Project specific question about vertical proportions

[Scott Winners]

I am going to have to commit not later than tomorrow night.

I think I know which one I prefer, and I think I know why, but talk me out of it if you can.

What I am building is a floor standing air filter for my shop. It is going to be overkill for sawdust in my 288sqft hand tool shop, but it is sized about right for severe seasonal wildfire smoke in 900sqft apartment + shop space. More than adequate for woodworking over the winter, adequate for having hazardous outdoor air quality in my front yard next summer.

Basic concept is a vertical double square that could hold 8 furnace filters, two on each side, with a box fan on the top blowing upwards. In reality two of the filter spaces will be blanked with 20x20 inch plywood squares so the unit can be backed up against a wall with no loss of filtration capacity. This is my second build of one of these.

With outdoor PM2.5 counts upwards of 300mcg/m3 I should have no trouble maintaining indoor PM2.5 counts under 25 mcg/m3.

So I have pics of two design possibilities on my dining room floor. 1) Can you even tell them apart? If you have a preference, do you like the one with my feet showing at the bottom of the pic, or no feet?

Thanks. I will share other information in the next couple days, but proportion is really all about impressions.

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[Scott Winners]

Not the busiest sub section of the forum to be sure.

The only difference in the 2 pics is the height of the center plywood panel. The basic vertical increment here is 5 inches. The horizontal members, the 1x2 furring strip, the 'blades' if you will have an actual height around 1.5 inches.

So from either end towards the middle it is blade, 5" panel, blade, 20 inch filter, blade, center panel.

As stacked up with feet showing, the height of the center panel is seven inches. I was kinda hoping for a ten inch tall center panel, but I can't do that from the current stash of furring strip. I could go to maybe 7.25 with the stock I have, but not a whole number ratio.

7 related to 5 is a whole number ratio, but it isn't used much at all that I can see. I did draw one up, "a square and two fifths." It looks not bad. It looks strong, but not graceful. To my eye.

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But I don't love it.

The other picture, without feet, the center panel is 6.5 inches tall, the same as one increment plus one blade width. It seems more familiar to me. This technique is used right regular on western chests of drawers where the deeper drawers towards the bottom of the casework are often the depth of the shallow drawers plus one or two or even three blades widths on tall enough cases with enough drawers to make all the steps.

I have to sharpen my carcass saw before I get back to work on this thing, but it is going 3D tomorrow.