HF Blower noise

[Dave Johnson29]

Hi people,

The red HF blower arrived yesterday and it is way overkill for air volume and also quite noisy. The noise is not a big problem as it will be outside the shop, but the draft inside the laser cabinet is amazing. Girlfriend described it as a wind-tunnel as it moved smaller items off the table. :eek:

I have read some posts saying the brushes will wear out quickly but I would have to question that. I have several HF items here and have yet to replace brushes with normal wear. Using he router speed control will lower the wear rate as well. Also the HF blower comes with a spare pair of brushes.

Since it was a brush-type universal motor, I dragged this out from the woodwork shop and it works a treat and will get another for the exhaust.

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=43060

[Bill Cunningham]

Other than hand held powertools, I haven't see a motor with 'brushes' for a long time.. My blower 'looks' like the HF blower, but has a induction motor.. On construction sites, Brush motors were handy, because the old Welding Generators we used had no inverters, but had a 110 DC outlet. Brush type motors work fine on DC..

[Dean Barber]

are there any links for the blower on hf

[Dave Johnson29]

Other than hand held powertools, I haven't see a motor with 'brushes' for a long time.


Hi Bill,

Yup, have to agree and I was quite surprised and delighted to see the brushes. Obviously they wanted the higher rpm, which in turn leads to the noise. Now I am able to back down the rpm and noise, but more importantly be able to control the number of air-changes per minute in the case.

With the speed control set to 5 the smoke is leaving horizontally about 1/8" above the material. Perfect, and noise is very low.

[Dave Johnson29]

are there any links for the blower on hf


Hi Dean,

Do a search for mini dust collector.

[bob pfohler]

Someone on this forum suggested an inline fan when I was setting up my system. It was a great tip, it produces low noise and it mounts to the wall out of the way.
I bought a Fantech FG 8XL.
http://www.fantech.net/fg.htm

[Chip Peterson]

I went the route of an inline fan also. I mounted it onto the laser's stand so that it is a complete, integreated package now.

It does a great job and is quiet. The cooling fans for the laser are louder than the exhaust fan.

[Ryan O'Hara]

Chip, that is an 8" inlet and outlet. How do you match this up to your laser? I am assuming you use some sort of adapter to get down to 4"?

[Chip Peterson]

I'm not at my laser currently, but I think mine is 6" and adapted down to 4".

The inline fans come in various sizes. Do a Google search, and look on ebay. There are tons of them out there, and they aren't badly priced.

I used insulated duct which will reduce some of the heat loss from the room during these cold Michigan winters. Initially, I used a blast gate to further that heat loss reduction. However, the inexpensive aluminum blast gate that I used leaked around the edges and fumes came into the area. There are expensive, sealed blast gates, but I haven't seen the need...yet.

[Dave Johnson29]

Initially, I used a blast gate to further that heat loss reduction. However, the inexpensive aluminum blast gate that I used leaked around the edges


Wow, saved by the bell. Saved me, that is!

Thanks Chris, I had not thought about that and was about to get a couple of woodworking blast gates today. Now I will fab up sealed ones.

This IS a great forum.