Oversize Dust Collector? Oneida V System 3HP vs. 5HP

[Ben Martin]

So before I moved from Chicago to Greenville, I sold my dust collector to a buddy with plans of upgrading to a nice cyclone system. I have talked to the wife and she has approved the purchase much sooner than I was expecting so I am ready to place my order.

Oneida recommended that I get a 3HP system, but I am planning on going with the 5HP as for the additional $300 it seems like money well spent, 1285 vs 1498 CFM. Does anybody see a downside to buying a bigger collector than I need? I am trying to "future proof" my investment. My shop is 28x28 with the standard industrial sized machines, mostly older. The biggest killer would be a wide belt sander, which I do not own yet. The longest run to the collector would be around 50' (the shop is an oversized 2-car garage, so the run would be down 2 walls).

I like going with the V-system as it is quieter and shorter than a Super Gorilla. I am thinking that if we ever move back up north, I might be forced into a basement again (please never happen!) so the shorter unit might be the ticket.

Thanks guy!

[David Kumm]

With 50' runs you want the larger system. Get the cyclone that separates fine dust the best- ask them for a recommendation and be sure to get as much filter area as they supply. Some of their 5 hp systems had different cartridges but that may have changed. You don't want to short the filter area. It would be even better if the exhaust was gated so you could go directly outside when using the widebelt in the future. It will screw up the cartridges. 8" amd 7" main runs. Dave

[Paul McGaha]

I think you're right to upgrade Ben. More cfm is good.

Not too many drawbacks-initial cost, uses slightly more electricicty, needs a larger circuit.

If I had to do it again I'd have probably bought a 5 HP cyclone. I have a 2 HP Dust Gorilla as recommended for my shop by Oneida.

PHM

[Jeff Bartley]

Ben--too bad clearvue isn't near you anymore!! You could have saved the shipping. I'd go for the larger system, not much larger a footprint, and more cfm is what you'd want with a wide-belt. I wouldn't worry about the level of noise---just plan on building an enclosure from the start---cyclones are loud! I 'future-proofed' my enclosure by building it as a stand alone unit rather than framing in a permanent room. My clearvue was 'clearly' the best shop purchase to date! Sorry, it's Friday and I couldn't help the pun.......Jeff

[Ben Martin]

Ben--too bad clearvue isn't near you anymore!! You could have saved the shipping. I'd go for the larger system, not much larger a footprint, and more cfm is what you'd want with a wide-belt. I wouldn't worry about the level of noise---just plan on building an enclosure from the start---cyclones are loud! I 'future-proofed' my enclosure by building it as a stand alone unit rather than framing in a permanent room. My clearvue was 'clearly' the best shop purchase to date! Sorry, it's Friday and I couldn't help the pun.......Jeff

Jeff, I had seen a post last night that Clearvue was in Pickens and got excited until I realized that the post was a couple years old. Saving $200 would have been nice!

Do you have a thread on your enclosure? I would like to see it!

[Sam Layton]

Hi Ben,

My shop is just a little larger than your, 750 sq ft. I have a 3 HP Oneida. It is not the Gorilla, it was purchased before the Gorillas came out. My main trunk line is 8". I then go down to a 6" duct through the shop. My system works very well. I have no experience with the 5 HP model. I an not recommending the 3 HP, I am just saying that it works good. I do not have a wide belt, but I do have a 37" double drum sander with an 8" trunk line with two 6" ducts to the sander. No problems at all. I have the largest filter that they offered. I am thinking that maybe two would be good with the proper adapter???

Sam

[Joe Vincent 63]

I am going to go slightly against the grain here - I too am looking to upgrade, but from an Onieda 2hp cyclone to either a 3 or 5. In talking to Oneida engineers at length, you have to have the duct work sized to allow you to use it. The 5hp with my 7" main duct runs was too much air flow - unless I separated 7" intake and added another at the collector inlet (maybe a 4 or 5").

As was suggested earlier, I would spend time talking with their engineers - they are very helpful. If you ductwork can support it, I'd be great with the 5hp. If not, why spend the additional money, its noisier, etc., unless you can truly use it.

Joe

[mreza Salav]

There is a compromise in performance to go to V series (e.g. they won't give you as good a separation as the Gorilla series I think).
I would consider a 3HP Gorilla over a V series, JMHO.

[Craig Behnke]

Of the hundreds of purchase/equipment decisions i've made in my life (hundreds of them, not all WW equip), i'd say that I regretted about 50% of the times I bought a smaller or what I thought was just the right size product....but I have only regretted about 10% of the times I thought I was buying more than needed/warranted.

i read a quote somewhere about the sting of an expensive/quality purchase is felt but once and the benefits are felt many times over...and the benefit of a cheaper/lower quality buy occurs but once and the frustrations occur many times over. or something like that. NOT AT ALL saying that the 3HP is lower quality vs the 5HP, they are both solid products, it's just the only parable I could think of to fit the situation.

[Ben Martin]

I sent Oneida an email asking for a quote on a 5HP Gorilla, will let you know what I hear back. Perhaps I should have asked about the 3HP too..

[Ben Martin]

i read a quote somewhere about the sting of an expensive/quality purchase is felt but once and the benefits are felt many times over...and the benefit of a cheaper/lower quality buy occurs but once and the frustrations occur many times over. or something like that.

I am a 3rd generation Cat employee, I was pretty much raised by this saying!

Gucci Family Slogan
"Quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten."

[David Kumm]

Too much airflow should never be a problem. If you run a 5 hp system with 7 or 8" mains you do have to be careful if only using one 4" port but that is easily compensated for. The bigger issue is that many 5 hp systems don't take full advantage of their capability by running too small pipes for the types of impellers in the system. If you buy more cfm than you can use you might have to open another port for some locations but if you guess wrong or upgrade to a larger machine there is no way to fix the problem of too little flow. The long runs with elbows dictate erring on the safe side. Dave

[Paul Wunder]

I am running the ClearVue 1800 in a basement shop (25X25) with only 90" headroom. I mounted my unit between the joists and mounted my filters side by side. It is 5hp and uses 6" PVC piping. My longest run is 50' because the cyclone is in an adjoining room. Pulls like crazy.

I mention this because you were concerned about perhaps going back to a basement workshop with limited height.

[Greg Portland]

So before I moved from Chicago to Greenville, I sold my dust collector to a buddy with plans of upgrading to a nice cyclone system. I have talked to the wife and she has approved the purchase much sooner than I was expecting so I am ready to place my order.

Oneida recommended that I get a 3HP system, but I am planning on going with the 5HP as for the additional $300 it seems like money well spent, 1285 vs 1498 CFM. Does anybody see a downside to buying a bigger collector than I need? I am trying to "future proof" my investment. My shop is 28x28 with the standard industrial sized machines, mostly older. The biggest killer would be a wide belt sander, which I do not own yet. The longest run to the collector would be around 50' (the shop is an oversized 2-car garage, so the run would be down 2 walls).

I like going with the V-system as it is quieter and shorter than a Super Gorilla. I am thinking that if we ever move back up north, I might be forced into a basement again (please never happen!) so the shorter unit might be the ticket.

Thanks guy!
I would absolutely go 5HP if a widebelt is in your future. I would also STRONGLY consider going with an option that allows you more filter media. The fine dust from the sander will quickly clog up the single filter options (blow it out after each session, etc.). I would call Oneida and describe your situation + the future wide belt sander and see what they have to say. Most folks with a widebelt are in a larger commercial situation with a 7.5HP+ collector + multiple filters on a plenum. I have a medium sized drum sander and a 5HP cyclone w. 2 large cartridge filters and find that I need to clean out the fine dust in the filter after each large sanding session. Just something to think about.

[Ben Martin]

I am running the ClearVue 1800 in a basement shop (25X25) with only 90" headroom. I mounted my unit between the joists and mounted my filters side by side. It is 5hp and uses 6" PVC piping. My longest run is 50' because the cyclone is in an adjoining room. Pulls like crazy.

I mention this because you were concerned about perhaps going back to a basement workshop with limited height.

Yeah, I just checked and originally I thought that there was only a 2" difference between the V and Gorilla, but it is actually 10"! My new shop only has about 98" tall ceilings, and the 5HP Super Gorilla is 97.5", I would definitely need to build a bump up in the ceiling to have some airflow room on top of the motor. From what I remember talking with the salesperson the first time, shipping is the same on the 5HP models since it has to go freight, so quickly adding up the costs, the difference should be in the $200 range. Once again, if I am spending this much money and given how long I plan on keeping it, $200 is a "drop in the bucket". Both the V and Gorilla have "about" the same foot print as well, but the Gorilla does come with an extra year of warranty...

