RL125 - Ductwork Size?

[Ed Weiser]

Anyone out there have a Felder RL125 Dust Collector? What size duct are you running? Performance?

[Patrick Walsh]

6" mains

6" drops to reducers at the blast gate to flex hose and machine port.

Mostly 6" to between 4-5" give or take.

[Ed Weiser]

Happy with performance, Patrick? No motor overheating or excessive amp draw?

[Erik Loza]

When I was with Felder, had several owners with issues and then as an SCM/Minimax rep, I had customers who owned RL-125's (or RL-160's) and issues, too. It's a dust collector. You should not have issues with a piece of equipment like that. I know the whole spiel about their HEPA-type rating and that sort of thing but most of my customers spent as much time working on their RL's as they did making sawdust. Pneumatic "self-cleaning feature" not working right, motor running really hot, super-expensive filter, etc. On the plus-side they fit well into cramped spaces and are quieter than cyclones but if I was outfitting a new shop, I could get a US-made cyclone that would do 99%+ of good a job, for a lot less money and if there were a problem or issue, 100% that I could get it fixed quicker if it were Oneida. Just my 2-cents. Best of luck with your decision.

Erik

[Bill Dufour]

Please modify the title since it is meaningless and not really searchable. I guess it make sense since Italy does make a lot of high end woodworking machinery.

http://www.motorstown.com/62646-puch-rl-125.html

[Ed Weiser]

Erik, I realize you have been of great assistance to Creekers with your substantial industry experience. The original question, however, was about ducting not the reliability or value of the Felder line of dust collectors. The filter on the RL125 is $289, much cheaper than some of the Oneida filters which run in excess of $400 for equivalent collectors. The 4 hp motor of the RL125 is time proven (I have three other machines with the same motor without a hint of trouble), the "self-cleaning" feature of the RL125 is manual not pneumatic, and so on. Do you have any opinion on duct size? (Feel free to PM me if you'd like more info.)
Bill, I don't think I can change the title at this point. The first line of the post does identify that this is not a question about Italian motorcycles!