Off the wall DC idea

[Rick Potter]

Hi,

The village idiot is baaaack.

I have been gone about three years taking care of family business and elderly parents. It's nice to have some time again.

I have a new home and workshop that I am just getting set up. I will probably buy a Clear Vue cyclone, but first I thought I might try a silly idea on my 3HP Powermatic dust collector (two sets of bags).

Living in SoCal I am not worried about heat loss in the shop (65 degrees today), so I will not use filters with the cyclone...just duct it outside. It worked well at the old shop with a small Onieda cyclone.

Before I do this I have been wondering about removing the top bags on the Powermatic, replacing them with an MDF lid with a 6" or 8" duct coming off each lid, and venting to the outside. The bottom plastic bags would still be there and probably (possibly...maybe...hopefully) collect much of the dust before it went out the top ducts to the great outdoors. This should certainly remove some of the restriction of the dirty, clogged top bags. If you look at the bag area you see that the intake for the dust is going to the bottom bag, and there is a downward angled flange about 6" wide that helps keep the dust in the bottom bag.

There are no neighbors close enough to be bothered by any dust, and the shop is away from the house too.

I wonder if it would work. I wonder how much dust it would retain. I wonder why I stay awake at night coming up with these weird ideas.

I am pretty sure I will eventually go with the cyclone, but this might be interesting to try.

Any thoughts??

Rick Potter

[Howard Rosenberg]

No lower bags - just the exit from the housing surrounding the blower assembly?

If THAT works, you could just dump into a hopper and then disperse that finely around your property.

Just an idle thought....

Howard

[Mitchell Andrus]

If you are in a warm climate, just pump stuff outside into a container designed to strip velocity and drop particulates. Be warned, everything in the area will get a covering of dust.

Warm climate because the air exchange in the shop is calculable, as is the resultant heating bill.

[Phil Thien]

I would add a neutral vane to each of the inlets. This would probably increase greatly the amount of fines that would stay in the bags.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Local and state ordinances may not favor that approach.. It is, after all, California.

[David Giles]

It will work like a champ and there won't be as much dust as you think. I put up a 3x6 plastic building outside the shop with a Jet DC inside. Cut a couple of holes in the side for air exhaust and took off the top canister. There is a trash can preseparator before the DC.

Most of the chips end up in the trashcan. If it overfills, the lower bag gets the overflow. The inside of the plastic building is covered with dust and cobwebs and some chips end up on the floor. I blow the motor off monthly and sweep out the building twice a year. Whatever dust leaves the building is too small to settle. There has never been a buildup around the outlet vents.

I don't consider this an optimal solution. The 1.5 HP is too small. The plastic building needs to be 4' wide and it crimps the inlet duct. The 4" duct is too small and has too many turns. Like you, a Clearvue cyclone is on the to do list. But with a 3Hp DC, you might be surprised at how well it pulls, especially if your ductwork is properly sized.

[Jim Becker]

Without a pre-separator, you'll be blowing the majority of your chips outside...the low-cost fix is to put a cyclone in front of the blower. Build or buy...doesn't much matter as long as it's a good design.

[Art Mulder]

Have you seen Steve Clardy's dust collector? The blower is outside, and the pipe just ends over a trailer.

Seems simpler than your suggestion.

Edit: Okay, I dug and here is Steve Clardy's blower setup (http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?p=90987).

[Rick Potter]

Thanks for the thoughtful responses. Especially nice no one laughed at me, at least out loud.

Wow, Steve Clardy has one big pile of sawdust. That would be a lifetimes worth for me. I am just a hobbyist.

As I said before, I will probably end up with the clearvue, but it looked like this method might serve me well till I get it, especially since I have a lot of MDF work coming up in the near future.

Thanks for the response.

Rick P

[JayStPeter]

If I could vent to the outside, I would just hang the blower on the wall and direct the outlet outside. Man, a zero floorspace DC would be sweet.