Decisions, decisions...

[mreza Salav]

One extra point: I too have a ClearVue in a basement shop (I have documented it here in a thread how I enclosed it in a closet to reduce the noise).
One advantage of CV is larger filter area.

[Erik Christensen]

My 2 cents is take a look at clearvue. I have had their system for about 4 years - 6" PVC ducting, 3 car garage sized shop, pulls like crazy, no noticeable difference in performance if running 2 stations at once. Of all the tools I have purchased I think it represents the best value and performance.

[Mike Heidrick]

What are the amp requirements of teh 5hp and is that an issue for you?

I run two 5hp DCs - a single stage Delta and a Delta cyclone.

Look for the larger impeller of the machines you are running.

[Ole Anderson]

If you go with a 5 hp, even a 3 hp, don't hamstring yourself and think you will be happy with 6" PVC duct, you want 7" or 8" main runs for that much suckability.

[Paul Wunder]

ClearVue makes two 5 hp models:

CV1800 which is the one most of us choose. It has a 15" impeller and a 6" inlet for 6" PVC ducting

CV1800 Max which is to be used if you anticipate using two machines at the same time. It has a 16" impeller and an 8" inlet for ducting

Both models have the same size cyclone and filters

[David Kumm]

Keep in mind that if you shorten or build your own stand you can shave off some height. Use 35 gal drums rather than 55 and I bet you can lose 10-12" in height. 35 gal is enough to carry up stairs anyway. If you see a used Aget push through system with the impeller along side rather than on top, that is an option. Dustkop cyclones are a step up from the hobby type ones although the CV separation is as good or better. Dave

[Ben Martin]

Mike, Power won't be an issue at all as I am having a new 200A service ran to the shop.

Ole, I have left over 6" ducts for the end runs, but will need to buy new for everythig else.

David, I was thinking about making my own collection drum, but read a lot of stuff claiming that the bin is an integral part to the system also.

Clearvue hasn't really been an option thus far, I just can't get over the looks of their machines... (not to start a debate...)

[David Kumm]

Ben, I use Oneida's stock 35 gal drum, just not their stand. When you are using a sander and filters you generally want the cone to be longer so it is tougher to fit everything under the ceiling. One of the reasons hobby cyclones aren't very efficient at fine dust is the attempt to build them to fit under lower ceilings. Life is a tradeoff. Dave

[Jamie Buxton]

A potential issue with extra horsepower is heat. A 5 hp motor generates something like 3000 watts of heat. A typical one of those 110-volt plug-in room heaters puts out about 800 watts. So running your cyclone is like running four of those room heaters. Run the cyclone for a couple of hours, and it will heat up a 600 sq ft shop quite a bit.

[Rick Fisher]

Oneida will have a suggested pipe size for the 5hp machine.. I would follow their directions.

I have a 4hp Felder RL-160. Yesterday, I sucked up a redbull can through a 4" hose.. The 4" hose is about 5 feet long and connects to about 20 feet of 6" PVC with 3-4 bends ..

I freaked .. wondering if the can was full or empty.. shut down the machine as fast as I could .. The can was gone, inside the dust bin . The can was an empty..

For $300 .. get the bigger DC.. It gives you lots of flexibility .. ability to leave other gates open, even by accident.. If you get a bigger sanding machine, you don't have to have it really close to the DC .. 5hp is freedom compared to 3hp ..

I have learned a bunch about airflow and dust collectors of late.. I have an issue with my Felder RL-160 ... if I leave 2 gates open, it trips the overload on the motor .. I am using the factory suggested size pipe but if I had gone with bigger pipe than suggested, it would probably trip even more .. Its a new problem, nothing has changed in 3-4 years.. not really sure why its happening .. As a sideline.. I learned that giving the machine too much airflow is not smart.. My problem is not specifically too much airflow, but too much airflow now aggravates my problem ..

Hope that made sense.. lol

[Chris Parks]

I think some clarification is in order here, the Clearvue does not use the whole 5hp, just a tad over 3hp on the 1800.

[ian maybury]

Another very happy Clear Vue user here - in this case a largely DIY version to Bill Pentz's drawings.

(1) You don't necessarily have to use the stock Clear Vue layout or fit it under a ceiling. My system (build and install photos here http://www.gallery2.clearvuecyclones.com/v/CV1800+and+CVMax/ondablade/ Despite being fairly inactive now there's lots of good CV info in this forum) placed the fan upstairs with the cyclone poking through a hole, and the filters separately set up for the more easily cleaned outside to inside flow. While it's more work there are noise reduction advantages to this layout. There are other layout variations possible too. e.g. separation of the fan and the cyclone with ducting.

(2) Larger diameter fan impellers like the 16in CV Max not only move more air, they also (as a result of the higher tip speed for a given RPM) develop significantly more suction/negative pressure. (judging by published fan curves it seems that even a 1in increase in diameter makes a significant difference) Which means they deal much better with restrictive hoods on machines.

This system draws just under 4HP with one gate open, depending on the motor efficiency and restriction/duct size some get a little higher.

(3) Duct sizing is a bit of a trade off. It seems to be possible with these impellers (it's tough in absence of fan curves to know for sure exactly what the limits are) to get more CFM by going larger than the 6in Bill Pentz standardised on (his pages deal with the topic of using 8in headers with the 16in impeller), but if overdone it's possible to slip below the industry guideline of minimum 4000ft/min for safe transportation of dust and chips up verticals.

If in doubt there's the option of enlarging just the horizontal runs/headers to minimise the potential for issues. Personal experience suggests that the 16in CV impeller has no difficulty running at least 160mm (a Euro size) verticals - it'll robustly transport chunks of wood up them even when pulling through a long and quite restrictive 4in flexible floor sweep. (provided no other gates are open) It shouldn't be necessary to reduce verticals (below this) on a properly performing 5HP system unless there's going to be a lot of restriction somewhere - or the fan is notably inefficient.

(4) The Clear Vue impeller has fairly minimal backwards curve on the impeller blades. This while possibly a little noisier likely delivers significantly better performance at higher pressure drops. There may also be reason to think that the taller cyclone does a better job on separating fines than some.

(5) There's no significant down side to throttling a big fan to reduce air flow - it actually reduces the amps and power drawn from the motor.

It's hard to see downsides to running a larger fan. (other than the previous initial cost - heating and energy usage are not really an issue unless it'll be run for longish periods) Even on something like a router table that strictly speaking isn't set up to use high CFM the extra suction delivers improved collection. The extra CFM makes it possible also to run an ancilliary 4in dust collection hose that can be placed where needed to capture escaping dust.

If cost is an issue it's possible to still do a decent job with around 3HP and a fan/impeller to match. The catch in that case is that the duct runs and hoses need to be kept very short (not much more than about 10ft with minimal bends and other restrictions) or the restriction will pull the available air flow (CFM) down low enough that the performance suffers.

Dust systems that move a lot of air (say over 1,000CFM) and run HEPA or similar standard cartridge filters not only do a superior job of dust collection, they also by pulling in a lot of air in th area of the machine do a very similar air cleaning job to that done by separate cleaners.



Despite all of this having high CFM and high suction isn't a universal solution for all dust collection issues. It most certainly does step the performance up very significantly compared to e.g. a 1kW bag filter on pretty much any machine you care to mention, and can be throttled down if needed should an issue arise (i've not seen one yet) but as in the threads on table saw dust hoods the details can still matter if you're looking to truly maximise dust collection performance.

ian

[Ben Martin]

Ben, I use Oneida's stock 35 gal drum, just not their stand. When you are using a sander and filters you generally want the cone to be longer so it is tougher to fit everything under the ceiling. One of the reasons hobby cyclones aren't very efficient at fine dust is the attempt to build them to fit under lower ceilings. Life is a tradeoff. Dave

David,
Are you using the wall bracket or something else? The 97.5" they list is with the wall bracket.

Can anybody tell me what the height to the top of the cyclone is not including the motor (they don't list that)? I want to see if it will fit under my garage door rails and leave the filter semi blocking a door...

Thanks!

EDIT: Found the height, 81" to the center of the exit, if anybody could get more exact it would be appreciated.

[Todd Brewer]

Clearvue hasn't really been an option thus far, I just can't get over the looks of their machines... (not to start a debate...)

I had a problem with that too. Then they came out with the painted version. I must say once installed I think it looks great. And I'm pretty picky about looks.

