air flow for cooling.
Thanks, Steve. Most of that made sense to me, on a very elementary level. Probably only because I saw a program a few weeks ago on magnetism and electricity. I'm much more oriented to biological phenomena than physics and such. Brain strain, ya know, and I don't remember learning anything about motors in school (the earth wasn't cool yet, in the same class as
So, with a dust collector, is the "full load" when all the gates are open and the largest volume of air is being moved, or is it when the gates are closed and the motor is having to work harder to move the air??
One part I'm having trouble with is "If you go past the rated power output...." Can you find another way to say that? In my layperson's way, I tend to think of power as an input, not an output, LOL.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Max load on the motor is when all the gates are open. When all gates are closed, the motor will have little load on it and the amperage draw will be minimized. This phenomenon can be observed by putting your hand over the end of a shop vacuum cleaner hose and you'll hear the motor speed up.
Years and years ago, I was reading some discussion about the difference between a vacuum and a dust collector, and there was some mention of a vacuum being "happy" to have the air flow blocked. Never did understand that, but maybe what you say here is what they were getting at.
However!....the gist of it was that the dust collector is different. And Steve seems to be saying the same below. There's much to be sorted out here, for me anyway. Going back to re-read his post, ask a couple of questions. Sorry to put you guys through what's probably taught in elementary school these days, LOL!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
"So, with a dust collector, is the 'full load' when all the gates are open and the largest volume of air is being moved, or is it when the gates are closed and the motor is having to work harder to move the air??"
It depends on the design of the system, on both the upstream (machines, ducting) side and the downstream (cyclone, filters, etc.) side. It could be either one or somewhere in between. In a well-designed off-the-shelf commercial system, it's probably at or near the "maximum flow" end.
"One part I'm having trouble with is 'If you go past the rated power output....' Can you find another way to say that? In my layperson's way, I tend to think of power as an input, not an output, LOL."
Energy is neither created nor destroyed (ignoring nuclear reactions for the moment...), it just gets moved from one place to another, or converted from one form to another. An electric motor consumes electrical energy and converts it to mechanical energy. Power is simply the rate at which energy is moved/converted. In other words, power measures the flow of energy per unit of time.
Let's say you have a 1 horsepower motor. What does "1 horsepower" mean? Horsepower is a way to measure power. To give some human scale to this, if you ate a Snickers bar every half hour, you'd be consuming energy at the rate of about 1 horsepower. (Scary, isn't it?)
A 1 HP motor is designed to continuously deliver 1 HP of power to the load, whatever that load might be. By "continuously," I mean that it can do so for minutes or hours at a time without overheating, shortening it's life, etc. Because a motor isn't perfectly efficient at converting electrical energy to mechanical energy, delivering 1 HP at the output causes it to consume somewhat more than 1 HP at the input (about 1.3 HP for a good-quality motor). The difference between what goes in and what comes out is mostly converted into heat, which is why a running motor gets warm.
Like people (and horses, for that matter), you can make a motor deliver more power, for a short period of time, than it can deliver continuously. How do you do that? Well, with a person, you do it by cranking up the speed on the treadmill at the gym. With a table saw, you do it by pushing that piece of 8/4 hard maple too fast through the cut. By pushing harder on the wood, you're in effect telling the saw to cut faster (that is, deliver cutting energy at a higher rate), and the only way it can do that is to deliver more power. In order to deliver more cutting power, it of course has to consume more electrical power, and that can eventually trip a circuit breaker. At the same time, more of that incoming electrical power is being converted into heat, and that can eventually trip a thermal switch.
-Steve
Steve's discussion of motor ratings is for "industrial" type motors, not the motors embedded in products with amazing claims of power. There is absolutely no comparison between a 2 hp motor in a cyclone dust collector and a "2 hp" motor in a router.
Yes, I explicitly referred to induction motors in my earlier message.
-Steve
When airflow is shut off to the blower on a dust collector or vacuum the fan blades can"stall" (air stops moving smoothly over them) and the power needed to turn the fan drops significantly. Therefore the power output of the motor also drops.
