Dust Cyclone "Crate" for noise reduction

[Christopher Charles]

Hi all,

Not too long after adding a super dust deputy to my 2 hp dust collector and mounting on the wall to save some space, I bought a used 3 HP Oneida V-3000, mainly because it was a good price and I'd already rented a trailer to buy a J/P from the same guy. And who doesn't need more horse power, right?

I do have enough space to mount the Oneida on the wall in the old spot as it came with a wall mount rather than a stand. But, while I've been happy with SSD, the current wall mount is loud and the garage is directly adjacent the main living area of the house. So I'm building a 'crate' for the V-3000 that will act as stand and cut down considerably on the noise if all goes well. I'm calling it a crate as it will be free standing like a large shipping crate to isolate it from the house. We plan to be in this house for at least a four more years but it definitely is not going to be the 'forever' house, so I am also aiming to make something that could be broken down and moved relatively easily and thrown up in a new and improved shop space.

After some head scratching, several draft sketches, and discovering a bunch of panel doors at the local habitat for humanity, I decided to make the skin from the doors with a 2x4 frame on the front and back, and with a plywood skin on back. The doors were $10 ea.--I really prefer to repurpose materials when I can and the six doors were quite a bit cheaper than ply would be to boot. The plan is to have a door for access on the front and a muffled exhaust in the upper left portion. I do plan to insulate with some bat insulation and possibly some sheetrock on the back if needed.

The best spot is on the other side of the shop and of course required moving a couple storage shelves a few inches to make space. The shelves block the north side garage door, which also meant the garage door rail was in the way too. The horizontal section was easy to remove, but the curved section still holds the upper part of the garage door. That was a head scratcher until I realized I can just incorporate a space for the rail into the exhaust port. The exhaust will be scrap ply serpentine baffles with some foam, full width and about 12" high and 24" long, oriented to pull air across the motor as it enters the muffler box.

Here's the progress so far-the back and part of the left side in place in the first photo and with two sides and the cyclone in for a test fit in the second. Still need to work out how to get power into the 'crate' and be kosher with code (240v outlets are nearby so no worries there) and get a dolly for the dust bin. Will be a week or so before I can make more progress, but good to get started.

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[Aaron Inami]

It will be interesting to see your final product. Why not stick some foam to that plywood/frame behind the dust collector. It's cheap here:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BW56YLXZ...roduct_details

[Alan Lightstone]

It will be interesting to see your final product. Why not stick some foam to that plywood/frame behind the dust collector. It's cheap here:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BW56YLXZ...roduct_details

I bought and installed some foam panels like those for my dust collection closet for my 5HP Oneida. I found they really didn't do much to decrease sound. What I found was far more effective was hanging thick moving blankets. They are very effective. I hung them from curtain rods . https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00JWU3QKK?th=1

[Aaron Inami]

I bought and installed some foam panels like those for my dust collection closet for my 5HP Oneida. I found they really didn't do much to decrease sound. What I found was far more effective was hanging thick moving blankets. They are very effective. I hung them from curtain rods . https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00JWU3QKK?th=1

Agreed, but this stick up foam would be easy. The better solution would be to glue some 2" fiberglass type panels into that section.

[Christopher Charles]

Thanks gentlemen. Aaron, I have some of those panels and will use them in the baffle section. I do plan to put up fiberglass over the plywood on the inside. Alan, good idea on the blankets and I may try that if needed--would be easier than adding sheetrock.

[Keegan Shields]

Looks like a fun project! Have you considered how you will keep the DC motor cool? Since the motor and its cooling fan sit inside your closet, things are likely to get pretty warm. Something to consider.

[Chris Stolicky]

I have my V3000 in a closet (perforated hard board/roxul/2"x4" studs/1/2"-ply/steel door). It is built into a corner rather than a standalone box. I used a baffle return lined with scrap carpet.
Here are some pictures:
https://flic.kr/p/TB7U8U
https://flic.kr/p/TEJ3aB
https://flic.kr/p/TB7hwd
https://flic.kr/p/TtfM3t
https://flic.kr/p/TEHyxc

The noise in the ducts is louder than the machine. I think you will likely hear noise in the house no matter what, but you can get it down to a distant hum.

Enjoy your build.

[Clifford McGuire]

For those that enclode the entire thing in a closet, do you have to accont for the air flow coming out of the filter? Is there a way to return it to the workshop?

[Michael Burnside]

What I don't quite understand is if the intent is to make the shop and living room quiet or just the living room? If the latter, I'm with Aaron in that I would stick sound deadening foam behind the DC along the entire wall to "help" prevent that noise from penetrating through and measure the sound inside the living room. IMHO this would be more efficient to block sound from all your tools, not just the DC. Or move the DC to the other side of the shop. Sound falls off by the radius squared.

Encapsulating the whole DC in a room requires careful consideration to heat, air exchange, access for maintenance, etc. If the shop is too loud, ear protection is your friend and something you should be wearing anyway IMHO.