I bought a black steel drum because I don't like the garbage can look. It looks very professional. Of course this will add more cost.

I didn't use the cantilever shelf method either. I lagged a 1.5" x 1.5" x about 24" long piece of aluminum angle to the wall. I screwed two eye bolts into a rafter. The motor assembly rests on the angle and two long eye bolts in the motor assembly connect to the ceiling eye bolts via S hooks. The motor assembly is bolted to the angle in two places. Very secure. Very clean look.

Battery in my camera is dead. Once recharged I'll try to post a picture (never posted a picture on this forum before).

Someday I am going to post a complete review of my dust collection system. It is not yet complete. A lot of people on this site helped and offered opinions. I want to show them how it turned out.

Todd

[Ben Martin]

Todd,

I would be interested in those pictures, I can't find amything about a painted Clearvue...

Ben

[Paul Wunder]

Ben,

Appearance and design are subject to personal preferences of course, but there are only three pieces in the Clearvue cyclone that would be subject to painting, if so desired: (the blower, the hanger bracket and the elbow (transition) that comes off the blower. With either a brush or spray that adds about an hour to the assembly. Naturally, you would not paint the cyclone body because it is clear which is useful in identifying operational problems such as clogs or an overfull dust bin.

I painted my unit white, but on the ClearVue site there are red, blue, green, etc. Perhaps some folks call in decorators.

[Kirk Poore]

A potential issue with extra horsepower is heat. A 5 hp motor generates something like 3000 watts of heat. A typical one of those 110-volt plug-in room heaters puts out about 800 watts. So running your cyclone is like running four of those room heaters. Run the cyclone for a couple of hours, and it will heat up a 600 sq ft shop quite a bit.

This is dead on. I was running my 5 HP Oneida over the weekend (outside temp 102F), and my shop heated up noticably even in the evening when it was finally cooling down outside.

I will say that my system worked fine even when I accidentally left my 6" jointer port open and was running my RAS (also with a 6" port). I'm not sure a 3 hp would have done that.:)

KirK

[Ben Martin]

Dealing with the heat won't be a problem as I am installing a 1.5T heat pump in the shop, which is oversized for my needs.

I see that Oneida has a sale that started today, I think I might be placing my order...

[Jamie Buxton]

Dealing with the heat won't be a problem as I am installing a 1.5T heat pump in the shop, which is oversized for my needs.

I see that Oneida has a sale that started today, I think I might be placing my order...

Doing the conversions, a 1 ton air conditioner would not quite keep up with a 5 hp motor.

[Ben Martin]

Doing the conversions, a 1 ton air conditioner would not quite keep up with a 5 hp motor.

This would be assuming that the dust collector and heat pump were the only things and located in a pseudo "vacuum" of a shop. The thermal capacity (I think that is the name, Heat Transfer class escapes me now...) of everything else in the shop can't be ignored.

Albeit it was interesting seeing how much heat a 5hp motor creates, something along the lines of 14,000 Btu/hr compared to my heat pumps cooling output of 18,000 Btu/hr. Now if I was a professional and leaving it on for hours at a time it would be a different story...

I called Oneida today and put the order in for a 5hp Super Gorilla, their current sale put me over the edge. I only paid $170 more delivered vs. the quote I got for the V System. Now just waiting the 4-5 weeks they quoted for delivery, I wasn't expecting that long of a wait...

[Michael W. Clark]

I called Oneida today and put the order in for a 5hp Super Gorilla, their current sale put me over the edge. I only paid $170 more delivered vs. the quote I got for the V System. Now just waiting the 4-5 weeks they quoted for delivery, I wasn't expecting that long of a wait...

I think you will be happy that you went with the higher HP and larger cyclone.

Mike

[Todd Brewer]

Good choice on the 5HP Super Gorilla. Nice thing about Oneida systems is you don't have to fuss around too much. Pull it out of the boxes and bolt it together.

[Kirk Poore]

Now just waiting the 4-5 weeks they quoted for delivery, I wasn't expecting that long of a wait...


Mine came in a week and a half early last November. Good thing my daughter was home from college, because nobody called me.

Kirk

[Joe Jensen]

I own and like Oneida. I also think buying a larger collector is a good idea. But if the port on the tool is say 4", the cfm you will actually get with a 3HP, or 5HP will be about the same. Also, putting that 4" port on a 5", 6", or 7" line won't make much difference either. What you need is more suction pressure. Most dust collectors are designed for max cfm with modest suction pressure. Say 14" of pressure with no duct, cyclone or filter resistance. The reason shops buy larger collectors is to run more machines at the same time. That's why in commercial shops you see huge main branches down to smaller sub branches and then the final size to the machine. That system is designed assuming many tools in use at the same time. Shop vacs on the other hand are designed for high suction pressure, say 90", but modest cfm of around 100. With either the 3HP or 5HP you will get only 350-400 cfm through a 4" port. Amazingly, you will get more CFM on a 2.5" port with a shop vac that with a normal dust collector.

Oneida has another line called the smart collector. I am certain that with nearly any tool you have in the shop you will get more real world CFM with the 3HP smart collector than you will with the 5HP dust gorilla.

[ian maybury]

Even an extra inch on impeller diameter at a given RPM makes quite a worthwhile difference to pressure capability Joe.

It seems like the Oneida impellers may be fairly heavily backwards inclined. Which normally quietens impellers a bit, but at the cost of a bit less pressure capability...

ian

[Joe Jensen]

Even an extra inch on impeller diameter at a given RPM makes quite a worthwhile difference to pressure capability Joe.

It seems like the Oneida impellers may be fairly heavily backwards inclined. Which normally quietens impellers a bit, but at the cost of a bit less pressure capability...

ian

Agree. There is just soooo much mis information on the web. I've read about a guy who ran 8" pipe everywhere hooked up to stock ports on hobby machines. Oneida's 5HP smart collector adjusts the speed of the fan to keep the current consistent. With small ports it generates more pressure. With that machine the extra HP is going to pressure and not raw cfm. No home shop is really getting 1200 cfm from cabinet saw class tools, 3HP, 5HP, or 7HP unless they have a high pressure fan design. Wish more folks understood and gave sound advice (not pointing at you :) )

[Ryan Brucks]

One thing has always puzzled me about the 5hp smart oneida. If it increases RPMs to get better suction at higher SP, that means it must have some RPMs to add....

meaning either their motors are running less then 3450 rpms by default (probably), or they somehow get them to spin faster than that at full speed?

[Joe Jensen]

One thing has always puzzled me about the 5hp smart oneida. If it increases RPMs to get better suction at higher SP, that means it must have some RPMs to add....

meaning either their motors are running less then 3450 rpms by default (probably), or they somehow get them to spin faster than that at full speed?

They are using a 3 phase motor with a separate electronic controller that varies the frequency of the power delivered to the 3 phase motor. Takes single phase in and makes variable frequency 3 phase out. These are called variable feed drives. They make them for 3 phase in and 3 phase out too. The tradeoff I'm told is more fan noise with the higher RPM and not all fan blades are engineered for higher speeds.

[Ryan Brucks]

I understand the 3 phase and the VFD. I have that same setup myself.

What I meant was that, almost all motors in this size class are meant to run at 3450rpm.

So either they are using a motor that can go beyond that... or they are setting them up to under perform in most situations, to give the impression of having more power.


either the motor goes up beyond 3450 or its operating under that most of the time.

[Joe Jensen]

I understand the 3 phase and the VFD. I have that same setup myself.

What I meant was that, almost all motors in this size class are meant to run at 3450rpm.

So either they are using a motor that can go beyond that... or they are setting them up to under perform in most situations, to give the impression of having more power.


either the motor goes up beyond 3450 or its operating under that most of the time.

Hmm, I just assumed that 3 phase motors operate at 3450 only when on 60hz power and that if you change the freq you change the speed. There would of course be a max speed that the motor could run at without shaking or destroying itself.

[Michael W. Clark]

One thing has always puzzled me about the 5hp smart oneida. If it increases RPMs to get better suction at higher SP, that means it must have some RPMs to add....

meaning either their motors are running less then 3450 rpms by default (probably), or they somehow get them to spin faster than that at full speed?

I agree, it has to be something like that. You are going to get the max SP at full speed (100%+ maybe some small amount of overspeed). When you slow the fan down, the fan curve (relationship of CFM and SP) is also going to shift down, giving you a lower max SP.

