Dust Collection Question

I am in the process of resetting up my shop. We were struck by lightning and our whole house had to be just about rebuilt. So now I am trying to get my shop which was our 2 car garage set back up. I had tried a portable Rikon Dust Collector with the bag as the filter type. I am not impressed with that type of filtration. It seems that once the fine dust get into the bag it starts to clog up and there does not seem to be any good way to get it totally clean again. So I have been looking at the larger cartridge type filtration systems. They really get complicated quickly. Currently looking at a 3hp Grizzly G0849 Cyclone. Seems to be priced pretty fair and has good specs. There is another Grizzly just like that one and it has a electronic canister cleaner built in and is about 5 hundred more dollars and not sure that feature is worth that much. I know this seems a little long but here is my two questions. One does any one have any of these systems and do they work as good as advertised? My second question is this, Powermatic and Jet both have similar systems but cost a lot more and the specs seem to be about the same. Is there any advantages to buying these more expansive brands over the Grizzly? Thanks for any help and guidance it is very much appreciated.

Welcome to the slippery slope of dust collection!

Oneida makes the Dust Deputy (it works for shop vacs too) preseparator. There are other solutions out there, including a popular DIY solution, the "Thein Separator". These will help your single stage DC mimic a cyclone.

A true cyclone dc usually works more efficiently than these preseparator solutions for 2 reasons: fewer connections, and therefore possible leaks, fewer bends from the dc to the tool.

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Originally Posted by Prashun Patel

Welcome to the slippery slope of dust collection!

Oneida makes the Dust Deputy (it works for shop vacs too) preseparator. There are other solutions out there, including a popular DIY solution, the "Thein Separator". These will help your single stage DC mimic a cyclone.

A true cyclone dc usually works more efficiently than these preseparator solutions for 2 reasons: fewer connections, and therefore possible leaks, fewer bends from the dc to the tool.

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The reason the smaller single stage is not working is not because it does not have a cyclone, the bag works good new but the small dust clogs up the pores in the bag. A cyclone will not do much for the fine dust and it is the fine dust that causes the problems with the bag. That is the reason I thought the canister type filter that can be cleaned would be a better bet. The only way to half way clean the bag is to take it off, turn it inside out and beat it half to death to try and get as much dust off it as you can. :)

I've got a grizzly cyclone, (G0443) and it appears to follow the Fan Curve published in their specs. So you can trust the specs published for the cyclones with fan curves.

That having been said, it's one of the large cyclones, which separates dust much more effectively than the 0849 you're looking at. The 0849, and all others of it's ilk, is a compromise, resulting in more dust in the filter as a result of the shorter cone. If you've got the room, I'd suggest the G0441 instead, since that design has the same HP, costs a little less than the 0849, and features the longer cone.

The advantage of the 0849, and the rest of the 08xx grizzly's is that it can be moved from machine to machine, and is more likely to fit into a hobbiest's workshop.

Also a note on the bag filters. That clogging is actually a feature. While it will cause the DC to performance, it will also catch much more of the fine dust. You can see this measured here:
https://woodgears.ca/dust/dylos.html

I only have experience with Oneida cyclones. Their cyclones are very efficient, giving sufficient air movement to get a high percentage of the dust and chips at the tool source. One reason I've stuck with Oneida is that their cyclones incorporate a HEPA filter that grabs the smallest particles of dust on the market. The filter on a cyclone is what filters the smallest dust particles out of the air coming through the cyclone. Because of this, I sometimes even let my Oneida run for awhile unattached to a tool, thus pulling my shop's air into the collector and filtering out the tiniest particles still remaining in the air.

While I have a bias toward Oneida, there are other HEPA filter equipped cyclones on the market these days. Jet, Laguna, Powermatic (probably identical to Jet), and others have more portable cyclones available that are designed mainly for single machine collection and on casters to move around the shop from tool to tool. Based on reviews, I understand that these are effective for use in this way. Oneida has cyclones like this also, but they are much more expensive.

I do whatever I can to get rid of dust from the air so, not only do I have the Oneida V series cyclone for source collection, I have hung an air cleaner from the ceiling, and generally use the Trend Air Shield powered mask for personal protection. I do not know for sure that all of those things together are as effective as I believe, but there isn't much dust anywhere in my shop.

If your bag is > 1micron, it won't catch anything fine - whether it's clogged or not.

If it's < 1micron, it will catch your fine dust until it clogs to a point where your airflow at the tool is choked so dust isn't even sucked up. The preseparator does indeed help with this.

You can purchase bags that are indeed < 1micron. The cannisters are better than bags only because they are easier to clean when they do clog, and they have more surface area than the bag, so air flow is preserved longer as it starts to accumulate material.

Andrew what about the cleaning of the filter on the 0441, how hard is it to do. That was one of the features of the 0849 i liked because it cleaned the filter electronically. Not sure how well it works with the cleaning but that is one of its features :) The 0441 seems to move a little more air and have a little larger filter surface area too along with a cheaper price.

I have an Oneida mini gorilla. See: https://www.oneida-air.com/dust-coll...dust-collector

Portable, HEPA filter, enough flow for what I do. Overall, works well for me.

I built a two stage dust collection system with a powermatic 1.75hp motor and large cartridge filter. Filter clogged up in one month (and what a pain it was to take apart and clean out the filter - took many hours). As a result, I took it totally apart, redesigned it and added a super dust deputy cyclone from Oneida and it works great now. I haven't had to blow out the filter in about two years now. I also installed a pressure gauge to the filter to know when it was getting clogged. I have probably emptied 10-12 32 gallon drums of sawdust since I added the cyclone. Sure works for me, cyclone made all the difference in the world. I use 5" overhead metal piping to all my machines, I have a small shop 250 sq ft so the runs are not long. I also modified all dust collection fittings on machines to pull through the 5" ducting to eliminate having choke points at the machines. Randy PS Interesting that my whole system took much more work than I anticipated, cost a whole lot more than anticipated, and entailed lots of dust collection research on line. As someone said, a real slippery slope..... Good luck.

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Originally Posted by Wade Holloway

Andrew what about the cleaning of the filter on the 0441, how hard is it to do. That was one of the features of the 0849 i liked because it cleaned the filter electronically. Not sure how well it works with the cleaning but that is one of its features :) The 0441 seems to move a little more air and have a little larger filter surface area too along with a cheaper price.

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Sorry, I mispoke, I have the G0443, which is the 1 1/2 HP version, so it's slightly smaller. In either case they have brushes that are easy to run up and down the inside of the filter, so I don't think I would pay for automatic cleaning. The truth is that with a very efficient cyclone, like the G0441, you're not going to get enough dust through to worry about cleaning it for months, if not years. In my case I decided to vent outside, so no build up at all.

I have the 3hsp griz with 2 canisters. Lots of power and the canisters do a great job & are easy to clean. If you want , you can get a cyclone for it to avoid having to empty the lower bags bags. Thing is loud tho, so I built an addition to cut the noise in the shop. If the units with cyclones were available yrs ago, I would have chosen one of the new ones that roll around and are very compact.

I run my shop out of a two car garage as well. I had used many portable (on wheels type) DC, but found their CFM lacking to properly clear chips and/or fine dust. Last year I finally bit the bullet and went with the Clear View 1800. It’s made a world of difference. I installed 6” pipe and 5 drops at various locations.

Sure, the cash outlay for the system and piping can turn people off, but I love not having to pull the DC around and constantly hook and unhook hoses.