[Aaron Inami]

If you are placing your dust collector in a closet, then you absolutely have to have the ability to "return air into your shop". Chris Solicky has a "cut out" on the top of his closet which allows air to be returned to the shop. It's a folded baffle section that blocks most of the sound of the cyclone/exhaust.

On Michaels' comment, some tools are louder than others. Dust collector is typically one of the loudest machines you will have in a shop, but there are some tools that are just as loud. Like a DeWalt benchtop planer or something similar.

[Christopher Charles]

Hi all,

Thanks for the thoughts and feedback. The plan is to have air cool the motor as it goes into the return air box that will be to the left of the motor using a baffle box. The return air opening will be ~12" x 32" with several baffles and lined with the acoustic foam. The overall set up should be very similar to Chris', possibly including the dart board (thanks for posting the pictures!). The aim is to get it down to a manageable roar that doesn't carry into the house enough to disturb everyone else. And would be nice to have the roar low enough that ear protection is not mandatory, which is definitely the case now.

I'm working to build it IKEA style so it'll break down for a move in a couple years if needed. I do plan to add insulation and or some sheet rock on the inside and possibly backside.

I've been plugging away in the evenings and have put on the front frame, torn down the cyclone, cleaned and redone the gaskets. Last night, I punched a hole through for the duct to enter the crate, shown here dry fit with a piece of straight pipe. That'll get replaced with a couple 45s.

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[Christopher Charles]

I plan to keep the main line at 6" until the first split (only about 8 or 10'). I could drop to 5" with a reducer at the first wye and will go 5" after that until I get to each machine. Or I could buy a 6-5-5 wye for $50+. There'll be two branches, each about 20' and only one gate will be open at a time (they're all switched). Any thoughts on whether it's worth it to upgrade the wye from 5-5-5 to 6-5-5? I only want to mess with it once since I don't have the fancy clip lock stuff!

[Aaron Inami]

I don't know your budget, but I would consider running 6" main all the way until the end. Then use 6-6-5 branches when you do your 5" drops. The system uses a 15" impeller and you will still have enough velocity in the 6" main all the way down the line. It will yield more CFM in the long run.

[Christopher Charles]

Thanks Aaron--thats a good idea that I thought about enough to go down a bit of a rabbit hole. Calculated the static pressure loss for a complete switch to 6" compared to keeping all 5" for my longest run using the worksheet here: https://www.woodmagazine.com/figure-...by-the-numbers

For the relatively short runs I've got, I ended up with 2.75" SP loss for 5" and 2.52" SP loss for 6", which is not much given the total static pressure for the system and not worth (to me) the extra ~$150 it would cost for a couple of 6-5-5 wyes and 20 additional feet of 6" pipe it would take to keep the main branch 6". I will definitely keep it to 6" until the first wye though.

[Christopher Charles]

Hi all,

This project is nearly in the bag after taking part of a couple of days off to give it some focused attention.

I added a 'baffle box' to the exhaust, which was a bit of a pain to build in place. My son had ordered a used camera a couple weeks prior and the packing was about ten foam acoustic panels, so that was handy and threw them up with some double-stick. Also was tough to take a decent picture...

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Hopefully you get the idea. The exit is ~3.5x greater in cross section than the intake hose, so _shouldn't_ cause too much back pressure. Plan to compare actual performance with the door open vs. closed and will make the opening bigger if there's a noticeable difference.

The motor was not wired, so added a cord and had planned to keep using my Long Ranger switch box. Sticker says "not to exceed 3hp", yet the the cord for the switch box is only 14 ga. Hmmm. Figured it would work for the short term and I'd keep a sharp eye on it. Worked fine. Twice.

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Third time was not the charm. A pop, no juice and quite a bit of heat and stink when I opened up the switch box. Consistent with the reviews for this unit. Oh well, to the trash it went and I wired up the mag switch box that came with the v3000 (after some head scratching about what went were since some of the wires were loose and there is also a receiver box for a remote start that was not provided when I purchased). I may rewire the blast gate microswitches later, but with the move of the dust collector to the other side of the shop, I'll only be a couple steps away from any of the main machines. And the switch blast gates _may_ have trained me to keep only the one in use open-we'll see!

Finished up the closet and I added a iVac fill sensor light. Seems to work, but haven't put it through the paces yet. Didn't hang the door, just fit with some stops since I won't be in there much and could get a tighter seal. And then was the unfun part of pulling foil tape from nearly all the ducting and redoing, but only have to re-tape and caulk some ducting, tidy some wires and decorate the door.

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The noise reduction on the "crate" is pretty good-about a 4 dB drop from 78 with the door open to 74 with it closed (according to my crappy iPhone ap). Can carry a conversation right next to it in a normal voice. And the new system is a quantum improvement in terms of suction and noise from the old 2 hp ShopFox-super SDD-Wynn filter set up it is replacing-the shop fox is about 86 dB, which definitely involved yelling and was very noticeable throughout the house.

Most importantly, LOML is very pleased-she describes it as a 'pleasant rumble'. If her tune changes, I'll look into adding insulation to the interior of the crate.

Best,
Chris