Blower fun

[Kev Williams]

word of advice if you have an HF green/gray blower, and likely most others-

at the exhaust end of the HF blowers at least, is this utterly stupid piece of plastic:
378272

Me, I can't think of a single reason why to 'filter' the outgoing debris?
And it's just going to block airflow...

Now, a dozen and more years ago when I bought our first 3 blowers,
I thought the same thing, and removed them before using them.

But 3 years ago when the blower that came with my Triumph quit,
and I was in the middle of a job, I went to HF and picked up another
blower, and hurriedly cobbled the hose onto the thing, rigging up my
own 6" to 4" 'adapter' out of rolled up strips of thin cardboard.
Hey, it worked!

But for the past several weeks it's been seeming like the smoke's taking
longer and longer to evacuate the lasers. So today I decided to finish up
my outdoor 2-blower setup, and while dismantling the blower in the
garage to move it outside, I found this:
378274

I totally didn't think about it when hooking it up!
Above is inside-facing side--
below is the outside side
378273

So I guess this explains the slow smoke removal issue!

So- remove the snout, take this out, and replace the snout, and know that in 3 years you won't be wondering why YOUR smoke isn't clearing out! :)

[Dave Sheldrake]

Me, I can't think of a single reason why to 'filter' the outgoing debris?
And it's just going to block airflow...

Safety requirement Kev in case you decide to stuff one of your kids hands in there.

[Gary Hair]

Safety requirement Kev in case you decide to stuff one of your kids hands in there.
It also keeps large debris from damaging the impeller.

[Kev Williams]

Safety requirement Kev in case you decide to stuff one of your kids hands in there.
...If I wanted to turn my kid's hands into hamburger, my garbage disposal is much more convenient, and gets rid of the evidence at the same time...
--which of course sounds and is horrible, but it points out the vagaries with 'safety requirements'. But yes, it will keep hands from the impeller, and HF out of court...

Gary, this thing in on the exhaust side, the intake 'grate' is metal and I don't think it can be removed...

[Gary Hair]

...If I wanted to turn my kid's hands into hamburger, my garbage disposal is much more convenient, and gets rid of the evidence at the same time...
--which of course sounds and is horrible, but it points out the vagaries with 'safety requirements'. But yes, it will keep hands from the impeller, and HF out of court...

Gary, this thing in on the exhaust side, the intake 'grate' is metal and I don't think it can be removed...

FYI - the inlet screen is removable. It's been so long since I've had one apart I forgot that they included an outlet screen as well. Mine have neither...

[Kev Williams]

Was just out working on my 2x blower box, and you're right! The snout can be removed and so can the inlet screen! One of these days I might take those out. For some reason I was thinking the inlet screen was part of the housing sheet metal...

Anyway, speaking of my blower box, I finally got the one blower out of the garage shop and into the cheapie patio box with the other one. This setup could've been much nicer to look at but I simply don't have the time to play dress-up with my tools ;)...

I got the preliminaries done last night after dark, took this pic this morning:
378388
looks much better than it has been. The storage container acts a muffler, and semi-stink filter. I have a 16 pound bag of cheap charcoal briquettes wrapped in 1/2" screen and stuffed against the far right air-out side. It's great at reducing the air noise, and while not hardly the perfect filter, it does cut the leather and plastic smell down by about 2/3.

Plenty of room inside for 2 blowers, the box dimensions are perfect :)
-note the 2 holes showing daylight thru (and above), these are for the motors to draw outside cooling air.
378389
378390

I after getting all the plumbing buttoned up I started stuffing
fiberglass between the blower and the box. Best I can tell
there's no part of the blowers touching box. I left the space
in between them so the motor's cooling air isn't totally trapped.
(it got dark and my flash doesn't work, so the pics are grainy)
378391

There's 2 layers of glass resting on top. Before closing the lid
I pushed the glass towards the back of the box, there's a good
2" of space for the motor air to find its way out.
378392

The box is now resting on a pallet, with 2" of foam rubber and a laser of glass as cushions (was too dark to get a pic).

For over 15 years I've had one and for a long time two of these blowers in my basement stairwell for the basement lasers. Being down there, they've always been fairly quiet, never had a neighbor complain (till a bearing in one started screeching ;) )... Both these blowers running, on the driveway on the side of the garage, are just as quiet. Our closest neigbors, who's bedroom window is about 60' from the blowers, can't hear them running inside their house even late at night.

There is one little flaw in my system- if both exhausts are plumbed into the muffler box, then both blowers must be on, or backpressure pushes the exhaust right back into laser with the blower not running. For now I'll just keep them both running.

So no blower in the garage pushing smoke into the room finally, which is quieter, and the wife can open the freezer door all the way now-- We're happy! :)


.

[Keith Downing]

Was just out working on my 2x blower box, and you're right! The snout can be removed and so can the inlet screen! One of these days I might take those out. For some reason I was thinking the inlet screen was part of the housing sheet metal...

Anyway, speaking of my blower box, I finally got the one blower out of the garage shop and into the cheapie patio box with the other one. This setup could've been much nicer to look at but I simply don't have the time to play dress-up with my tools ;)...

I got the preliminaries done last night after dark, took this pic this morning:
378388
looks much better than it has been. The storage container acts a muffler, and semi-stink filter. I have a 16 pound bag of cheap charcoal briquettes wrapped in 1/2" screen and stuffed against the far right air-out side. It's great at reducing the air noise, and while not hardly the perfect filter, it does cut the leather and plastic smell down by about 2/3.

Plenty of room inside for 2 blowers, the box dimensions are perfect :)
-note the 2 holes showing daylight thru (and above), these are for the motors to draw outside cooling air.
378389
378390

I after getting all the plumbing buttoned up I started stuffing
fiberglass between the blower and the box. Best I can tell
there's no part of the blowers touching box. I left the space
in between them so the motor's cooling air isn't totally trapped.
(it got dark and my flash doesn't work, so the pics are grainy)
378391

There's 2 layers of glass resting on top. Before closing the lid
I pushed the glass towards the back of the box, there's a good
2" of space for the motor air to find its way out.
378392

The box is now resting on a pallet, with 2" of foam rubber and a laser of glass as cushions (was too dark to get a pic).

For over 15 years I've had one and for a long time two of these blowers in my basement stairwell for the basement lasers. Being down there, they've always been fairly quiet, never had a neighbor complain (till a bearing in one started screeching ;) )... Both these blowers running, on the driveway on the side of the garage, are just as quiet. Our closest neigbors, who's bedroom window is about 60' from the blowers, can't hear them running inside their house even late at night.

There is one little flaw in my system- if both exhausts are plumbed into the muffler box, then both blowers must be on, or backpressure pushes the exhaust right back into laser with the blower not running. For now I'll just keep them both running.

So no blower in the garage pushing smoke into the room finally, which is quieter, and the wife can open the freezer door all the way now-- We're happy! :)


.

Really good setup Kev. Thanks for sharing.

As far as your problem with the backpressure blowing exhaust back into your shop, have you thought about trying one of the little dryer vent covers at the end of the hose in the muffler box? i'd be surprised if that didn't help tremendously, or even fix the problem completely.

Something like this is what I was thinking would help:

378510

[Kev Williams]

Actually, a pair of those would work nicely! Not sure why I didn't think of that, since I walk past one exactly like it 10 times a day! (which is probably why I didn't think of it- like how I have a hard time remembering a new customer who's named "Kevin");)

Thanks for the tip!