What did I get myself into

[Jerome Stanek]

I get on a lot of auction sites that have that sort of collector and not many sell for very much. To much time to take down and patch the walls. and like everyone said 3 phase

[michael gates]

I see them online a lot too, unfortunately in my neck of the woods an auction with decent equipment only happens about once every five years.

[McKay Sleight]

When I taught high school shop, We had a "Torit" brand cyclone that was about that large. Because I did not have to pay the bill I did not know how much it cost to run. However, the tools did not need blast gates and every machine could be running at the same time. (about 9 large machines.) The machine was a wonder. I welded a 500 gal container so that the dust only had to be dumped about once a week. They re-built the school from the ground up two years ago. When the time came for the DC, they elected to give this unit to the district cabinetshop and purchase a unit that would just barely extract from 3-4 machines. I just shook my head when I asked why they downsized. Their answer was that the students could open/close blast gates. I asked them if only 3-4 students were allowed to work at a time. What were we do do with the other 28 students? Take turns at the table saw, jointer, etc? Like most administrations, they need to get back to the workers that actually know how things are run.

[Rick Christopherson]

Regardless what power is needed at the motor, it must still originate at your existing load center. So depending on what you have, it will require 150 amps at 240V single-phase, 85 amps at 240V 3-phase, or the 42 amps at 480V 3-phase someone else mentioned. These numbers will still be true regardless how you make the power at the motor, such as transformer or VFD, but they will be significantly higher if it is with a rotary converter from single phase.

It's a great bargain, but unless you are already in a commercial building, you probably won't have enough existing service to power it. (Sorry for the gloom and doom . Just letting you know "what you got yourself into".) It's a heck of a bargain that would be tough to pass up at first glance.

[Anthony Whitesell]

I'm thinking a more appropriate title would have been "What did I get sucked in to?"

[Alan Schaffter]

Lets not forget the connections- what diam is the 90 ft of ducting? It is probably too large for most home shops and will get in he way. As Rick said, you will likely need 480V three phase. If you are not in a commercial area, you are not likely to get 3 phase, not easily or inexpensively anyway- 3 phase is typically not run in residential neighborhoods. Even if 3 phase is available do you know what it will cost to have the power company connect it to your shop- the numbers I have seen in forum threads have far exceeded what you paid for the cyclone.

What are you going to use to collect the dust and chips - a large bulk truck like you see on the highway hauling wood chips, soy beans, etc.? And what will you do with the dust that makes it past the cyclone? You won't find a filter that will handle the CFM that system generates- you'll need a filter bag house- literally a house-sized building with multiple filter socks, a bag shaker, etc., etc.

Is where you live zoned commercial? If not, code may prevent you from installing the beast.

[Mike Archambeau]

And best of all when you aren't working in your shop you could rent out the space as a windtunnel to test airplane and automobile aerodynamics. Oh the fun you could have........................

[Aaron Berk]

To the OP
---
How about some more info on your shop and location and if you have the power available for the cyclone.

I'd like to know if it will work for you. Who cares what the market value is. What was it worth to you?
Or are you trying to resale it for a markup? Which would change the ball game completely.

[michael gates]

To the OP
---
How about some more info on your shop and location and if you have the power available for the cyclone.

I'd like to know if it will work for you. Who cares what the market value is. What was it worth to you?
Or are you trying to resale it for a markup? Which would change the ball game completely.

I am going to resell the blower and 30hp motor, I do custom woodwork for a living but the blower is way to big for me. The actual cyclone and air lock may be of use to me with a smaller blower but I will likely sell it all. I will keep some pipe, it has about 200ft of 9 inch and 90 ft of 16inch.
It came out of an Ikea manufacturing building and there where two of them, these where the smallest units there. Mine was used for one piece of equipment.

[Brian Tymchak]

make sure the tools are bolted down..

[Jerome Stanek]

do you have to repair where it goes through the wall and are you going to need riggers to haul it.

[michael gates]

No riggers, no patching for the dust collector how ever I bought a spray booth as well which needs a water tight patch...no big deal.

[Randy Dutkiewicz]

I'd consider the price an absolute steal! It appears in really nice condition also.

Are you going to use it as a mobile unit and pull it around the shop from machine to machine??

LOL!!! Bet it would work well hooked up to the router too

[Nicholas Carey]

30 HP? That means your probably needing 3-phase 480V power? Might be a problem to a residence.

An honest 30HP is 22,500 watts. that's c. 47A at 480 V and c. 187A at 120 V. That's some big honking cable.

[Rick Christopherson]

30 HP? That means your probably needing 3-phase 480V power? Might be a problem to a residence.

An honest 30HP is 22,500 watts. that's c. 47A at 480 V and c. 187A at 120 V. That's some big honking cable.

I am not saying this to nitpick. Just to be informative. So please don't take it the wrong way. Your intentions were in the right place, but your equations were off.

First is the conversion between motor HP and electrical watts. There are two separate variables in the equation that most often get confused. The first term is powerfactor, and it is the most commonly known, but least understood. That's because it has nothing to do with the motor's efficiency, but that's how most people apply it. The second term is actually the efficiency, and deals with such things as windage resistance of the spinning motor, losses inside the iron core, and the size of the air gap. A good approximation for efficiency is 0.8 to 0.85. The powerfactor is a function of electrical delay between current and voltage (capacitive circuits) or voltage and current (inductive circuits). For motors, the powerfactor is also a variable function of load. For an idling motor, this should be somewhere down around 0.1 (10%). For a fully loaded motor, this can vary depending on how far into saturation the manufacturer is willing to spec their motor. 0.8 (80%) is a common powerfactor for most motors, but some manufacturers will allow their motor to be operating with a higher load and the PF can increase to 0.9 (90%).

So your conversion from HP to watts becomes:

HP = I x V x pf x eff / 746, where eff = 0.8 and pf = 0.8 (or pf x eff = 0.64)

However, the equation above doesn't take into account 3-phase power. The reason your numbers came out kind of close is just luck, because the missing pf x eff almost balanced out with the √3 term for 3-phase. Going from single phase to 3-phase is not simply a matter of multiplying by 3. (well actually it is, but there is a tan(120) in there too, so 3/√3 = √3.) and the 3-phase version of the equation becomes:

HP = √3 x I x V x pf x eff / 746, where the current is the current in just one phase