The other thing I noticed is the flow and SP they quote for 10' of hose. I have a spreadsheet I have used for DC system design and the only way I can get that SP in their chart is to assume a bellmouth inlet on the hose (yes I'm a dork). Suspiciously, the calcs for the 6" and 2.5" hoses work out perfectly, but that's the only two I tried. I would venture to say that none of our tools have hood losses as low as a bellmouth inlet in free air. What I am trying to say is that, one would likely not be able to obtain flows this high in an actual setting. They also mention that its "patent pending", how can you patent a VFD on a fan or HP control? VFDs on industrial fans are typical and HP control is also common place.

I've tried to be an Oneida fan, and I want to like them, but they seem to have so many "gimmicks" that are unnecessary and it makes me loose confidence.

Edit: Not trying to single out Oneida, this is true with me for a large number of the hobby DC suppliers. Whether they are talking about gadgets or quircky performance numbers, it makes it hard for an average person to know what they are getting. I do this stuff for a living, and still wouldn't be 100% sure of what I'm getting if I were evaluating. Until information is more clear and consistent between suppliers, evaulation of equipment from two suppliers will be difficult IMHO.

Mike

[Chris Parks]

What I meant was that, almost all motors in this size class are meant to run at 3450rpm.

either the motor goes up beyond 3450 or its operating under that most of the time.

I think that the designed motor rpm is not in fact true but is an assumption we make due to motors running at that speed by default at 60hz. In Australia those exact same motors run at 2850 and everyone assumes the same thing. I have run the old Leeson that Clearvue supplied at anything from 2850 to 4000 and it appeared to take it all in its stride as did the impeller. Of course the higher rpm must shorten the life of the bearings but no one knows by how much until they do it.

[David Kumm]

If you are going to get the best bang for the buck when running a vfd on a DC a straight blade radial is the way to go. Speeding up the motor won't lead to problems but every fan has an rpm limit and aluminum fans generally won't run at as high a speed as steel. In addition, a BI fan is designed so it won't draw more than a certain amperage regardless of available cfm. It maxxes out at fairly low pressure so additional speed isn't as effective as with a straight blade. The downside with a straight is less efficiency at lower pressure so more amp draw. At higher pressures it outperforms the BI so it is a good choice with a vfd to monitor the amp draw. The Oneida smart is more of a way to juice a smaller DC than a way to max out a 5 hp system. It mates a little larger impeller with a little smaller inlet and uses the vfd to control the amp load. You can do the same thing yourself with a three phase motor and vfd. You will find that you only will vary the speed by about 5 hz to keep the FPM the same at most size machine ports. I'm always surprised more choices aren't out there for people who want to customize their system to their ducting sizes. We aren't given much credit for doing homework. Dave

[Michael W. Clark]

The Oneida smart is more of a way to juice a smaller DC than a way to max out a 5 hp system. It mates a little larger impeller with a little smaller inlet and uses the vfd to control the amp load.

I thought about that too. Basically, the fan is too much for the motor if the system were running "normally". When you connect the smaller hoses, you choke the flow, and the motor speed increases to maintain FLA (or to 100% output on the VFD). Still not sure how this is a benefit over connecting a 2.5" hose from the shopvac. You would need to run the small hose back to the collector or else dust could settle out in your larger main ducts (or you could blead in air, but now your fan would slow down). The cyclone efficiency is also going to be greatly reduced at 400 CFM if it was intended to operate at 800-1000 CFM. I could definitely see the VFD to protect the motor when you have machines of similar size and you want max flow without overamping when you go to the branch with the least resistance.

I think for the smaller stuff, a shop-vac or DE will be a better solution. If your connecting a hand-held sander to the Smart system, you have a lower cyclone performance, high air:cloth with the Oneida systems, and very fine dust. Seems like it would tend to plug the DC filters even quicker, you know more fine dust would be getting through the cyclone since the efficiency is lower.

[Joe Jensen]

Shop vac pull about 100 cfm so I doubt a shop vac is better. A shop vac would do about 90" of pressure though. I think the ideal setup for an overhead blade guard would be a shop vac mounted up in the attic. Seems to me that I read that the 5HP Smart Pro had a straight fan but I am now 50 and my memory isn't what it once was. I am hoping to chat with the Oneida folks at IWF in August.

[ian maybury]

As ever in these matters it's got to come down to matching the fan curve of the collector to the system curve. Trouble is that we can fairly easily estimate the system numbers, but typically have no means of including the resistance of machine hoods. (it'd be perfectly practical for machine makers to include this information in their specs)

And as ever too obtaining solid and reliable data that hasn't been goosed to make the xyz dust collection kit look good is often a problem. The Cincinatti Fan tables seem as before to be a pretty good source of trustworthy fan performance numbers (CFM vs pressure vs RPM) for many types of impeller. It's possible to pretty clearly figure the effect for example of an extra inch in impeller diameter.

It's clear that most machine hoods are restrictive, and that short of surgery/running older machines like David K does that dust collector performance is often improved by extra pressure capability. Even with the option of hood mods there seem to be places where the it's necessary to generate fairly decent air speeds through tightish gaps to get good collection. e.g. ref our recent discussion on saw top and bottom guards.

What I was driving at in the earlier post is that the simple solution to getting quite a decent amount of extra pressure (there may still be times where upping the RPM with a VFD will be needed - if the extra noise is OK) that often gets overlooked is simply to use a larger diameter moderately backwards inclined fan such as the 16in Clear Vue or something similar. (this will also produce a bit more noise)

There will be probably times where it's overkill in terms of its CFM capability (e.g. on a router table with a small cutter), but running restricted is no problem unless the ducting is ginormous, and in the meantime having the extra suction available can really pay off. In that the air flow is much higher than would be the case with a smaller diameter/lower pressure capability fan.

Think also of the benefit of having some cushion to cover for filter blinding....

ian

[Michael W. Clark]

Shop vac pull about 100 cfm so I doubt a shop vac is better. A shop vac would do about 90" of pressure though.

I'm not sure that I am in agreement here. The Oneida 3HP system (didn't see the link for the 5HP) has a max SP of 24"wg. A 3HP, 6 gallon shop vac has a max SP of 57"wg (according to the Shop-Vac website) and a Festool CT36 has a max SP of 96"wg (according to Festool specs). The most that the Oneida system will pull in a 1.25' flex hose, 10' long is about 65-70 CFM because it is limited by the max SP of 24"wg. When you add hood losses, bends in the hose, etc., this flow will go down because you cannot generate any additional SP. The shop-vac has over 2X the max SP and the Festool has almost 4X the SP. I'm sure the shop-vac and Festool are not going to develop their maximum flows (147 CFM and 131 CFM, respectively), but they certainly have the potential (SP) to draw more flow through the system. Like Ian stated, the volume flow is completely dependent on the relationship of the system losses to the fan's capability.

From an operations standpoint, its usually not recommended to operate a fan at the max SP because this is an unstable point on its curve and it can surge. Also, I would not want to run a long length of flex back to the collector and start a large motor everytime for all of my smaller bench operations. If you connect the small hose into your existing system flowing only 100 CFM, then a lot of the material would certainly drop out in the duct.

I think the smart system would work as a compromise if you didn't have a shop-vac, but I don't see it as replacing the shop-vac which is where their advertising leads you. I have experience with two industrial applications where the owner wanted to us to use the DC as a housekeeping system. Both of those attempts failed, despite a lot of effort. We were ultimately able to get one of the systems to work by replacing the exhauster with a Roots PD blower with a max SP of 24"Hg (327"wg). The other system, the owner replaced the centrifugal fan with a pressure blower capable of about 24 osi (42"wg). This system never really worked even though all the duct was reduced to 4" diameter from 10" and all joints were caulked and sealed as much as possible.

Back to the OP, I would get the 5HP system and run it full out. You can always reduce the volume if necessary (not sure why on most stationary tool applications) but it is difficult to add SP and flow that your fan/motor is not capable of handling should you acquire something in the future that required the flow. The difference in price between a 3 and 5HP system is minimal.

Mike

[Alan Bienlein]

Say what you will but you wont regret going with the higher horsepower unit.

I started out with the 1 hp delta dust pump when I didn't know any better. It didn't take long to see how inadequate it was. I did some research and bought the 16" impeller from clearvue and the 5 hp motor from electric motor warehouse. I figured it was cheaper doing that than wishing I had done it for when I might add some more machines in the future.

Think of it like this it's easier to choke off the dust collection to a machine with and oversize collecter than it is to add and wish you had more suction with and under size unit!

