Dust collection $1200 budget - want expandable

[brendan chatt]

Hi guys, I'm new here and to woodworking in general.
I'm going to be picking up a table saw and router table, etc..
I want to limit my total dust collection expenses to 1200 — collector, separator, ducting, hoses, etc. everything in my garage will be mobile, so I don't need a port at every tool right now — I guess two would be fine for now. I want to get the best collector I can afford now, that I can expand on in the future.
Any recommendation on duct size, brand, or even a specific product?

tysm in advance
-Brendan

[Curtis Kimble]

Of course! The most simple, easy and inexpensive way is to use a 5 gallon drum and a cyclone hooked up to a shop vac. It's the exact same design we use on our 15 HP 20' dust collectors, but this perfect for your garage, very mobile and keeps dust from reaching your shop vac, making cleaning super easy. Look up Oneida Dust Deputy. They have a $100 kit you can use!149951.0.jpg

[glenn bradley]

In my experience if you try to use that budget for everything you will end up with $1200 of stuff you will probably replace 90% of. This is based on having very little information about what your shop situation is, what your exhaust or re-entry air situation is, blah, blah, blah ;-)

To get better answers than "go buy a Harbor Freight DC and then upgrade it" you will want to give us some more info.
- Can you vent outside? This can change the whole foundation of your approach.
- Can you roll the DC from machine to machine? Is there floor space to do this comfortably?

Here's where things start to break down:
1. If you have to vent your DC exhaust into your breathing air you need filtration to around .3 microns.
2. That level of filtering will clog quickly without a separator.
3. A separator requires a more powerful blower for a given ability to collect.
4. Larger more powerful blowers run larger ducts.
5. And the whole thing can spin out of scale rather quickly.

Baseline is to get the best you can as soon as you can. Shoot us a little more info and we will try to get you better suggestions.

[brendan chatt]

Very interesting, thank you much!
I never knew you could vent to outside, but I don't see why I couldn't, if it works better for me. I live in Florida it temperature makes a difference.
I will have space to roll around the collector, but I would rather have it stationary, and do some ducting, and use my tools' mobile bases when necessary.
I assumed I would have to get some kind of separator. If for a couple hundred more I could be in a whole 'nother class of collection, I could manage, but I just don't want to get some super system I don't need. I also plan to get a decent air filtration unit that I'm separately willing to spend about $500 on.

My garage is 20'W x 24'L x 12'H
I have a bandsaw, and plan to get as soon, as I have dust collection, a table saw with router table, drill press belt/disc sander... I will possibly get possibly a jointer planer. A CNC router may soon follow as well.

In my experience if you try to use that budget for everything you will end up with $1200 of stuff you will probably replace 90% of. This is based on having very little information about what your shop situation is, what your exhaust or re-entry air situation is, blah, blah, blah ;-)

To get better answers than "go buy a Harbor Freight DC and then upgrade it" you will want to give us some more info.
- Can you vent outside? This can change the whole foundation of your approach.
- Can you roll the DC from machine to machine? Is there floor space to do this comfortably?

Here's where things start to break down:
1. If you have to vent your DC exhaust into your breathing air you need filtration to around .3 microns.
2. That level of filtering will clog quickly without a separator.
3. A separator requires a more powerful blower for a given ability to collect.
4. Larger more powerful blowers run larger ducts.
5. And the whole thing can spin out of scale rather quickly.

Baseline is to get the best you can as soon as you can. Shoot us a little more info and we will try to get you better suggestions.

[Curtis Kimble]

Man, you guys are way overcomplicating things here. Everything you say your running is small demand. You just gotta ask yourself, do you want a cheap roll around dust collection, or should you build (for 1200 you could) a stationary dust collector with duct work ran to where you need. You did say youre in a garage, so that's a small space. No biggie. Next, I think you should consider a sound deadening box around the collector and motor...Nothing better than a quieter shop! - just my two cents

[Jim Becker]

Unfortunately, that small cyclone and a shop vac are not adequate for tools like a table saw...great for small hand-helds, however.

