New to woodturning and wondering about dust collection

[Joel Christensen]

Hi I am wondering if a shop vac with 1.5 horsepower and a 2 inch hose will be good enough to use for dust collection and I do have a 3m respirator and If a shop vac is not good enough what should I get and I don't have the money or the room for a big dust extractor. I bought a nova comet 2 by the way with extension and G3 chuck.

[Dennis Peacock]

Joel,
When I first started turning, all I had was an old box fan that I used to blow the dust away from me while turning or sanding. Later I moved up to a 2 HP portable DC with the dual bags. That helped but after a bit the DC would move less and less air due to the small holes in the bags getting clogged. Even later down the road I built my own cyclone DC setup and I am happy to say that I have enough air flow near where I'm turning to be satisfied with what it collects. Nothing will get it all but wearing your respirator will provide the most critical air filtration while you are at the lathe.

[Bob Bouis]

A small dust collector or a good shop vac close to the workpiece will catch a lot of sanding dust. As far as shavings go...nothing you can do about that but hang a curtain around the lathe.

[Brian Kent]

I use a box fan with a dust filter tied on. It collects a whole lot of the free-floating dust that I can knock off into a trash can. I will ALWAYS use a 3M half-mask with P-100 filters. They protect my lungs while the house filter captures some of the clouds of dust. When I can figure out space issues, a cyclone system would be peachy keen.

[Steve Arnold]

Unfortunately, a really good shop vac with a 2" hose is no substitute for an OK dust collector with a 4" hose. Pay particular attention to the CFM (cubic feet per minute) of whatever method of dust extraction you choose.

[Ron Rutter]

Joel. A 2" hose is basically useless. The air just tunnels. It is air volume that really pulls away the fines. Look up the Bill Pentz website & do some research is the best advice a I can offer. Ron.

[Joel Christensen]

You guys were very helpful on this and this gave me some comfort here on dust collection and I might actually buy festool dust extractor for the lathe later on but I will definitely be wearing my respirator and have the garage door open. Now the wood shavings is no issue for me as I make a lot of em through the day using hand planes.

[William C Rogers]

Joel, the Festool extractor is a very good vac, however it is more suited to hand power tools such as sanders. If the Festool is just for the lathe I think there are better choices. For the lathe you would be better off with a dust collector that moves more volume. For my midi lathes I have the Big Gulp (from Rockler) that has a 4" port connected to a D.C. This doesn't eliminate the need for a respirator, but is very good at collecting dust when sanding.

[Reed Gray]

A box fan blowing the dust away from you will move more air than a shop vac, even one from Festool. A box fan with a filter on it will pick up a lot of the chunks floating in the air, but I am not sure those filters are fine enough to remove the very fine dust particles that stick in your lungs. If you make a hood to go over your lathe, and put a box fan with a filter on it in the back of the hood, that will remove most of the dust. If there isn't a hood, then lots of dust escapes. I have a couple of clips up on You Tube about my sanding hood and dust collectors. Type in robo hippy

robo hippy

[Roger Chandler]

I would recommend a minimum of a dust colleector....especially with sanding and a good respirator mask. Anything less will allow too much dust in your lungs. Wood dust is toxic, and causes cancer. You only get one pair of lungs, so protect them from the start of your turning adventure!

[Brice Rogers]

I have been following with interest various discussions on dust collection. I basically started with a box fan blowing particles away from me and turned on the "whole house" shop exhaust fan. Then I added an N95 dust mask if I'm sanding. Then I bought a 1 HP Harbor Fright Dustcollector for $15 at a garage sale. That is when I felll into the vortex. The single stage dust collectors work fine for dust but aren't meant for curls of wood. So I made a Thien baffle separator. (BTW, Even a garbage can separator with a couple of 90's will separate out the big chunks and "brillo pads" of shavings). But the Thien baffle works very well and I am venting the really fine stuff outside. Then I bought a 2 HP HF DC at one of their sales. It may not be as powerful as the Griz, but on sale it costs around $180 so there is good value per buck. I am thinking about adding a hanging box fan with a disposable filter. When I looked at the 3M Filtrete filters, I was surprised to see that they filter out particles from 0.3 to 1.0 micron. They seem to do much better than the fiberglass types. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microparticle_performance_rating . So, that is my next investment.


