DIY Over Arm Dust collector

Just completed my version of the overarm dust collector. The commercial versions go for $300-500 depending on the manufacturer.

A few improvements over the typical commercial versions:
1) Gate built into the collector for easy adjustments. I happened to have an extra 4" gate.
2) Ported for 4" instead of the typical 3"
3) Counter weighted to be perfectly balanced. I think the SawStop version uses a spring, so this might be a wash.

Attachment 425735

Attachment 425736



When not in use, swings out of the way.
Attachment 425737

Comparison for 5 cuts of a pine board, with an open ended cut, since open ended is virtually guaranteed to throw out dust.

Without the dust collector, just in cabinet collection.
Attachment 425738

With over arm dust collector working:
Attachment 425739

Your pics aren’t showing up. Please upload them to the site so the kinks don’t get broken in the future and we don’t see small white boxes like we see now. Looking forward to seeing what you did!

Thanks, first time trying to post project pics. Hopefully they're showing up now.

Just wondering why you put the vertical pipe to the left of the blade? I assume you don't work with sheet goods?

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Originally Posted by Doug Garson

Just wondering why you put the vertical pipe to the left of the blade? I assume you don't work with sheet goods?

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Depends on what I'm doing, if they're large I usually use the circular saw. Really though, it's easier to pull the fence over to the other side of the blade, and cut that way, since there's more support that direction. Finally, worse comes to worse, I can just remove the pipe, since it's deliberately not screw in, though with my current garage setup that wouldn't really get me much more room, say another 6"-12".

Looks good Andrew. The amount of change with the overhead collection looks similar to mine. I was hoping it would get more but it gets most of it, definitely not all.

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Originally Posted by Jim Dwight

Looks good Andrew. The amount of change with the overhead collection looks similar to mine. I was hoping it would get more but it gets most of it, definitely not all.

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Thanks! I think to get more you'd need to physically block the stuff that shoots out the side on an open cut. For a closed cut I get virtually no dust on the table top.

I've seen swing down side pieces that seem like they would address the issue, but I'm happy for now with the results I've gotten.

This is an excellent example of side blocking for open ended cuts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxZOO_zcpNM&t=58s

I ended up shelling out for the shark guard, which has been wonderful... BUT... I can't use it with non-through cuts since it mounts on the splitter (rather than to the arm like yours).

What I ended up doing when performing (as an example) dado cuts to produce tenons was to direct 100% of my air flow to the cabinet, and clamp my nearby shop vac hose to the front rail of my table saw. It was surprisingly adequate, but still made me wish for a setup closer to what you have going.

Nice work!