OP, Your best play may be something like Oneida's Mini-Gorilla. It's a couple hundred more than your stated budget, but it's nice for single tool use, rolls around and can be tucked away when not in use and is from a vendor that's dedicated to dust collection...it's all they do. The performance curves also tend to be accurate rather than overstated as is the case with many mass marketed products.

[brendan chatt]

Thank you! I will definitely take a look into that product. I didn't know to look out for inflated performance curves, but I guess exaggerated marketing is always something to watch for.

Unfortunately, that small cyclone and a shop vac are not adequate for tools like a table saw...great for small hand-helds, however.

OP, Your best play may be something like Oneida's Mini-Gorilla. It's a couple hundred more than your stated budget, but it's nice for single tool use, rolls around and can be tucked away when not in use and is from a vendor that's dedicated to dust collection...it's all they do. The performance curves also tend to be accurate rather than overstated as is the case with many mass marketed products.

[brendan chatt]

Thank you! I was looking at that, but I want something that I can down to a precise micron level. I don't want to use my shop vac

Of course! The most simple, easy and inexpensive way is to use a 5 gallon drum and a cyclone hooked up to a shop vac. It's the exact same design we use on our 15 HP 20' dust collectors, but this perfect for your garage, very mobile and keeps dust from reaching your shop vac, making cleaning super easy. Look up Oneida Dust Deputy. They have a $100 kit you can use!149951.0.jpg

[brendan chatt]

I was looking at this DustRight collector from Rockler:
https://www.rockler.com/rockler-wall...ector-1250-cfm
with this filter:
https://www.rockler.com/canister-fil...dust-collector

What do you guys think of that?

[ChrisA Edwards]

I went down this road about 5 years ago. My garage at that time served double duty, me playing hobbyist woodworker during the day and a place to park the wife car at night.

I had bought a Woodpeckers Router Table, Laguna 14/12 band saw, Sawstop 1.75 PCS, a Dewalt 735 and a Supermax 19-38 drum sander.

All were on mobile bases and would be moved in and out for use and storage.

So I bought a Jet 1.5HP DC with a canister filter ($650 and 5" schedule 20 PVC Sewer pipe, a few elbow and Tee's ($80). I ran it about 40ft and had a 4" and 2.5" blast gateon the end of two drops ($50). From there I use flex hose to the actually tool.

Later I converted it to a two stage unit and bought an Oneida Super Duty XL Cyclone ($240) and a 20 gallon drum.

When I move from TX to TN, in my new garage, I went with about 60ft of 5" HVAC metal duct pipe and swapped out the 20 gallo drum for a 55G from Amazon($80).

This has served me well and I've added a Hammer A3-31 J/P, a Shopfox W1812 Moulder and a Hammer F4 Shaper. All of which can generate copious amount of shavings quickly.

This was my original system when I used to have to put my tools away each night, showing the 20 gallon bin (yellow).


My system now




You could replicate my setup today and still have a little change left over.

Hope this helps.

Question: As a Member of this forum, can you see the images I posted? I know a Contributor($6 per year) can.

[Scott Bernstein]

I was you about 5 years ago. Started just plain shop vac, then shop vac with cyclone separator. The addition of the small cyclone to shop vac definitely helps decrease the frequency of shopvac filter changes, but it does not improve the suction power and airflow from the shopvac - if anything it decreases it by adding a static pressure load to the system. Even at its best, the shopvac basically did almost nothing when hooked up to my jointer or table saw...it just lacks enough airflow for those big tools. Contemplated getting a ceiling mounted filter, but quickly realized the better strategy is to prevent the dust from getting into the air in the first place. I also considered something like the wall-mounted blower you referenced from Rockler - I have a friend who has one and he likes it. However, some of my tools have two 4" dust ports and smaller units like this just don't have enough flow for that - although they will try to tell you it will. Also I did not like the idea of constantly having to use the "flapper" to keep the filter media clean. Lastly, I want to filter down to 0.5 micron particle size. So...after much internal deliberation I ended up with a full-size 5hp cyclone dust collector in my small hobby garage shop. Initially it seemed like way overkill, but boy is it nice. I have multiple 4" drops from the 6" main line running along the ceiling, which is so convenient. The thing has so much power I can easily run 2 or more open 4" ports with plenty of suction and air movement. It is such a pleasure to work in the garage now - there is so much less dust in the air. And when my Dylos particle counter shows a bolus of dust in the room, I can watch it climb back down as my cyclone stays on cleaning the air in the entire space. It has a huge amount of < 0.5 micron filter media which I do not have to clean often...actually have not cleaned it all since i acquired it. I have measured with an air flow meter and I am getting an honest 2100+ CFM at the end of my 30' main line, from three 10' lengths of 4" flex tubing at the tool. This is way more than I actually need, but my point is that a shop vac or small blower may not be quite enough for big, stationary tools. For my small handheld powertools, like sanders, Lamello Zeta, etc... I use a Milwaukee shop vac with HEPA filtration and automatic filter cleaning. A shop vac works great in this application where you need a smaller cross-sectional area of high velocity and higher pressure flow than a huge cyclone can produce. Good luck!