A box fan blowing the dust away from you will move more air than a shop vac, even one from Festool. A box fan with a filter on it will pick up a lot of the chunks floating in the air, but I am not sure those filters are fine enough to remove the very fine dust particles that stick in your lungs. If you make a hood to go over your lathe, and put a box fan with a filter on it in the back of the hood, that will remove most of the dust. If there isn't a hood, then lots of dust escapes. I have a couple of clips up on You Tube about my sanding hood and dust collectors. Type in robo hippy

robo hippy

[George Courson]

I'm actually in the process of building a separator and dust filter. I was looking around on the web for 1micron filters but they were way over my budget. I ended up getting a number from a company in Canada that makes commercial dust filters for wood shops and got the number for their supplier for the material they use.
I got a blower from a friend, how much air it moves is an un-known factor. But it has a 6" intake hose on it. It’s a blower for a laser-cutting machine with a large bed.
Anyway, I’ll be using a cardboard barrel that’s 18”W x 18”D inside, to build the separator.
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Today, I was able to get 2 meters of 6” flex hose to use to connect everything and yesterday I had the wood cut to build most of the box for the dust filter.
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I was able to get the parts for the filter box cut at a local shop with one of the giant full sheet table saws. Got the parts all lined up to make sure everything is cut evenly. It needs to be air-tight....
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I’ll be cutting the filter trays on my friends’ laser, so that the filter will be pleated, providing 278” of filtering surface. I’ll be making 4 filter trays between the separator and the blower, so that the air is clean before entering the blower.
I acquired just over 6sq. yards of the material from the supplier and the trays will have 1 layer at the intake, then 2, 3, and 4 layers of the cloth in the final tray. (As per the instructions by the guy at the place I got the cloth.)
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I know it won’t suck the chips as I turn, but with the Jet 1221 being reversible, I’ll be able to sand with the dust going in the direction of the hood I’ll be building to sit behind the bed. The 2nd drawing has a square with circles in it that i plan to put in to disperse the airflow evenly into the first filter.

[Brice Rogers]

George, it appears that you are making a Thien baffle also. I'm pleased with mine.

If you have the capability to exhaust outside, you'll end up with less dust in your shop and zero maintenance on a filter. Plus you won't get any pressure drop across a non-existent filter. ;-)

[Bob Bouis]

If you vent outside it'll remove the dust, but you will eventually suffocate after all the air is sucked out of your shop. At 600 CFM that should take about 5 minutes for a typical garage!

If you're concerned about the health aspects of wood dust, I'd encourage you to read up on it from sources outside the wood forum loop. From my own reading, it seems that by far the biggest danger of wood dust is sensitization -- i.e., allergies/asthma -- and congestion. Some studies showed a correlation between occupational exposure to wood dust and fibrosis/lung cancer, but it was always a very modest increase in risk. Much smaller than, say, being male versus being female and thousands of times smaller than smoking.

There seems to be little if any evidence that really fine wood dust is particularly dangerous, that it causes lung cancer or fibrosis, etc., like everyone here seems to think it does. There's a small risk of nasal cancer with some woods, at least there was one observed among people who worked at furniture plants in the '60s. Charred meat is a carcinogen, too. Brass ferules on your tools also. Government regulations cover the total mass of dust suspended in the air rather than the particle size. Based on what I've read, you'd be far better off getting a "marginal" system with a 5 micron filter bag now than you would going without while saving up for one of those super duper 5hp submicron systems with 7" piping. But that's just my take on it.

