Stage 1: acquire dust collector... Stage 2

[Rusty Eads]

So I finally landed the mother of all dust collectors for my 300 sqft shop, a 2480 cfm 4 hp Coral 2 (or is it 4) bag dust collector. Picked it up today after pondering and pondering and pondering. The price wasn't too bad, $125 :), just the fact that it is 3 phase and probably a whole lot more dust collector than I would need. It looks almost brand new and the motor hardly had any dust on it. The downside is that it did not come with any bags or filters.

I am going to be asking a lot of advice while I begin to set this monster up which will be happening probably over several months. I figure since I got such a large dust collector I might as well get the full use out of it. It is quite the upgrade over my 20 year old 1 hp 580 cfm single bag hf dust collector I have now. First step will be to obtain or build a rotary phase converter-I have been eyeing some other three phase equipment anyways :rolleyes:.

So now I got the dust collector the next thing I need to get are bags or filters for it. Where do you all suggest I start to look? Money is a big factor but so is safety. I have looked at wynn filters but can't really afford the $300+ that it will cost. My ceiling height is also a consideration. The collector without the bags is 45" high and I have 7 1/2 foot ceilings. Since this is a 2 - 4 bag collector can I run it with bag/filter in the first port (there is a baffle seperating the 2 ports)? Doing it that way may allow me to afford the wynn filters one at a time.

Ok, a little long winded for a simple question but like I said it will be a long work in process and I will be taking it one step at a time. Once I finish this step I will be back for more advice on the electrical part.

Thanks in advance

[Alan Schaffter]

Freshen the edge on your tin snips, buy about $60 worth of 26. ga. galvanized steel, make your own cyclone, and discharge outside- no bags.

[Rusty Eads]

I have thought about that, actually thought about placing the whole unit out in a shed beside the window to the shop. By the way my shop is in the basement. My basement is seperated into two sections, my shop which is 11 x 30 and then in the other section is where my furnace and hot water heater is. Seeing how this collector pulls enough cfm to replace all the air in my shop every minute, how would I safely exhaust outside so I don't pull the air from my furnace or the fumes (both furnace and hot water heater are natural gas)?

[Alan Schaffter]

You will need to make sure there is good source of make-up air that can provide more CFM with less static pressure resistance to your shop than pulling reverse flue, seal up all gaps in the separating wall, and provide a source of make-up air right at the furnace and hot water heater as well. You can check flows with a "smoke candle" but I would have it checked out by a knowledgeable HVAC guy. I would also invest in a CO detector or two.

[Dave MacArthur]

What Alan said. I would not want to be running a bag filter DC in a basement... I'd expect that to just pump/recirculate the fine dust. I'd build a DC off the Pentz plans/calculations, and I'd use that thing to PUSH through the cyclone probably, and vent outside.

You can probably get pretty far on your research by just SEARCHING using:
poster= "Alan Schaffter"
Keyword= "cyclone"
and search workshops and general power tools. He has a setup similar to what we both recommended and has posted a LOT of DC info.

[Mike Archambeau]

If you exhaust outside, that monster will vacuum up all the heated air in your building in a few minutes. Then you will have the pleasure of buying lots of fuel to heat all the incoming cold air that is rushing in to replace what you just blew outdoors. At 2000 cubic feet per minute, it will empty a room that is 10 feet by 10 feet by ten feet in 30 seconds. In ten minutes you can send all the air in your house out into the great outdoors!

Woul be better to line up some high quality bags and filters and keep the heat indoors. I wonder if Oneida Air can help you with bags, filters, or even a cyclone?

Just my .02. Of course if you have an oil well on your property you won't care and the fresh air would be great!

[Rusty Eads]

And that is exactly why I have not committed to venting outside. With my shop being 2475 cubic feet and this thing venting 2480 cubic feet per minute, I really do not want to be heating 0 degree air back up to a reasonable temp every minute.

[Alan Schaffter]

If you exhaust outside, that monster will vacuum up all the heated air in your building in a few minutes. Then you will have the pleasure of buying lots of fuel to heat all the incoming cold air that is rushing in to replace what you just blew outdoors. At 2000 cubic feet per minute, it will empty a room that is 10 feet by 10 feet by ten feet in 30 seconds. In ten minutes you can send all the air in your house out into the great outdoors!

Would be better to line up some high quality bags and filters and keep the heat indoors. I wonder if Oneida Air can help you with bags, filters, or even a cyclone?

Just my .02. Of course if you have an oil well on your property you won't care and the fresh air would be great!

It is not that simple, especially for a basement.

Here is the rest of the story- that warmed or cooled air you will be pumping outside has very little thermal mass compared to your shop and contents, so that once the DC stops running, the ambient air will quickly warm or cool and stabilize at nearly the temperature of the shop environment. If you calculate the thermal mass of the wallboard (if you have any), the concrete (block) walls behind it, concrete floor, wood framing overhead and all the machines and other contents, you will see they hold MANY, MANY, MANY more BTU's than the volumes of air the DC is pumping out. Air has zilch thermal mass in comparison. I don't have the link any more but I think cast iron or concrete have around a 1000 times as much thermal mass as the same volume of air.