This is counter-intuitive if you are thinking about the fan as some sort of pump device which has to pump a certain amount of air per revolution. But it's not. The fan blades behave more like the propeller on an airplane (perhaps a non-optimum shape propeller).
Hi, Steve. Thanks for being so patient and describing things so well. I get the Snickers thing, for sure, having stored some energy over the holidays, LOL! The Snickers thing works OK if I'm on the treadmill while I'm eating them (and going fast!). Not so well if I'm just chatting with family and watching sappy movies on TV.
You may be helping me understand a weird discussion I saw a very long time ago, related to the difference between vacuum cleaners and dust collectors. Don't remember much of it, except some reference to a vacuum being "happy" when the air flow is cut off, and that being different than a dust collector's reaction (didn't know either had emotions). Your take on which causes max load seems different from Woodhacker's answer to my question (click here). I've got my teeth in this one, guys, not gonna give up until we get a concensus! Please 'splain, Steve, please 'splain.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
I'm not sure how to measure the happiness of any kind of vacuum set up (they didn't cover that in physics classes). There is definitely a difference between shop vacs and dust collectors: shop vacs move a relatlvely small volume of air at high velocity, while dust collectors move a relatively large volume of air at low velocity. Think of a shop vac as high voltage/low current and a DC as low voltage/high current. Sort of.
But I don't know how any of that translates into "happiness" when the air flow is blocked; in either case, the motive force behind the air flow is a centrifugal blower, and the basic design of the blower in a shop vac probably isn't all that different from one in a DC. When the air flow is stalled, I would think that they would behave more or less the same way.
I don't think my answer regarding the maximum load is significantly different from woodhacker's. He said that the maximum load is at maximum air flow; I said that it depends, but in a well designed system is probably near maximum air flow.
-Steve
"I don't think my answer regarding the maximum load is significantly different from woodhacker's. He said that the maximum load is at maximum air flow...." Ach, I read it backwards. OK, all is well.
Back to the original purpose of this post, it's all got me thinking even more about ducting and air flow. Have to revisit Bill Pentz' site and get a grip on how to maximize air flow, since it's more complicated than I originally thought. Then toss a coin whether to pull $$ from the table saw fund or wait and stick it out with the hoses (short).forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
This thread has got me thinking as well. I currently run a 2HP 1 micron felt bag dust pump. It is suppose to give 1200 CFM. The very first connection is a factory supplied Y to reduce the 6" intake to 2 X 4" connections right at the fan suction. And the generous 30 SQ FT of felt filter bag supplied is really going to pass a lot of air once it becomes seasoned.
My safety glasses tell how good a job this thing is doing. I wear an approved face mask as well.
According to Pentz ducting info, that unit needs 6" ducting right to the machine to be sure of achieving the 800 CFM required. The sad part is, the dust collecting industry has everything a 4". 6" is just starting to be seen in the Edmonton area and only hose and gates.My dust collector cost me about CAD$400.00 at a tool show. I should buy a pleated canister element for another CAD$250.00. Then we start with 6" ducting. So at CAD$650.00 plus ducting I will have a collector that might do the job if I am careful with my piping.Fortunately I have a 5HP Clear-Vue cyclone sitting in its crate just waiting. The cost of the cyclone and discharge filters will be around CAD$1700.00 all delivered.
I am hoping to use 8" mains with 6" drops to the machines - all in an island arrangement.
If all goes well, my cost to complete will be around CAD$2000.00.
I have seen this cyclone design work. It is awesome. A local wood worker built his using Bill Pentz design. He is lucky in that he lives in the forest and can exhaust to the wild. I have neighbors to contend with. Freight to Canada has hit me hard - probably $300.00 of this total cost.Don
I built one a couple months ago, and the freight for the filters to Canada was a eye opener for sure. The filters cost $300 to ship from CA, and the machine was only $185 from SC. Amazing how much difference shipping costs are when you are a long standing client. Both UPS. Its a great machine. I put a heavy duty 45gal plastic drum on mine and much to my surprise it hovers until approximately 1/2 full. When I use it with the floor sweep I have to fight it collapsing the flex hose. I agree with the $2k est.
Have fun with the build.