[George Courson]

Actually, I'll be redirecting the exhaust air to cool the blower motor. I live in Peru and the power here is 60Hz, but the fan is for 50Hz. Also, my workshop is in my living-room. There is no venting to the outside.
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I've got the other panel/shelf up with the other gouges now. it's all going to get moved when I extend the bed on the Jet.
This is the old lathe....
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[Brice Rogers]

George,
I have a Harbor Freight 2 HP dust collector and the motor has a fan inside so it is self cooling. Perhaps your motor may be different.
With respect to 50/60 hz issues. I always thought that if a motor had an internal fan blades for cooling that running at higher RPMs would make a synchronous motor run faster and would provide additional cooling. I am familiar with 60 hz. motors potentially having overheating issues when running at 50 hz.
But having said that, I think that you are going in the right direction. If you closely follow the available data on the Thien baffle, it should work well for you.


Actually, I'll be redirecting the exhaust air to cool the blower motor. I live in Peru and the power here is 60Hz, but the fan is for 50Hz. Also, my workshop is in my living-room. There is no venting to the outside.
350894
I've got the other panel/shelf up with the other gouges now. it's all going to get moved when I extend the bed on the Jet.
This is the old lathe....
350895

[Ron Rutter]

You should consider incorporating a cyclone with a dump box. Much more effective. For the best info around on dust check out the Bill Pentz website.

[Stewart Campbell]

I'm in the same situation. It is time for me to look into setting up dust collection. I've read some posts about getting a Wynn filter, or even some large truck air filters for the 2hp HF dust collector. What I'd really like is to find a plan somewhere that tells me which DC to get, and what exact parts to get for it, to be up and running. I don't really know much of anything about this.

[Ron Rutter]

Bob. I would respectfully suggest that you do a lot of research. You have a lot to learn.

[Brice Rogers]

Bob, My shop is about 9000 s.f., so I won't explode into a vacuum for at least 15 minutes. I have some roll up doors that leak so maybe I won't get "bug-eyed" for an hour or so. Ha ha.

I wish that my D.C. drew such a strong vacuum as I would use it with a vacuum chuck.


If you vent outside it'll remove the dust, but you will eventually suffocate after all the air is sucked out of your shop. At 600 CFM that should take about 5 minutes for a typical garage!

[paul cottingham]

If you vent outside it'll remove the dust, but you will eventually suffocate after all the air is sucked out of your shop. At 600 CFM that should take about 5 minutes for a typical garage!

If you're concerned about the health aspects of wood dust, I'd encourage you to read up on it from sources outside the wood forum loop. From my own reading, it seems that by far the biggest danger of wood dust is sensitization -- i.e., allergies/asthma -- and congestion. Some studies showed a correlation between occupational exposure to wood dust and fibrosis/lung cancer, but it was always a very modest increase in risk. Much smaller than, say, being male versus being female and thousands of times smaller than smoking.

There seems to be little if any evidence that really fine wood dust is particularly dangerous, that it causes lung cancer or fibrosis, etc., like everyone here seems to think it does. There's a small risk of nasal cancer with some woods, at least there was one observed among people who worked at furniture plants in the '60s. Charred meat is a carcinogen, too. Brass ferules on your tools also. Government regulations cover the total mass of dust suspended in the air rather than the particle size. Based on what I've read, you'd be far better off getting a "marginal" system with a 5 micron filter bag now than you would going without while saving up for one of those super duper 5hp submicron systems with 7" piping. But that's just my take on it.

Bob, I would respectfully suggest that you do much more research. Cause you really don't know what you are talking about. Respectfully.

[Bob Bouis]

I certainly do have a lot to learn, but on this subject I've done quite a bit of reading and am fairly confident in my conclusions. Like I said, I encourage you to do the same. Don't take my word for it. But here's what I gathered from reading occupational safety publications and surveys of scientific studies:

1) The evidence linking wood dust and lung cancer / fibrosis / decreased lung function is very tenuous and the subject does not appear to have been very heavily studied. All of the studies seem to have been on people who are occupationally exposed rather than on hobbyists. There seems to be far more evidence that drinking beer causes lung cancer. Seriously. I'd encourage you to read explanations of why the beer studies ought to be taken with a grain of salt, to help you put the studies about wood dust into context.