That is not to say you won't eventually start to see a drop in temp over time. You will see it almost immediately when the air is being pumped out and replaced by outside air. But who uses their DC continuously? Once the DC stops the air will warm or cool VERY QUICKLY and seek equilibrium with the surrounding thermal mass whose temperature has changed little, if at all. The biggest effect will most likely be an increase in relative humidity in the, hot, humid summer. But, unless you run your DC continuously, the difference in the cost to heat and cool a basement shop without a DC should be minimal.

Also consider, if your basement is below grade, you have the thermal mass of the surrounding soil too!!! In my days with "a government agency" I visited a number of deep "underground facilities" that were surrounded by concrete and "cold" solid rock. Do you know what the biggest environmental problem was? It was getting rid of excess heat!!

[Rusty Eads]

I would really much rather vent outside for several reasons; no need for filters or filter bags, can move this monster into an adjoining room to save on my precious shop space, keep noise down to a minimum. What would be the best way to replace the outgoing air? I have only two windows right above grade that are about 24" x 24" each and one doorway that leads into the other part of the basement that contains the furnace and water heater.

I made a crude sketch of my shop, location of current tools and my proposed layout of dc pipe. Please let me know what you think and any improvements I might make. The table saw will have a cabinet port and an overhead port

[Phil Thien]

Excuse the shameless self promotion, but...

If I was going to vent that monster outside, I'd just modify it with my baffles. Why go through all the trouble of building a cyclone when you're exhausting outside anyway? The small degree of extra separation via a cyclone will never be noticed. You can save room, time, and money by using baffles.

And then you can buy bulk bags from ULINE (or someone) and some nice band clamps to make getting rid of debris quick, clean, and easy.

[Rusty Eads]

You piqued my interest at saves money, what exactly are the baffles and what do they do? As long as I still get optimum dust collection in the shop, I am up for anything cheap. I must add though that there is a house that is about 8 feet from mine on the shop side, though where I am proposing the new location for the dust collector is the house's side yard. The edge of the house is about midpoint of my shop to give you guys a point of reference. I guess I could also vent out the front of my house (the wood storage room and hopefully dust collector room is under my front porch)

[Phil Thien]

Just search for "thien" on the SMC search function, you'll find plenty of stuff.

[John Coloccia]

Excuse the shameless self promotion, but...

If I was going to vent that monster outside, I'd just modify it with my baffles. Why go through all the trouble of building a cyclone when you're exhausting outside anyway? The small degree of extra separation via a cyclone will never be noticed. You can save room, time, and money by using baffles.

And then you can buy bulk bags from ULINE (or someone) and some nice band clamps to make getting rid of debris quick, clean, and easy.

I was just about to mention this. +1

[Alan Schaffter]

Another option I forgot to mention in my long thermal discourse- something I have done. If at some later time you decide you need to recirculate the air back to your shop during the coldest or hottest months, and have the $ for filters you can do so if you have a good separator. You can set your system up with a diverter valve- pump the air outside when the weather is mild, but recirculate it back to your shop through a filter(s) when it is not.

[Dan Friedrichs]

+1 on vent outside but build a baffle instead of a cyclone. I use a baffle in the bag ring and it keeps all visible chunks inside, and blows all fine dust outside. The best $1-worth of plywood I've ever spent :)

Whenever discussions of venting outside arise, people always say, "Oh! The COST of the heat/AC!!", but you never hear anyone discussing the cost savings of not using expensive filters! The filters are expensive, and they have a finite lifetime. If you want to compare, you need to consider the amortization of those filters as a COST of venting inside.

If I ever moved to a colder climate, I'd probably spend a few hours trying to calculate the heat loss from venting outside, but for anyone who lives in a remotely moderate climate, venting outside (if possible - neighbors, etc...) is a no-brainer.

[Rusty Eads]

So I am seriously leaning towards venting outside, the less mess the better, so now what is the best way to replace the displaced air? Will opening one of the windows be enough? While this is not the most desirable scenario in the middle of the winter when it is 0 or below, I can deal with it. My shop is not heated or cooled, only relies on the heat from up above.

[Dan Friedrichs]

So I am seriously leaning towards venting outside, the less mess the better, so now what is the best way to replace the displaced air? Will opening one of the windows be enough?

If you have a 6" duct running to outside, you'll need at least that much area bringing air in. In reality, you'll want much more intake area than that to prevent accidentally sucking flue gasses inside.

Like electricity, the intake air will try to take the path of least resistance. So make sure the path of least resistance is through several open windows, not down through a furnace vent.

[David Giles]

If you vent outside and suck in the window screen, you need a bigger inlet air source. If you suck in the door, you need a screen door. If you suck up the cast iron top from your table saw, you need a smaller dust collector. Experiments are your friend.