Brad
Brad,
Good to hear you have had such good success with your clear Vue.
I came across a company in Hamilton, ON - http://www.maddocksgroup.com - who have supplied to some other Canadian folks. If they can meet the spec and the price is decent I'll go with them. FedEx and UPS really put a damper on cross border shopping, which bugs greatly because most US suppliers are an absolute treat to deal with.Don
I noticed you are in Edmonton. I am about 500km north of you. If you want a really good bucket for collection go to ZeeBest. Personally, I do not believe the typical trash can in the instructions will not hold up. I put a 45gal drum on mine, but that will put you over the 8' ceiling height. They have several different models on their website and Dave was great to deal with. I started out trying to fit the 75gal version, but the only model that would fit was 35" in dia and I would have lost too much space. Hindsight, I am glad I did not. The 45gal is heavy enough when full. I have emptied 5times in the last two weeks and it weighs about 150lb +- or so when full. I use a scissor cart from Princess Auto ($85 on sale) to get it in and out of the truck.
I am not sure if you know, but Mr. Pentz is on a couple of diff sites and is really a nice man. He spoke of a recent trip to CA to help a fellow test and complete his setup and I believe he completed this at his own expense. I would make darn sure the filter specs match.
Brad
I have a 10ft ceiling so height is not an issue. I am currently using a 45 gal plastic chemical drum as knock out preceding my current dust pump. When it gets about 2/3 full, I dump it into a big plastic bag and haul it to the recycle station.
I have known Zeebest for many years going back to when Derek was making stuff on the farm. At least he can supply exactly what you need with beefed up wall thicknesses.
I plan on being very careful with the discharge filtration. I spoke to the manufacturer in Hamilton and he has no problems meeting the specification. We are actually going to increase the height to 36" as that is the standard material width and spun polyester which will permit hosing it down once in awhile.
Sounds like you have put your cyclone to good use. How much discharge dust are you disposing of?Don
They have some nice clamps too if one wanted to stack them like the Clearvue's setup. I wish I would have found them (bookmarked now) before. I ended up building some MDF filler pieces and added dowels to bolt the filters together so the setup was not quite as hokey. Are you going with the clearvue electrical setup? I thought that was a little hokey too, so I put in a professional mag switch similar to what I see when I am in industrial mills. My old dust collector drove me nuts with a flaky electrical setup, so I am a little sensitive to that issue.
Dust disposal is a problem i have not quite solved yet. I am re-doing my entire house and have been milling floor stock and trim lately. If I wanted to buy all the trim necessary for the typical craftsman style, I would be in the poor house. I go in spurts, the current flooring project has generated the most thus far.
Interesting to see another stuffed into such a small space. Last year I built some big tables, and have been slowly forced to move them out as I aquire new larger tools. I am expecting delivery of a new slider, and out goes the last bench. Live and learn.
Brad
Electrical - I picked up an Automater last year - on eBay. It is a solid state device that is hard wired into the dust collector and tool circuits. Turn on any tool on the tool circuit, the device detects the current and on comes the dust collector which is on its own circuit.
I can put all of my heavy machines on one 20 amp 220V circuit. I cannot imagine ever running 2 simultaneously. My existing dust pump is on its own 220 circuit. The cyclone will assume this circuit.Dust Disposal - I was really refering to the micro dust that should be collecting in the discharge circuit. If the cyclone is working well, you should not see much with the work you are currently doinf, but there is alway some.Don
Honestly, I have not checked the cannister yet for the fine dust. Should be little there. I will take a look.
Sounds like a nice electrical setup.
