William C Rogers
02-23-2013, 6:56 AM
I have a lot of cabinets that I am making that will require a lot of sanding which translates into better dust collection than I currently have. I looked at commercial unit and although very nice the one I would want would be about $700 plus adding a dust deputy and container putting it about $1K. Being an engineer I looked at alternatives and I broke things down into requirements. You need to be able to vacuum the dust and contain it so it does not end up airborne. The shop vac will vacuum, but not keep the fine dust from being airborne due to filtration. The solution was to filter the air and then decide what other essentials and options could be added. Essentials were portability, dust separation, variable vacuum, hoses, and filtration. Options were hose storage, auto on/off and boom arm. Looking around my shop I had everything but filtration, dust separation and variable vacuum. So I ordered the prefilter bags (capture 95% 0.5 micron) 2 for $17, HEPA filter @ $20, Dust deputy @$40, and variable controller @$30. I could have put the filters in the shop vac and added a 5 gallon bucket with the dust deputy, but that would not give me the portability I wanted. So I decided to build an enclosure shown in the pictures below. I guess I was in the jointer mode (bigger is better) as it did not need to be this big, but is really about the same foot print as a shop vac and 5 gallon bucket. I used EDPM rubber for sealing and used window latches to hold the top on and for access. This sealed very well. The HEPA filter fit very tightly around the shop vac and feel this is a very good seal as the end is already sealed. For the dust deputy I added a sight glass and made a plastic bag hold down from plexiglass to keep the bag from being sucked up. I knew I would need a more positive seal for this and used the aluminum angle and screw knob to get that seal. I incorporate hose storage into one end of the enclosure. All in all with my $2 yard sale shop vac I have $125 including the dust depty which would be an add on to any system into this. The only option I incorporated was the hose storage. I will plug the sander into the power strip and that will turn on the vacuum and power the sander. Using the sander off/on it will force the vacuum to run before the sanders is on and after the sander is off. I was going to make a second one for my bench sanders, but will figure a way to incorporate this as a docking station for those tools. I have several vac hoses including a Bosch 1" hose for my sanders. Boom arm, don't have anything in the shop to make one so none. One bonus is it is a lot quieter than a regular shop vac. I am not making any claims to efficienty and this does not have a place in the commercial environment as it is for my shop only. And true a universal motor will most likely not outlast a induction motor. If I didn't have the extra material in the shop it would not be cost effective in my mind as you could buy a less expensive extractor for about $300. However I feel I have significantly improved my dust collection for the upcoming sanding operations.
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