[David Kumm]

I think the differential is even greater than Michael's example. I doubt the type of impeller used by most hobby collectors will pull at 24". Once you get under a 3" hose a strong vac provides more cfm. I run a 7.5 hp motor with a straight blade and doubt the velocity in a 2.5 hose will equal the shop vac. I'll test it when I get home and let you know. Dave

[ian maybury]

I'd be dead interested to hear the result of that Dave. It's hard to predict, and I'm not sure how it would do re. Michael's point about instability - but digging around in fan curves suggests that for example the 16in Clear Vue might just be able to shift enough air at 24in to match a vacuum. I can't remember the diameter of your fan, but knocking even an inch off the impeller diameter looks like it might drop the pressure by a few inches..

ian

[Ryan Brucks]

i've compared my 16in clearvue impeller running through a 2.5" line to my 5hp "peak" rigid shopvac... they were really close, would need testing to be able to tell the difference for sure, but I still thought the shopvac had a bit more, and of course more suction.

[Joe Jensen]

I'm not sure that I am in agreement here. The Oneida 3HP system (didn't see the link for the 5HP) has a max SP of 24"wg. A 3HP, 6 gallon shop vac has a max SP of 57"wg (according to the Shop-Vac website) and a Festool CT36 has a max SP of 96"wg (according to Festool specs). The most that the Oneida system will pull in a 1.25' flex hose, 10' long is about 65-70 CFM because it is limited by the max SP of 24"wg. When you add hood losses, bends in the hose, etc., this flow will go down because you cannot generate any additional SP. The shop-vac has over 2X the max SP and the Festool has almost 4X the SP. I'm sure the shop-vac and Festool are not going to develop their maximum flows (147 CFM and 131 CFM, respectively), but they certainly have the potential (SP) to draw more flow through the system. Like Ian stated, the volume flow is completely dependent on the relationship of the system losses to the fan's capability.
Mike

I think we agree, I just wasn't clear. Take my 2HP Oneida Super Dust Gorilla. Generates a max of 11 or 12" of pressure with no cyclone, filter, or duct losses. I've read that the cyclone is .5", filters in use about 1.5", and my typical duct run is about 5-6". That leaves me with only 4-5" of pressure at the machine port. If it's a 3" or larger port a dust collector will be better. With the smart system I would get a net of 16-17" of pressure at the port, that would pull about 2X the CFM. But, take for example the Sawstop overhead guard with a 1.25" port, or the Felder overhead guard with a 1.5" port. Both of those would probably do better with a Festool vac or my WAP vac.

[Michael W. Clark]

That leaves me with only 4-5" of pressure at the machine port.

I think we ultimately have the same veiw. I was confused by your pressure statement and reference to the small port scenarios earlier in the thread. I'll explain what I mean, and I do not intend to talk over or under you as I am not sure how deep your understanding is for these systems.

The pressure at the machine port is related to the fan capabilities, but it is not necessarily the subtraction of the system losses from the max SP rating of the fan. The fan has a performance curve such that it produces less CFM at the max SP and more CFM at a SP less than the max SP. This curve, or relationship, is primarily dependant on the fan type, wheel type, size, and speed, and is usually referred to as the fan curve.

The system requires a certain amount of SP to move a given volume of air through the system. Air will flow from an area of higher pressure to an area of lower pressure. The fan's job is to generate the negative pressure to cause the air to move. The amount of SP it takes to move a certain CFM through a system is dependant on the system losses. The small hoses we are talking about require a lot of SP because of the resistance. A larger hose requires less SP to move the same volume of air because of less resistance. This CFM/SP relationship for the system is referred to as the system curve.

The SP at the hood will be dependant on the hood configuration and the force required to accelerate the air up to the duct velocity. The pressure at the duct opening, will be approximately equal to ambient or 0"wg. If you take SP measurements closer to the fan inlet, the SP gets more negative. As you pull more flow through the system, the SP requirement increases with the square of the increase in CFM. If you double the CFM, you need 4x the SP to generate that flow in the same system. This square relationship is how the system curve is generated.

Ultimately, the system curve and the fan curve have to find a common point to coexist. This is known as the system operating point. Take your 2HP fan for example. If you connect it to a 1" hose, you will likely operate at the max SP and the flow will be the CFM that can be drawn through that hose with 12"SP applied at the outlet of the hose. This would be one operating point on your fan curve. If you connect your fan to a 10" diameter duct, you will likely not produce anywhere near 12"wg of SP because the 2HP fan cannot generate enough flow to cause 12"wg SP worth of losses in the 10" duct. This would be a different operating point on your fan curve. The pressure at the inlet of the 10" duct would not be your fan max SP minus the losses of the 10" duct. It would be dependant on the flow and inlet configuration of the 10" duct.

All this is why it is generally advisable to go with a larger DC fan given the opportunity. The larger fan will tolerate additional flow and system SP requirements (system losses). If you have a system with a lot of losses and the fan is marginal or slightly undersized, the fan's CFM will be reduced. This translates to more dust getting airborne at the hood, and reduced efficiency at the cyclone. As the cyclone efficiency drops, more fine dust is carried over to the after filters, starts plugging them and reducing the volume further.

Mike

[Alan Bienlein]

Hey Michael didn't I say the same thing in my post that it's easier to choke off the dust collection to a machine with and oversize collecter than it is to add and wish you had more suction with and under size unit!

[ian maybury]

Thanks Ryan, that's about what i'd expect. That while it's not got quite the same pressure capability that you can get fairly decent airflow from a 16in impeller compared to a vacuum - even on a small hose provided it's not too long.

Quite a bit probably comes down to specifics. The brochure for the 5HP Smart unit shows a heavily backwards curved impeller, but doesn't seem to specify the diameter or the RPM range. The fan curve shows pressure at the inlet (so it includes the filter and the cyclone), but only goes to 15in WG/586 cfm.

I'm not sure how heavily BI impellers respond to increased RPM, but they tend not to do so well at higher pressures.

I've been banging away on the impact of quite small changes in impeller diameter on pressure capability.

They don't publish curves, but the 16in Clear Vue seems from other's fan curves like it should get to about 24in WG. That may not be any more than the Smart, or it could be - it depends on what pressure drop you factor in for the cyclone and filter.

My recollection is bit fuzzy, but i think that tip speed is probably a fairly good indicator of pressure capability in a centrifugal fan. By that measure a 15in dia fan is about 7% faster than a 14in, and a 16in about another 7% faster than the 15in.

It's meanwhile i suspect fairly unusual to run a fan all that much faster than 3,450RPM on a VFD - not because it's not possible mechanically, but because of noise.

Shout if you know better, but i'm guessing that if the Smart impeller was more than an inch or so smaller in diameter than say a 16in dia item run at 3,450RPM that it could struggle to do much better on pressure.

Put another way. Whether you achieve the tip speed through extra RPM or through extra diameter is it possibly the noise that sets the practical upper limit?

Anybody?

[Jerry Cummins]

In case anyone is interested. http://desmoines.craigslist.org/tls/3169810425.html

[Ben Martin]

In case anyone is interested. http://desmoines.craigslist.org/tls/3169810425.html

I do have family in Des Moines. Too big of a hassle to get it South though...

[Ryan Brucks]

just FYI that Clearvue indeed published fan curves for the 1800 and Max a few months ago.

http://www.clearvuecyclones.com/Bullentin/attachment.php?attachmentid=463&d=1337614552

of course we could easily launch into a full length discussion analyzing the different numbers. I have talked with them about the results and its clear that the MAX is well suited for lower pressure ranges. For some reason it's not really performing better at the higher pressures despite the larger impeller.

What I did was use the CV1800 body with the 16" impeller. Seems to be the best of both worlds if you aren't going to be under 7" WC (and pretty much everyone is going to be over 7" wc unless they have two 6" gates open). BillP told me that the 1800 has far better fine dust separation than the MAX and the only reason to consider the max is for under 7" wc.

I'm not sure what's going on, but I attribute it to the fact tradeoffs were made to get the higher theoretical MAX cfm. For one, (as BillP told me), if they were to optimize the MAX for the 16" impeller, it would have to be LARGER, too large to fit in the average 8' ceilings, so that was out. So instead compromises were made. The inlet was enlarged at the expense of making the tube connecting cyclone/blower smaller. I think this is to blame for the reduced fine dust separation capability (higher velocity air escaping the cyclone equals more chance of particles taking the trip).

I also wonder if it could merely be an artifact of testing procedures that won't reproduce in the real world.