Brad
OK folks, the moment of truth had arrived. I'd completed install of my GRIZZLY G0440 2 HP cyclone.http://www.grizzly.com/products/2-HP-Cyclone-Dust-Collector/G0440I installed enough ducting to run an initial test. One 90 degree elbow, and 8" main and a 8" to 6" reducer. Duct work in place, I started the cyclone up and let half of a trash can of sawdust and chips go thru the system.Wow...wow...wow. The power was impressive. Equally impressive was how relatively quiet this system was. I had purchased the 'noise reducer kit' they sell for these cyclones, but I'm not going to bother with it. The cyclone is no more noisy than my small Jet DC system was. It is not any more noisy than my table saw, and is much quieter than my planer! I was amazed at how smooth the system ran, I expected much more vibration than I experienced, which was virtually none. The system is VERY WELL BALANCED. When all the sawdust had flowed thru the system into the cannister, there was not one spec of dust in the bag below the filter. All contents were in the collection drum!Final comment...I could not be more happy with my equipment.Jeff
Re Electrical controlBrad,I stumbled across this article by accident. It uses different hardware to control the devices than what I have. I have not read it in detail.FWW 143http://www.taunton.com/finewoodworking/Workshop/WorkshopPDF.aspx?id=2658Don
Thanks. Felder has a very similar version. I went to the effort to wire mine with a remote, but I mounted the switch high enough that I find I use it most of the time. Get some ear plugs if you are not mounting in a separate space.
Brad
Don, I have to thank you for asking me about the fine dust quantity. I opened the cleanout, and much to my surprise it was full of chips and not fine dust. I learned that if one overfills his chip collection bucket, it can backfeed into the filters. This had occurred recently for a short time. I was surprised not too find much, if any, fine dust. After searching out the problem I discovered a few leaks that I should have caught earlier. Until then I had thought some of the fine dust collecting on the piping was from running some equipment not attached to the DC while I wait for a new machine. Not the case. Chaulk the joints carefully when you build. It was difficult to chaulk the joints with the machine piped around the room.
Thanks
Brad
He is lucky in that he lives in the forest and can exhaust to the wild.
Your probably fortunate you don't duct outside... Edmonton is too cold, you'd never make up the heat!
Don, sounds like you are going to have a great system! 8" mains are to die for, eh? If you get an island arrangement that you're happy with, please post some pics, as I've considered doing the same, but haven't come up with a workable idea.
If we ever get another house, with a "real" shop building, I'd love to go to a cyclone (I'm already spending the profit off the land sale, LOL!). Let us know how it all comes together, for sure.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
I will do that. After 20 years with no garage, we built a 26 X 40 garage/shop. My shop is about 15 X 25 on the inside. In hindsight, 20 X 26 would have been a better size for slightly more upfront cost.
You have to keep in mind that unlike cars, televisions and washing machines, our shops, dust abatement, major power tools will likely survive our grand children with moderate care - if they are well built to begin with.
The building and the dust collector can make or break your woodworking experience. Some of the upfront costs are high but you have to amortize over the life expectancy of your woodworking experience. $2000 over 10-20 years is a small price for clean air.
I like the island idea - many uses for one surface. Prefer the bandsaw to the table saw, hate lifting, moving , cutting 4 X 8 sheets of anything.Don
15x25 inside dimensions? Wow, that's smaller than my place. I definitely wanna see your floor plan! My shop is about 22x22, with about 16 square feet taken up by the pellet stove. Feels realllllly small now that there's a lathe and an RBI Hawk added to the mix!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Don,
I too have some of my power tools arranged in an island configuration consisting of TS, Jointer, Router Table & Downdraft Table. The DC, it has a 5" to a Y that yields 2 4" connectors with one of them servicing the island. As I envision it the other connector will service a remote RAS/Chopsaw setup and also allow connection to a mobile BS. This leg will be closed when these remote tools are not in use.
The issue I'm having is that I got the trash can cyclone adapter from LV, which has a 4" input. The only way I can think of to connect this all together is to run the 2 4" legs into a Y that connects to the cyclone. Then the outboard side of the cyclone (input to the DC) will have to transition from a 4" to a 5" input to the DC.
Not sure how this is all going to work but will post final results when I get there. I've been running each leg, i.e. to the island and remotes independently, sans the cyclone, and so far it works quite well with just the 4" straight runs. I don't anticipate it will perform any worse when I connect the cyclone and the 4" to 5" transition to the DC.
Regards,Bob @ Kidderville Acres
A Woodworkers mind should be the sharpest tool in the shop!
