Upgrading motor and impeller, and putting blower on top of aget dustcop cyclone

[Jim Andrew]

Was looking at building a new blower housing and installing a larger impeller, and motor on Aget Dustcop, called Clearvue, and looking at their impeller, looks like it would be right for the Dustkop, as the inlet is rear left, but my question right now is, the Aget has baffles, which can be easily removed, and then it has a tube that goes down into the center of the cyclone about 21", the tube is 8" in diameter, so that part is ok. The cone on the cyclone is about 23" high, cyclone is 18" diameter, everything looks right except I wonder if I should cut the tube off, or remove it. Will it be a problem? Also, with the tube in the way, don't know how I could fasten the blower to the top of the cyclone? With it gone, could hold huts underneath the cyclone top and use countersink bolts to bolt the blower housing to the top. How have others fastened the blower housing to the cyclone? Can see how the baffles and tube would work well on a push through cyclone, but if I went push through, the clearvue impeller would run backwards.

[John Donofrio]

Are you referring to the tube down the center of the cyclone? If so, don't cut it. It's a huge reason the cyclone does what it does.

[James Gunning]

If you are talking about modifying the internals of a manufactured cyclone, I would advise against it. It seems you are not familiar with how a cyclone functions, and would cause more harm than good. Not an insult, just want to keep you from ruining something that will work as intended. All you need to do, is mount the blower with the inlet over the top center tube of the cyclone. Many use a piece of flex pipe to connect the two, but any type of duct that is airtight and smooth inside will work. You will have to fashion a frame or other mount to hold the motor and blower assembly above the cyclone, as it's quite heavy. I would advise against drilling holes into the cyclone to do it. The proper airflow inside the cyclone is critical to it functioning properly, and drilling holes or putting mounting bolts into it at best would reduce the overall efficiency. There are hundreds of photos on this and other sites showing builds where someone mounted a blower and cyclone together. Search for those and you should see lots of ideas on how to do it.