For example, testing 6" and 8" pipe at the same SP makes little sense... in the real world you'd reduce SP by increasing duct size, but these tests all use the same length of pipe. So the 8" test needed a smaller restriction on the line to get the same SP... meaning they needlessly increased VOLUME... and that messes with pressure.

[ian maybury]

I didn't know they had published anything Ryan (i even checked a few weeks ago, but expected it to be in the information or education sections of the site) so I based my view on the Cincinatti Fan curve for a similar sized impeller. Which does perform significantly better.

There's something very odd about those curves, in that the 16in impeller performs no better than the 15in - worse actually. It's even down as doing better on a 6in pipe than the 16in does on an 8in. Not just in terms of pressure, but also CFM.

It was a couple of years ago, and there were no curves specific to it at the time - but Bill and the then owners steered me towards the 16in as having better performance all round.

There were problems with the older curves that CV had - something about the power supply not having been right.

It seems like there's something sub optimal about the design of the bigger impeller, or the use of it in the their housing - or somebody screwed up.

ian

[Ryan Brucks]

These are probably the same old curves that had problems. I asked James Bushey about them and he said they were done before the Busheys were involved....back under Ed Morgana (probably said that wrong).

He said they didn't want to release these and only did so because of the number of requests... And he said he kind of regrets publishing them.

It would help to see curves with the 16" impeller on the 1800 body and likewise curves with the Max and 15" impeller but that will probably never happen.

I agree the 16" impeller should give better cfm across the range... That's the main reason I went 1800/16 instead of just Max. I was just hoping for a slight improvement at higher sp.

[David Kumm]

Ryan, I've seen the curves too and while not perfect there isn't much info there. A 16" BI fan won't be much different from the Oneida 16" fan. The CV cyclone has a little less resistance but was engineered for 1200-1400 cfm. The larger impeller will create higher velocity at the inlet which will likely reduce the fine dust efficiency somewhat, particularly if the outlet is reduced but if running a sander and the port restricts the cfm is probably doesn't matter all that much. When I ran a 5 hp system with a 15" impeller with a 20" Torit I got pretty good dust separation. When I upgraded to a 7.5 hp with a 15.75x6.25 straight fan the cfm went to 1800-2200 with my 8" and 7" mains. That is a little fast for the cyclone so for fine dust I restrict it down until I can install a 24" Air Sentry i picked up for $200. If we could get the Busheys to manufacture some larger cyclones I think they would sell. The 8' ceiling restriction creates lots of design compromises. I sometimes think we should be looking at push through cyclones when installing in reduced height situations rather than using shorter cyclones and depending so much on the filters to do the work. Dave

[Chris Parks]

I have been told that the only reason the larger impeller was used was to increase flow at 2800 rpm and no other reason. The fact that the US uses it at 3400rpm most probably falls under the heading of bigger must be better.

[Michael W. Clark]

Hey Michael didn't I say the same thing in my post that it's easier to choke off the dust collection to a machine with and oversize collecter than it is to add and wish you had more suction with and under size unit!

Alan, yes you did and I said again in the post right above that and may have said it again earlier.:)

I was mostly commenting on the hood pressure concept. It probably was more confusing than helpful.

Mike

[Michael W. Clark]

I'm not sure what's going on, but I attribute it to the fact tradeoffs were made to get the higher theoretical MAX cfm. For one, (as BillP told me), if they were to optimize the MAX for the 16" impeller, it would have to be LARGER, too large to fit in the average 8' ceilings, so that was out. So instead compromises were made. The inlet was enlarged at the expense of making the tube connecting cyclone/blower smaller. I think this is to blame for the reduced fine dust separation capability (higher velocity air escaping the cyclone equals more chance of particles taking the trip).


I'm not familiar with these two cyclones like you and Ian are, but based on the conversation, I think you are correct.

If you want a cyclone to handle more flow and you simply enlarge the inlet, your efficiency will typically go down. The primary reason for this is that the residence time in the cyclone has been reduced. The hobby cyclones with round tangential inlets suffer due to the inlet being located so close to the outlet pipe. The industrial cyclones we provide do not use this type of inlet due to lower efficiency and increased wear on the outlet pipe. We use an inlet that wraps around the OD of the body (involute) and has a rectangular cross-section instead of round.

Generally speaking, if you reduce the size of the outlet pipe (diameter) the efficiency and pressure drop go up. There is a limit, if you reduce the outltet pipe diamter too much, the vortex is too strong and can re-entrain particulate. The length of the outlet pipe also has an effect on collection efficiency, too long is bad and too short is bad.

We have to admit, as critical as we are of all of the offerings, hobby cyclone suppliers are selling to a niche market. There are space constraints, power constraints, noise limits, and the largest constraint...sales price. Often, I read on here where someone ultimately chooses between supplier A and supplier B because there was a sale and one was $200 cheaper. We can't run a particle size distribution for that!

I still would like to see the hobby cyclone suppliers provide a performance curve for their equipment and it seems several are starting to attempt it. The other thing that would be most helpful is to provide guidance to the intended operating range for their systems. A cyclone designed for 1200 CFM is not going to be near as good at 750 CFM.

Mike

[Michael W. Clark]

It's meanwhile i suspect fairly unusual to run a fan all that much faster than 3,450RPM on a VFD - not because it's not possible mechanically, but because of noise.

Shout if you know better, but i'm guessing that if the Smart impeller was more than an inch or so smaller in diameter than say a 16in dia item run at 3,450RPM that it could struggle to do much better on pressure.

Put another way. Whether you achieve the tip speed through extra RPM or through extra diameter is it possibly the noise that sets the practical upper limit?

Anybody?

Hi Ian, not saying I know better, but there are some fan selection charts for small industrial fans at 5000+ RPM. Usually, the larger the fan, the lower the max speed. AMCA fans are also classed. The higher the class, the higher the maximum safe speed. I think it ultimately has to do with the mechanical design and integrity of the fan. I doubt a VFD would push a 3450 RPM motor to 5000 RPM, these are likely belt driven with a speed-up arrangement.

Twin City Fan - Radial Blades (http://www.tcf.com/docs/product-bulletins/rbo-rbr-rba-rbw-rbp---industrial-fans-class-22-32---catalog-902.pdf?Status=Master)

Mike

[David Kumm]

For those interested I did put an anemometer on my mediocre 20 gal shop vac and got about 6500 fpm through a ten ft hose. My DC pulls about 8500 fpm through the same hose but I'm running a 7.5 hp pressure blower so I think it unlikely a 5 hp or less BI impeller will outperform a quality vac with a 2.25 hose. Dave

[Joe Jensen]

For those interested I did put an anemometer on my mediocre 20 gal shop vac and got about 6500 fpm through a ten ft hose. My DC pulls about 8500 fpm through the same hose but I'm running a 7.5 hp pressure blower so I think it unlikely a 5 hp or less BI impeller will outperform a quality vac with a 2.25 hose. Dave

Cool. I bought an anemometer for testing and I haven't tried the shop vac hose comparison. Everyone is asleep in the house now so I'll try to remember to do it Saturday.

[Ben Martin]

Well look what showed up today...

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-13_17-41-42_240.jpg

Now to figure out how to get it off the truck!

[J. Greg Jones]

Congrats Ben, it will be interesting to follow your experience with the installation. Yesterday I ordered a V-3000 and there is a lot of good information in this thread that helped me make my decision. Mine should be here in 3 weeks. Good luck!

[Ben Martin]

Greg,

Congrats!

Oneida failed to mention how absolutely massive the box would be, I was assuming that that cyclone would be laying down.

My truck has an 8' bed for reference, I expect that the box is at least 8' tall...

I am pretty close to having the lights up in my shop, after that a bit of conduit work and than I will be starting on the installation. I need to see if any of my neighbors has a fork lift!

Ben

[Paul McGaha]

Well look what showed up today...

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-13_17-41-42_240.jpg

Now to figure out how to get it off the truck!

Congratulations Ben. Afraid you have a little work ahead of you now.

What type of ducts and elbows are you planning on using? I used the spiral duct and the long sweep elbows from Oneida. Expensive but really nice stuff. Surprising how the costs of the duct, fittings, etc adds up.

Would suggest a couple of accessories, the filter effeciency gauge from Oneida and a Dylos meter.

If you're bagging your chips (I do) Oneida also makes a sleeve that goes in the drum to keep the bags from sucking into the cyclone. I made one out of wood but the factory one looks like it would work well, not take up hardly any room in the drum, and not make much mess when you remove it to change a bag.

