Dust Collector upgrade - Felder RL 140 or updated Oneida Smart 3hp collector

I left Vermont a few months ago and sold most of my major shop equipment in anticipation of moving into a small setup at our new home in South Carolina. I had an Oneida V3000 3hp cyclone for years and really liked it. I was fortunate to have the cyclone on the lower level below my shop and wasn't exposed to any of the real fine dust that might have escaped through the filter. The noise was completely isolated from the main shop. And daily/weekly bin cleanout was easy - I had two bins and just swapped them when one bin got full and then took it down to the neighbors who used it for animals.

My SC shop will basically be a 2 car garage. The dust collector will have to be in that space and with the neighbors close by there is no option to vent outside, and I need to do some extra work to keep the noise down. I'm a one man shop and I make furniture and built-ins for my wife and friends - about one project a month. The wife/CFO has given permission to do upgrades. The challenge will be the space. My first two pieces of new equipment are a Minimax FS30 jointer/planer and a MM16 bandsaw. I have a good compliment of portable tools including a Festool tracksaw for breaking down plywood. I'm going to run with just these two big pieces for a year to see how well I can function. There might be a point in year two where I add a Sawstop PCS with a 36 inch fence and a Supermax 16-32 sander (newly introduced) to get up to four tools connected to the dust collector.

And now I want to invest in my last duct collector and am willing to spend more especially for this "tool" After months of research I've focused in on two alternatives mentioned in the title. First the Felder RL140 - the major advantage to this choice would be the least amount of dust particles coming back into the shop. The 140 is only $500 more than the 125 and the intake is 5.5 inches vs. 5 so it should perform better if I run a 6 inch main. I hope this is possible instead of having to go immediately down to a 5 inch main. The filter for the 140 is also twice the size of the 125. I like the size format of this collector for a garage shop and couldn't see fitting a 160 (at about twice the size) into my space. And being portable is good in terms of having some flexibility in moving it around until I have a permanent floor plan decided on. It has a manual brush bar that I will need to remember to pull across the main filter perhaps every day. It's a 4hp motor so it should be able to do a decent job at moving air. These are not known for being quiet and I'll look into getting the noise reducer on top.

Second choice - Oneida is in the process right now of upgrading/merging their Smart collectors and their Pro line collectors. The smart collectors have intrigued me for awhile in the way they are providing a variable speed motor that changes speed based on the pressure it senses. In an ideal world we would all have 6 inch mains going to 6 inch intakes off every machine. In my shop I'll have about a 4 inch intake on the jointer/planer, for the bandsaw a 4 inch at the bottom and probably a 2-4 inch at the table, a future Sawstop will be similar to the bandsaw setup. The Oneida will have a good Hepa filter. With the variable speed this could end up being a loud machine. The first 3hp version of the Smart collector had less CFM in a standard setup compared to the V3000. Hopefully in this next iteration if they can bring the 3hp version closer to the Pro line then the CFM stats should be respectable. Oneida is going to get back to me in the next two weeks with more details.

I'm looking for reactions to these two choices. I don't have final pricing but the Felder will be in the $4k range. The Oneida might be $3k to $3.5K but they have made no commitments yet to pricing. Remember ducting will add probably another $1.5K to $2K for my shop. So it's a big investment, but in an area where I want to do it right. The Felder might be the way to get the cleanest shop I can (assuming I get a lot of other things right like the ducting) and the Oneida smart collector might give me the best CFM/static presssure results across a wide range of hookups.

I know I could get a traditional Oneida V3000 again or a Clearvue for around $2K, but I have a once in a lifetime chance here thanks to the CFO to do better. Which way would you recommend?

I suspect you know that I'm an Oneida fan when it comes to dust collection so I'm glad it's on your short list. Noise containment as well as minimal ambient dust can be be handled by a small closet like I did for mine and the big compressor. The Felder is a good unit, for sure...they are a quality manufacturer. I've only ever seen one up close and personal and it was clearly quality. BTW, I suspect that's a 120mm port, not 5", the same size as likely on your J/P if it uses the same size port as mine does.

That all said, given the space you will have as a shop and the likely length of ducting runs, type of tools, etc., I wonder if you need to go quite that high-end in either product you're considering. My unit is a 2hp Oneida that just predates the original gorilla. A similar 3hp unit may be great for what you really need to accomplish what you want to do. Talk to them about it in detail about your shop, your tools and your concerns.

You really need to compare fan curves for the machines. I looked at the Smart Collector but ended up with an Oneida 5 hp Dust Gorilla. It does great even with 4" ports on the machines.

Good advice guys. The more I look into this the more I lean toward Oneida also. A Felder unit will run about $1K more with lots of issues when you really need to clean the filter. On my previous Oneida I cleaned the Hepa filter once a year and it wasn't bad. Just took it outside, put on my respirator, and used compressed air for 10 minutes. With the Felder it sounds like you have to get underneath the filter and be ready to get covered in dust. I haven't heard any Felder owners talk about how easy/hard it is to remove the filters and clean them separately from the unit.

So I'm going to wait a couple of weeks until I hear back from Oneida once they have details about their new product line of Smart collectors merged with their Pro line.

Al-Ko makes dust collectors in a similar format to the Felders, but they include an air system to help clean the filters.

Matt