(the earth wasn't cool yet, in the same class as
Were you in my class, FG?? I remember a cute cheerleader-type who sat in the front row and had a thing for fuzzy sweaters. I had an all-pro crush on her and always wondered what happened to her. - lol
Cheerleader! Ohmigod, if there's anything I wasn't it was a cheerleader, ROFLMAO. Deadly serious student. The funnest thing I ever did relating to cheerleaders was when I was the leader of the Pep Band in high school. We had one of those big "assemblies" -- some kind of rally for basketball or football -- and the cheerleaders were all lined up on the stage in front of the entire school (over 1,000 students). Instead of playing whatever pep-tune was scheduled for them to do their routine to, I giddily led the band in "The Stripper" or whatever that tune is officially called. I do believe the band teacher was so flabbergasted that Jamie would do such a thing, he couldn't speak for quite some time.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Ok, the lust of my life must have been someone else. My graduating class only had 62 students and there weren't 1000 kids in the entire district. I'm talking about a real "country" school. - lol
I remember those assembly pep rallys during football season. The cheerleaders (five, I think), and the varsity (all 12 of us) stood on the stage while the band played songs that were sometimes recognizable. - lol I don't remember what they played, but I'm quite certain that it wasn't "The Stripper". My little town was the buckle on the Bible Belt and such foolishness wouldn't have been tolerated.
"I'm talking about a real "country" school. - lol" Although for the most part my schools were pretty good-sized, I did go to a one-room schoolhouse for 3 months in Sarasota, FL, in 5th grade, or 6th. Had to give up the clarinet, switch to violin, since they didn't have a band <grin>.
I hear ya about "no foolishness" -- family came from N. Carolina, pretty solid Babtists. I was corrupted when I moved back to California, though. Fun in the Sun!
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Edited 1/1/2008 9:47 pm by forestgirl
FL & NC, huh?
I was born in FL in '45 while Pop was in the Navy at Banana River NAS (near Cape Canaveral). He was discharged when I was about six weeks old and we went back to MO. Although I traveled all over the U.S. during my nuke career, I never made it back to FL.
I spent three years "commuting" between CA and Wilmington, NC in the late 80's and early 90's. We were doing a plant computer upgrade on the plant at Southport, NC and I would go there for 1-2 weeks every month, or so. I worked on ~15 nuke plants between '73 and '92, and was offered jobs at 5-6 of them. I was really tempted to move to NC but didn't. I really liked the people and the area although the summer heat, humidity, bugs, and hurricanes were negatives. - lol
Not many Babtists where I grew up, but the Methodists (including my folks) took up the slack. Two of my favorite jokes about my hometown are:
The population never changed because every time some girl got pregnant, some guy left town.
There was no need to signal your turns because everyone knew where you were going. If you went anywhere else, you got talked about in church.
Love the hometown jokes, really paints the picture, eh? Lots of people retiring to NC, sure you don't want to go back? I've thought about it, but I'm sure the country dirt roads and farms that I remember are long gone, and I don't want to see what's there now. :-( Beautiful out there, though.forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
We did something like that in high school. I was the orchestra leader for a small ensemble that supplied musical accompaniment for three plays put on by the foreign language clubs. The Spanish Club put on a somewhat farcical version of Snow White. The student playing Snow White was male and black, and this was the early 70's, so before each performance he fluffed his hair out to about a 2' diameter (think Linc from the Mod Squad).
Anyway, we were supposed to play a light version of Frankie and Johnny when (s)he first made an appearance, and then Chopin's Funeral March after falling into her death sleep. And we did, except during the last performance, in which we substituted The Stripper for Frankie and Johnny, and Ding, Dong, The Witch Is Dead for the Funeral March.
-Steve
"And we did, except during the last performance, in which we substituted The Stripper for Frankie and Johnny, and Ding, Dong, The Witch Is Dead for the Funeral March." ROFL!!! That's funny! Boy, sometimes I miss those days, even though I was a bit of the odd-girl-out, I had a great time with the band groups. My best friend was first-chair flute, and I sat first-chair clarinet every year from junior high through high school, except 1st year of HS. Concert band, jazz band, pep band, marching band, honor band and some kind of little chamber thing - kinda vague on that one. Of course, going out after FB games and TPing people's houses was the most fun!
