My thoughts. Both as an cardiothoracic anesthesiologist and an avid woodworker. So I think about my lungs and other people's lungs a lot.
1.) Buy the best dust collector you can afford / fit in your shop. Buy once, cry once.
2.) I went with 7" dropped down to 6" for most runs with my 5HP Oneida. Worked well on tools that have good design for dust collection.
3.) Overhead air filters make a huge difference. I have 2 Jet units (overkill), but with my Dylos unit I can see that they make an unbelievable difference.
4.) Buy a good P100 respirator (I use the 3M ones. Reasonably comfortable).
5.) My rule is that I don't take off the respirator mask until the Dylos reads back to ambient levels. 500 particles in my case.
6.) I really think that the Dylos meter was money incredibly well spent. They are impressively accurate. Mine picked up a weird anomaly a few months ago that I was stumped by. My ambient air became roughly 6 times worse than I had ever seen. I took it outside - same readings. Very bizarre. It turns out, my local paper wrote an article I saw a week later about a sandstorm from Lake Mali in Africa that was dumping sand out of the atmosphere on Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. My Dylos actually picked this up. Truly amazing.
7.) If you think sanding is bad, try using a hammer drill on cinder block walls and measure the particles in the air. Easily 5-10 times worse than sanding.
8.) Seeing patients with bad COPD - it's pretty terrible. Do everything you can to avoid breathing this stuff. The small particles are really bad for you.
9.) SCMS dust collection is terrible. Even with my Festool Kapex hooked up to a HEPA festool vac. Nature of the beast / designs.
- After I ask a stranger if I can pet their dog and they say yes, I like to respond, "I'll keep that in mind" and walk off
- It's above my pay grade. Mongo only pawn in game of life.