Oneida also makes a drum fill sensor.

Hope the install goes well. Please post some pictures of it when you can.

PHM

[Ben Martin]

Congratulations Ben. Afraid you have a little work ahead of you now.

What type of ducts and elbows are you planning on using? I used the spiral duct and the long sweep elbows from Oneida. Expensive but really nice stuff. Surprising how the costs of the duct, fittings, etc adds up.

Would suggest a couple of accessories, the filter effeciency gauge from Oneida and a Dylos meter.

If you're bagging your chips (I do) Oneida also makes a sleeve that goes in the drum to keep the bags from sucking into the cyclone. I made one out of wood but the factory one looks like it would work well, not take up hardly any room in the drum, and not make much mess when you remove it to change a bag.

Oneida also makes a drum fill sensor.

Hope the install goes well. Please post some pictures of it when you can.

PHM

Paul,

I currently have a bit of left over SD pipe from my last install, not sure if I will re-use that or buck up and go for metal ducting this time. I can see myself moving again in the future and want to have the ability to remove everything and reinstall it in the new shop, so metal ducting has me concerned in this aspect.

I got the Dust Sentry and remote from Oneida.

I have about 0.5 acres of woods on my property, so once the 35 gal. drum is full I just plan on taking them to the woods and dumping them. If I decide to bag in the future I will look into.

Here are a couple pictures of the install so far. Let's just say it hasn't been easy... :mad:

Under that massive box was a bunch of smaller boxes, no show and awe like I was expecting...

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-15_18-44-47_384.jpg

Everything into the shop...

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-15_18-51-56_429.jpg

I got the bracket mounted on the wall and then the unit up, less the motor...

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-15_19-54-26_486-2.jpg

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-15_20-57-22_697.jpg

Than my wife and I realized that to get the impeller into the housing, we needed to remove the whole thing from the wall. We tried to lift the motor in and that was impossible, that sucker was heavy!

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-15_21-29-24_243.jpg

Than we slept on it, lol.

Came back at it last night with my engine hoist. Made quick work of installing the motor.

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-16_19-10-00_216.jpg

And than we attempted to lift the unit onto the wall for about 2.5 hours, dropping and re-rigging umpteen times. And to no avail!

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-16_19-18-45_747.jpg

I do not have enough head room to lift the unit from the top with the hoist. Lowering the lift point makes it impossible since the unit is so top heavy.

So today, I think I will be stopping by HF and picking up one of these. I have wanted one for a while, and this is about the only thing that I can think of that will make this job safe and easy.

239298

[Paul McGaha]

Hi Ben,

We lifted mine by hand. Think there was 2 of us, each on a ladder. Mine is probably lighter though as it's 2 HP.

I think you're right about the metal duct. If you move I would think you can re-use at least some of the duct and all of the fittings. Besides I just like metal duct for dust collection.

I bought the stand with mine. I actually need to raise it up a couple of feet. Was thinking I'd either buy the wall mount bracket from Oneida or make a taller stand.

Ben, you're going to love that thing.

PHM

[Ben Martin]

Thanks Paul!

Notice in this picture the inlet relative to my sub-panel coming from the house:

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-15_20-57-22_697.jpg

It looks like I am going to need to do something about the door on the box, or move the box up/down. I only have 2 breakers being used in that massive box, it is only 30A (the box is an old re-used one, it was there when we bought the house). I had to run a new 200A service to the shop which is on the other wall.

I like that my shop has 4 windows for natural light, but it sure makes it a pain to hang stuff on the wall!

[Paul McGaha]

Ben,

Yeah I see what you mean. Looks like you need to either raise the cyclone or lower the panel.

Does the wall mount bracket seem like it's going to work well?

PHM


PHM

[Ben Martin]

Ben,

Yeah I see what you mean. Looks like you need to either raise the cyclone or lower the panel.

Does the wall mount bracket seem like it's going to work well?

PHM


PHM

Paul,

Before I moved to Greenville, I designed sheetmetal for mining equipment; so perhaps my background is correct to answer that question...lol. Personally, it looks a bit thin, but I will see what happens once I get the unit hung. I am used to having to deal with dynamic loads, and this should be mostly static assuming that the fan is balanced. I had read that some people add cables on the front connecting it to the ceiling for additional support, that wouldn't be a problem for me.

Unfortunately, the bracket is locked in that position, I will barely meet the minimum requirement of 2" between the motor and ceiling, it will probably be about 1.5". The thing will be "shoe horned" in there!

Ben

[Ole Anderson]

For future reference you ought to get some measurements on that impeller, specifically the diameter, that always becomes an issue as to performance in future discussions. Wish I would have measured my 2 hp Oneida before installing it. No problems with it, just curious.

[Kirk Poore]

I think you should go higher.:)
239326

239327

239328

Kirk

[Ben Martin]

Well, the DC is finally installed! Unfortunately, I keep on tripping my 20A breaker (it is on a dedicated circuit). I had originally wanted to go with a 30A breaker, but when I saw that the wiring to the switch and everything that Oneida did was 12G I thought it was worth a try. Also, when you take the cover off the motor, the motor leads are only 12G as well. I am now going to have to re-do the circuit with 10G wiring. The breaker will only pop if I start and stop the motor within in a short period of time (say 10s), but it will turn on and get going without popping. Nonetheless, think that it is worth upsizing the circuit because it is apparently right on the edge...

My question about this is, do I need to replace all of the wiring going to the switch and motor with 10G too, or is leaving the 12G and replacing the plug fine? Since the leads off the motor are only 12G it has me confused!

EDIT: I guess that one thing I just thought about is that there will be more resistance once I get the ducting hung, perhaps I should wait till than to further diagnose the breaker tripping? Also, I didn't start the DC fully, just enough to get the motor spinning and make sure everything was installed correctly. END EDIT

Here are some pictures of the finished installation. I supported the motor up top, by running threaded rod to the lower most mounting holes on the motor. The thing is rock solid now, well worth the time!

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-30_20-49-33_157.jpg

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-30_20-49-42_839.jpg

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-30_21-13-51_929.jpg

[Michael W. Clark]

Ben,
It will definitely pull less amps with the duct connected. If you have a 3HP motor, 20A will probably be fine. If you have a 5HP, you may need to upsize to 10GA. What does the manual say for the required service size? What is the FLA on the motor nameplate at the voltage you are supplying?

Mike

[Ben Martin]

Ben,
It will definitely pull less amps with the duct connected. If you have a 3HP motor, 20A will probably be fine. If you have a 5HP, you may need to upsize to 10GA. What does the manual say for the required service size? What is the FLA on the motor nameplate at the voltage you are supplying?

Mike

Mike,

Oneida supplies the DC with a 20A plug and 12G wiring. The motor plate lists FLA as 19.5A. Right on the cusp!

Ben

[Michael W. Clark]

Mike,

Oneida supplies the DC with a 20A plug and 12G wiring. The motor plate lists FLA as 19.5A. Right on the cusp!

Ben

That's a 5HP motor, correct? I would run a 30A service. You could hardwire it, but you may need/want a disconnect to turn the power off to the motor (you could use the breaker, but not usually a good idea). It doesn't look like your going to be moving it around, so mobility is not a concern.

Mike

[David Kumm]

When the ducts are hooked up the motor might never reach FLA but the start up surge might still be more than the 20 amp breaker can handle, particularly if there is some voltage drop along the way. DC motors start hard so the 10 ga wiring with a 25-30 amp breaker will be the safe bet. Dave

[ian maybury]

I'm no expert, and especially not on US wiring practice. It'd surely be strange if the cabling and wiring supplied by Oneida on the dust system proved to be undersized though. Closely sized for sure, but actually undersized? The motor as the guys say probably won't run at FLA when hooked up to decent length of ducting either.

The potential downside of going to a much larger breaker is that it might not properly protect the 12G OEM wiring on the dust system - it'd be worth checking this out with Oneida as so far as I know it's normal to size the breaker to protect the smallest cable size in the circuit. Most machine makers will specify the rating and type of breaker their unit requires.

Over here it's pretty normal to run what we know as a type C (slower acting) breaker on loads like largish single phase motors that pull a lot of current on start up - they still pop at the rated current, but can handle a higher initial surge and for longer. It could be that something like this is what Oneida would recommend. It might avoid your problem while still giving better protection.