2) The mechanism by which wood dust may cause or contribute to these conditions is unknown. The few times it's discussed there seems to be suspicion about chemicals present in some woods. Not only is there no evidence that it's mechanical damage from invisible, sub-micron wood particles, there doesn't even seem to be any interest in studying them. The claims one often sees in wood forums (and from people who sell dust collectors) that wood dust causes subtle, irreversible scarring of the lungs with every breath seem to unfounded and cribbed from silica or asbestos, which are actually proven to do that. There does seem to be suspicion that general stress on the lungs increasing your chances of getting lung cancer, but, again, no evidence that it's the really fine wood particles (you know, the ones that don't seem to cause stress to the lungs but supposedly do).

Like I said before, though, there are very real issues with wood dust and lots of good reasons not to breathe it if you can help it. But when you're deciding how to protect your health you ought to go about in an informed, rational way. There may be better places to spend your energy or money than on more air filters.

[paul cottingham]

Sir, there are lots of studies linking fines to lung damage, but believe what you wish. I would point you to some of it, but I suspect you would reject it, due to its "bias."

Foolishness.

[Reed Gray]

As for dust, yea, it bothers the lungs. Some woods for sure will cause reactions, some minimal and some very serious. As to the actual cancer 'causing' issue, I would expect species to be every bit as relevant as quantity of dust inhaled. No scientific evidence, just common sense, meaning the same amount of dust from one wood may not bother you at all or as much as the same amount of dust from another species. If you don't have a dust collector, your lungs will collect it. Not good any way you look at it. Damage, well of course. Cancer, well quite possibly....

robo hippy

[William C Rogers]

What I want to protect from is sensitization and decrease risk known or unknown. You can vent outside without suffocating. I vent outside. My shop is 30 X 50 and I built it considering venting outside. I put gable vent panels the full length and up the peaks. I did not use a ridge vent. I have 12' walls and installed a drop ceiling. The gable vents are above the drop ceiling, but there are ample openings for air movement in the ceiling. When the D.C. Is running the makeup air is drawn through the gable vents and mixed with air above the drop ceiling before drawn into the shop below. I don't AC the shop and this wouldn't be ideal for a AC shop. Since the air above the drop ceiling is heated air that has risen, I can run the DC for hours with very little decrease in temperature. This works for a shop my size, but may not be near as effective for a smaller shop.

[Bob Bouis]

Your lungs can clear dust -- you wouldn't live very long if they couldn't. Certain kinds of dust have been shown to injure the lungs for various reasons -- the best two known are silica and asbestos. Some kinds of chemicals and molds, too. These cause damage to the lungs which can, usually in old age, lead to the lungs freaking out (technical medical term) and scarring over heavily (fibrosis), eventually killing you. This isn't common even among people who have been exposed to asbestos or silica, but it's known to happen and they have a pretty good idea why. Apparently the only wood dust that's proven to do this is dust with certain kinds of mold in it (and it's the mold that damages the lungs). How common are these molds? I have no idea. Might be worth looking into since wood turners seem to collect a lot of moldy wood.

There's another kind of fibrosis called idiopathic fibrosis, which from the name you can probably guess means fibrosis of unknown cause. There are some (surprisingly few, really) studies, which are basically surveys, showing that wood dust exposure correlates to better odds of getting the disease (up to three times as likely). But these are relatively small surveys with huge margins of error, and surveys of people with a disease are unreliable for obvious reasons (they've generally had a lot of time to think about what might have given them the disease compared to controls). And it's a pretty rare disease to begin with, plus there are surveys associating fibrosis with all kinds of things (metal working, farming, hairdressing, various seemingly unrelated diseases and drugs, family history, etc.). Wood dust is usually described as a "risk factor" for fibrosis.

So, far from being proven scientific fact, the claim that wood dust damages the lungs in subtle ways sometimes leading to fibrosis seems to be an educated guess at best.