Love the Snow White/Afro image!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
"Boy, sometimes I miss those days, even though I was a bit of the odd-girl-out, I had a great time with the band groups."
Yup. As Bill McNeal in NewsRadio would say, "Good times, good times."
-Steve (1st chair alto sax)
A lot of times I do not write using the proper terms, I just start writing. I really strive for accurate, concise and easy to understand posts. I failed miserably on this subject but have learned to be more careful in what I say. What I should have said is below and I have edited my post. Thanks for pointing out my mistake.
"Because of the large load the motor will draw a lot of amps and possibly burn up. Think of air as water being pumped."
Have a Happy New Year and don't step in any horse dodo today.
Life is what happens to you when you're making other plans .
Edited 1/1/2008 10:20 am ET by JerryPacMan
Happens to all of us! Thanks for the water analogy (or is that a metaphor?). Water gets picked on alot -- that's the way the electrical gurus tell us to think of electricity. Something mystical about that -- water being the source of life and all.
Here's to a great 2008! The horse stuff is easy to spot and avoid. It's the dog stuff in the yard I have to watch out for, LOL!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
No worries, and it was an informative post.
Yes, I do have a Grizzly cyclone, the G0440 2 HP model. I purchased it last summer, it's taken me a long time to get it assembled and up and running. I'm very excited to finally be close to using it. In fact, I stood it up today, fully assembled. I should have it plumbed and ready to rock within a week or so. Then I'll sell my 'little' Jet dust collector...;-)
http://www.grizzly.com/products/2-HP-Cyclone-Dust-Collector/G0440
Jamie:
Thanks for that link to Bill Pentz's site. Scared me into getting serious about this dust collection stuff!
Dennis
"Scared me into getting serious about this dust collection stuff!" I do believe that's his intention. It's too easy to shrug off a little dust here, a little dust there, and especially the stuff you can't even see. Bad idea, that. Glad you find the site useful!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Jeff, I cruised through the HVAC section at Home Depot yesterday, and saw very little stuff. Wondering specifically what I need to ask them for. Also, was your ducting open along a seam, and you need to close it and seal the seam??forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
J, as I said in previous posts, HD told me I could design my system, then make a list of components I need e.g. Y's, reducers, straight runs, elbows, Y's that reduce (7" on main, 6" on the "Y" etc.). Then when I have a list of components, I could order all my components at one time at the contractors desk, picking them up at the store or shipped to my house. I'd pick them up at the store, why pay for shipping, it's expensive these days!As for the seams, yes, the straight runs are seamed. I have bought and plan to use aluminum tape to seal the seams, once they are mechanically closed and locked. I've done a couple and it's fairly easy to work with, the seam locks fairly easy. You could also use seam sealant, but that stuff is pretty messy to apply, I like the tape better, although it's VERY SHARP! You've got to be careful with it not to get cut. On the straight runs, I will tape the seams on the OUTSIDE. It's a bit of a pain in the rear, but for the money I will save compared to the high end stuff, it's worth it to me. Talk to the HD folks about ordering your components, forget trying to pick thru what's on the shelf, except for perhaps the straight runs you need. I've also found tremendous variation from store to store on what's on the shelf. Keep that in mind as well, but it's probably easiest to just order what you need. This will force you to sit down and draw out your system so that you can determine what components you need, but hey, that's all part of designing an effective system anyway, right? BTW, I'm also using the aluminum tape to deal with the fact that these HVAC components are designed to flow the other direction. Where I can reach inside, I'm taping INSIDE the joint so that they don't catch/collect chips and create a jam in my system. That's my plan, anyway...good luck, let me know how you make out or what you end up doing.Jeff
Edited 1/11/2008 1:41 pm by jeff100
Jeff,
I agree completely with forestgirl; Bill Pentz knows all, sees all, tells all!
Jeff, I have a bunch of 4''blast gates I can sell you cheap. My new system has 5 inch.( I have a box of old 4inchers) I know how costly it is. I think I have some 4in hose too. I'm in NJ. Let me know if I can help out.
-Lou Carabasi
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