On the basis that they presumably did their homework before using 12G on the system it might be worth carefully checking the cable sizing on your own supply circuit too - it might just save the job of rewiring. I've no idea what the amps capability of 12G cable is. (it'd be a wiring code issue)

Against that 12G might not do the job (even if it's OK on the fan) in that factors like the type of insulation and whether the cable can easily shed heat (e.g. a cable buried in lagging is de-rated quite a bit over here for this reason) can have quite a significant influence on the rating of a particular size.

ian

[Kirk Poore]

I have my 5 hp DC on a 30 amp/240v circuit, and have had no problems with the cord. (I did replace the plug since I have all L6-30 outlets on 240v circuits in my shop.) I don't think you'll have any issues with the 12 ga wire. I suspect the motor overload will trip if it's pulling over 20 amps for any significant length of time.

Kirk

[Michael W. Clark]

Ben,
On a side note, is all your shop electrical done in EMT? How do you like it? I'm thinking about doing my next shop that way and any new circuits in this shop.

What's going on with the 110V receptacles above the 220V outlet? Are they on the same circuit or just multiple circuits in the same conduit? If they are on the same circuit, you need to include any load that could running on 110 while the DC is running when determining your service size needed.

[Ben Martin]

Kirk,
I checked the motor this morning, it had 14g leads. No clue what to think...

[Michael W. Clark]

Kirk,
I checked the motor this morning, it had 14g leads. No clue what to think...

Have you asked Oneida? Do they have a recommended service size in the manual?

[Paul McGaha]

Kirk,
I checked the motor this morning, it had 14g leads. No clue what to think...

Ben,

For the shop wiring you need to install #10 wiring to meet code requirements and connect to a 30 amp breaker.

Need not be concerned with the wiring provided by Oneida. It's been tested by them.

PHM

[Paul McGaha]

Ben,
On a side note, is all your shop electrical done in EMT? How do you like it? I'm thinking about doing my next shop that way and any new circuits in this shop.

What's going on with the 110V receptacles above the 220V outlet? Are they on the same circuit or just multiple circuits in the same conduit? If they are on the same circuit, you need to include any load that could running on 110 while the DC is running when determining your service size needed.

Hi Michael,

My shop is in EMT. I like it a lot. Very versatile when it comes to adding or moving circuits and receptacles or changes to the lighting. I like the look of it anyway but I'm an electrician so I guess maybe that's why.

PHM

[Ben Martin]

Ben,

For the shop wiring you need to install #10 wiring to meet code requirements and connect to a 30 amp breaker.

Need not be concerned with the wiring provided by Oneida. It's been tested by them.

PHM

Paul,

I got it all swapped out last night, big difference with the 30A circuit. No longer can pop the breaker and it seems to be starting up much faster!


Ben,
On a side note, is all your shop electrical done in EMT? How do you like it? I'm thinking about doing my next shop that way and any new circuits in this shop.

What's going on with the 110V receptacles above the 220V outlet? Are they on the same circuit or just multiple circuits in the same conduit? If they are on the same circuit, you need to include any load that could running on 110 while the DC is running when determining your service size needed.

Michael,

I wouldn't run a workshop in anything other than EMT. Way too nice to have the freedom that it gives you. That being said, my first house was in Chicago and that is how everything is done there, so it is what I am used to.

The 110 above the 220 is for the Dust Sentry. But the rest of my shop is ran very similar though. I have 4-packs of 110 outlets with a 20A 220V above. I have between 12-16 110V outlets and 3-4 220V outlets on each circuit. If I was to do it again, I would have used 3/4" conduit for the horizontal runs up top, but the 1/2" worked fine...

(The shop was a disaster here! Finally got the electrical done though!)

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-20_20-21-50_417.jpg

http://i424.photobucket.com/albums/pp325/martbj/SC%20Workshop%20Build/2012-08-20_20-21-33_557.jpg

[Paul McGaha]

Glad to hear it Ben.

Really nice looking shop you have. Liking that air condtioner.

PHM

[Ben Martin]

Glad to hear it Ben.

Really nice looking shop you have. Liking that air condtioner.

PHM

Paul,

Installing the heat pump (both heating and cooling) was definitely the best $1k out the tool fund I have spent in a while.

Still waiting for it to cool down enough to get the attic and doors insulated. We got a mess of rain last night and the shop doesn't have gutters, unfortunately I got water seeping in where the walls meet the floors, so adding gutters to the shop just made the project list as well...

Ben

[Michael W. Clark]

Nice looking shop Ben. EMT seems the way to go for me too. Anytime I do something electrical, the mess seems to get bigger and bigger and bigger. However, a shop is to use, so its gonna get dirty!

Mike

[Kirk Poore]

Nice shop, Ben. I hope you don't have to run too much ducting on the ceiling (as opposed to along the walls). It doesn't look like you have a real surplus of head room. All my electrical is in conduit too, but I put in so much I haven't had to make any changes yet.:)

Kirk

[J. Greg Jones]

Ben, I remembered yesterday that your order all came in one 'box' when my order arrived by UPS... In 11 boxes! Got everything in the shop and started the install when I discovered that Oneida had shipped the wrong brackets for the leg kit! Hopefully they put a priority on sending out the replacements.

http://f.cl.ly/items/401d1Z3w0h2W1b1k1D3X/IMG_0199.JPG

[Ben Martin]

Greg,

That looks great, let the fun begin! How do you plan on lifting it onto the stand? That was my hardest part.

So I am sort of stuck in the water with my install. I want to go with S&D pipe because this will definitely not be my last shop and I am worried about the durability of using metal duct with being taken down and put back up. I am having a hard time finding 8" S&D in my area, and the people that do carry it want $4-5/ft, I need about 40' of it for my main run. I am considering reducing it to 6" at the collector and going with 6" for my main runs. Anybody have any insight?

And please don't turn this into a debate on the merits of PVC pipe in DC applications. :D

Ben

[David Kumm]

Spiral pipe and metal fittings are reuseable. Half my system consists of used parts which are cheap and plentiful. The benefits of proper pipe sizing and long radius ells are worth the effort and a few extra holes can be covered with sealing tape. Dave

[Kirk Poore]

So I am sort of stuck in the water with my install. I want to go with S&D pipe because this will definitely not be my last shop and I am worried about the durability of using metal duct with being taken down and put back up. I am having a hard time finding 8" S&D in my area, and the people that do carry it want $4-5/ft, I need about 40' of it for my main run. I am considering reducing it to 6" at the collector and going with 6" for my main runs. Anybody have any insight?
Ben

Ben: My longest run is about 50', with two 45 and four 90 degree turns. It's about one-third 7", and two-thirds 6". It handles the output from my Oliver 399 just fine. I think you'll be fine with 6".

Kirk

[Ben Martin]

Spiral pipe and metal fittings are reuseable. Half my system consists of used parts which are cheap and plentiful. The benefits of proper pipe sizing and long radius ells are worth the effort and a few extra holes can be covered with sealing tape. Dave

Dave,

I have probably $300 worth of 6" and 4" fittings left over from my previous system that I would like to re-use.


Ben: My longest run is about 50', with two 45 and four 90 degree turns. It's about one-third 7", and two-thirds 6". It handles the output from my Oliver 399 just fine. I think you'll be fine with 6".

Kirk

Kirk,

Thanks, I was thinking along the same lines. This system was overkill in the first place, I can't imagine that I need 8" mains. I was looking on McMaster and they don't even carry a lot of 8" S&D fittings, so besides the pipe being a hassle to get, the fittings would be impossible!

Ben

[Paul McGaha]

Spiral pipe and metal fittings are reuseable. Half my system consists of used parts which are cheap and plentiful. The benefits of proper pipe sizing and long radius ells are worth the effort and a few extra holes can be covered with sealing tape. Dave

Just my $.02 but I'd agree with Dave. I used the spiral duct and the long radious Y's and 90*'s. I bought the stuff from Oneida. It's expensive and there's also a cost for shipping but I think it's ideal for dust collection and very good about being re-usable or making changes to the system. If I had to do it again I think I would try to buy it locally and save some. I would think the HVAC Supply houses would carry it. At least the spiral duct.

Careful about reducing the size of the main. Reducing the size of the main slows down the air flow.

Just my thoughts.

PHM

[David Kumm]

To me the 6" mains negate the reason for buying the 5 hp unit. You get a little more cfm due to the larger diameter impeller than you would with the 3 hp unit but it is still like putting a small exhaust on a Corvette. Spiral is not that expensive if bought locally and often the HVAC places have a bunch from prior jobs pretty cheap. 6-7-8" fittings are all over the internet as well as Kencraft and Oneida. There is even a fair amount of Nordfab on CL. Dave