As far as wood dust causing COPD (reduced lung function), I found this 2015 survey of studies done by a UK government agency:

The available evidence for a relationship between COPD and work with wooddusts is limited, of variable quality and inconsistent in its findings. No studies have been identified which suggest circumstances in which the risks of disabling loss of FEV1 are as much as doubled

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/450425/copd-in-woodworkers-iiac-inf-note-aug-2015.pdf

[Ron Rutter]

As for dust, yea, it bothers the lungs. Some woods for sure will cause reactions, some minimal and some very serious. As to the actual cancer 'causing' issue, I would expect species to be every bit as relevant as quantity of dust inhaled. No scientific evidence, just common sense, meaning the same amount of dust from one wood may not bother you at all or as much as the same amount of dust from another species. If you don't have a dust collector, your lungs will collect it. Not good any way you look at it. Damage, well of course. Cancer, well quite possibly....

robo hippy
Well said Robbo. Some people obviously have to learn the hard way. The emphasis on cancer is misguided.The problem is loss of lung function,and wouldn't it b nice if our lungs expelled all that crap we breath in! That sharp wood fibers do a lot of damage is a well known fact. Ron.

[Bob Bouis]

"The available evidence for a relationship between [reduced lung function] and work with wooddusts is limited, of variable quality and inconsistent in its findings."

[Joel Christensen]

Okay I have one problem with the box fan idea I thought about that but the fan is to tall for where this lathe is going and unfortunately I can't post a picture of how much room I got because I don't have a good computer only a good tablet. I am really glad you guys are giving me ideas and I have been reading them and I only got very little amount of space thanks to all my industrial tools and the lathe is going to get mounted on a heavy duty work bench that I built for tools and there are cabinets that are above the workbench and that's why a box fan will not work but I do have a very good quality respirator that can use p100 filters that will not let any kind of sawdust through my respirator it can use any kind of 3m gas cartridge i need to. I use my respirator quite a bit for when I work on the scroll saw as well as when I put a finish on wood. I know rockler has the dust right system that might work and I heard it is very much like what you guys have been describing this dust collector sounds like what you guys are talking about as well and for $500 it's not to bad for the price http://www.rockler.com/laguna-b-flux-1hp-1-micron-canister-dust-collector

[Dennis Peacock]

Okay I have one problem with the box fan idea I thought about that but the fan is to tall for where this lathe is going and unfortunately I can't post a picture of how much room I got because I don't have a good computer only a good tablet. I am really glad you guys are giving me ideas and I have been reading them and I only got very little amount of space thanks to all my industrial tools and the lathe is going to get mounted on a heavy duty work bench that I built for tools and there are cabinets that are above the workbench and that's why a box fan will not work but I do have a very good quality respirator that can use p100 filters that will not let any kind of sawdust through my respirator it can use any kind of 3m gas cartridge i need to. I use my respirator quite a bit for when I work on the scroll saw as well as when I put a finish on wood. I know rockler has the dust right system that might work and I heard it is very much like what you guys have been describing this dust collector sounds like what you guys are talking about as well and for $500 it's not to bad for the price http://www.rockler.com/laguna-b-flux-1hp-1-micron-canister-dust-collector

Joel,
Also, check around with some of your buddies and see if they know an HVAC guy that will sell you an old squirrel cage blower. Those move a lot of air and I have 3 in my shop that I use at various times of the year. If you were closer to me, I'd give you one.

[Robert Engel]

Pardon my ignorance, but doesn't a lathe mostly product shavings?

Why spend the megabucks on a Festool extractor for lathe?

If you're working with wood that concerns you, why not just a respirator and a fan as mentioned?

[William C Rogers]

Pardon my ignorance, but doesn't a lathe mostly product shavings?

Why spend the megabucks on a Festool extractor for lathe?

If you're working with wood that concerns you, why not just a respirator and a fan as mentioned?

i agree. I would not buy a DC or Festool extractor just for a lathe. Nice, but really won't help that much when turning.