[brendan chatt]

I also love how Grizzly uses affirm so you can pay off over time, so given the comments, I am thinking about this: https://www.grizzly.com/products/Gri...ollector/G0441

[Matthew Hills]

I also love how Grizzly uses affirm so you can pay off over time, so given the comments, I am thinking about this: https://www.grizzly.com/products/Gri...ollector/G0441

What height can your shop accommodate? That grizzly is quite tall. I think the clearvue or oneida cyclones can just barely fit with 8' if you use a short collection barrel.
(ceiling height is one of the requirements for the tall cyclones that provide good separation -- the short cyclones have historically not separated as well, so more dust ends up in the filters)

Matt

[Tom Dixon]

I also love how Grizzly uses affirm so you can pay off over time, so given the comments, I am thinking about this: https://www.grizzly.com/products/Gri...ollector/G0441

If you go this route you likely will never need to upgrade unless you move to a much bigger shop with many more tools. I have it's 5HP bigger brother the G0442 and I'm extremely satisfied. I'm running an 8" main with 6" branches and only step down to 5" or 4" at the machine. The G0441 will more than handle the machines you ave listed. There's some pics of my system in this current thread https://sawmillcreek.org/showthread....collector-Pics

[brendan chatt]

Very cool. Yeah I can see your beginnings were similar to where I’m headed. I got a grizzly 14” bandsaw and plan to get the contractor sawstop. I’m definitely curious how strong that Jet 1.5hp does for you. I don’t need to put a car in my garage, but I need to be able to make the space available in case of hurricane. I want to do all my ducting in the metal stuff. My good bud is generally handy but also a skilled AC guy and I’m sure he could show me the ropes and I can avoid static.

I really think I want a shaper, but don’t want one right now. I like the planet jointer combo for space and a couple other reasons, but I am curious if the jointer bed stay solidly calibrated after using the planer. Anyways, thank you, that’s for another thread

I can see the photos. Very nice and cool upgrade on the dust collection!

I went down this road about 5 years ago. My garage at that time served double duty, me playing hobbyist woodworker during the day and a place to park the wife car at night.

I had bought a Woodpeckers Router Table, Laguna 14/12 band saw, Sawstop 1.75 PCS, a Dewalt 735 and a Supermax 19-38 drum sander.

All were on mobile bases and would be moved in and out for use and storage.

So I bought a Jet 1.5HP DC with a canister filter ($650 and 5" schedule 20 PVC Sewer pipe, a few elbow and Tee's ($80). I ran it about 40ft and had a 4" and 2.5" blast gateon the end of two drops ($50). From there I use flex hose to the actually tool.

Later I converted it to a two stage unit and bought an Oneida Super Duty XL Cyclone ($240) and a 20 gallon drum.

When I move from TX to TN, in my new garage, I went with about 60ft of 5" HVAC metal duct pipe and swapped out the 20 gallo drum for a 55G from Amazon($80).

This has served me well and I've added a Hammer A3-31 J/P, a Shopfox W1812 Moulder and a Hammer F4 Shaper. All of which can generate copious amount of shavings quickly.

This was my original system when I used to have to put my tools away each night, showing the 20 gallon bin (yellow).


My system now




You could replicate my setup today and still have a little change left over.

Hope this helps.

Question: As a Member of this forum, can you see the images I posted? I know a Contributor($6 per year) can.