[Joel Christensen]

Robert Engel I like your answer I really appreciate that you get straight to the point and I can get a smaller box fan and use the shop vacuum that I have along with my respirator and that I am sure will work for me as my lathe is going to be here tomorrow and I hope it doesn't come damaged. I am mostly going to be doing spindle work and I got a really good shop vac already thanks to the woodworking I do already that goes same for the respirator to and I still got some cleaning to do still so I can have a safe work area when turning I can't wait to start practicing tomorrow unless the lathe comes heavily damaged as I have heard some horror stories about that.

[david privett]

one thing you might want to think about is sanding on the lathe ,that can make quite a amount of dust and vacs are brush type motors ,I do not believe that running for hours would be very good on one whereas dust collectors use a non brush design.

[Ron Rutter]

Robert Engel I like your answer I really appreciate that you get straight to the point and I can get a smaller box fan and use the shop vacuum that I have along with my respirator and that I am sure will work for me as my lathe is going to be here tomorrow and I hope it doesn't come damaged. I am mostly going to be doing spindle work and I got a really good shop vac already thanks to the woodworking I do already that goes same for the respirator to and I still got some cleaning to do still so I can have a safe work area when turning I can't wait to start practicing tomorrow unless the lathe comes heavily damaged as I have heard some horror stories about that.
Joel.Turning produces fine dust as well as shavings,especially dry wood. Then there is the sanding!!If you can exhaust outside a good fan & 6"duct from a boot will help

[Brian Kent]

Pardon my ignorance, but doesn't a lathe mostly product shavings?

Why spend the megabucks on a Festool extractor for lathe?

If you're working with wood that concerns you, why not just a respirator and a fan as mentioned?

I use a respirator and a box fan filter. But an answer to your question - there is a lot more volume of wood that comes off in shavings (which end up on my back lawn). But I do a whole lot of power sanding from 60 through 600. That's where I need the help, and would love to have access to my higher volume dust collector.

Before I started using a half-mask respirator, I had about 5 months of bronchitis while working on walnut furniture. When I added a respirator, the lung irritation stopped. 13 members of my extended family have died of lung related diseases, so I am very happy to "err" in the direction of being able to breathe.

[Fred Belknap]

A lot of ideas here. I have a 2hp DC with 6" plastic sewer pipe run to the lathe as well as some other machines. I have gates to shut off what I'm not using at the moment. It is exhausted outside without filter. It works ok for sanding and most other things I use it for except turning at the lathe. I also have an exhaust fan in the wall at the headstock end of the lathe. Last summer I upgraded the exhaust fan to a 24" with 4800cfm. Now I can turn without breathing dust, however there are downsides. With all the door and window shut there is enough leakage that I don't pass out from loss of air but I gets pretty cold when the temp outside is below freezing. I can deal with that better than I can the dust. It also is loud. In moderate weather I just put on a heavy Carhart coat and keep turning. We had some temp in single digits Fahrenheit and I just went in the house. One thing I have sliding doors on the shop and with the fan running the wife can't get the doors open:). I am happy with the fan, I can't stand much dust, and I don't like respirators much but do wear them sometimes. Without the fan on the shop stays around 65 degrees and I have free gas.

[Mike Goetzke]

I've been woodworking for a very long time but just recently been getting into turning. I started with the HF DC, then added the Wynn filter, and then found an unused CV cyclone for a great price. I also have a Jet ceiling mounted air filter and a Trend Airshield Pro.

Few years back there were many popcorn discussions about the need and extent of woodworking dust control - I chose the safe route. At that time, some of us got in a group buy for air quality particle counters. I sold mine after surveying my house and shop (garage shop). As I remember:

- with the air filter on in the shop (without generating dust) the air quality was better than my house
- with the dust collector on in the shop (without generating dust) the air quality was better than my house
- Even with the DC running you can see spikes in particle levels when running tools
- air quality level became normal after about 10-15 min. if I left the air filter on and stopped producing dust

This is not really surprising. What it showed was you need DC at point of dust generation and that an air filter unit is very helpful.

Mike