Replaced Harvey G700 with Clearvue EF5

[Kent A Bathurst]

The Harvey is an excellent machine...and I have zero regrets in buying it, especially for the money. I'm just in the shop a lot more now and that one machine is testing it...'cause I like wide boards and that makes for "extra fluffy" stuff!

So if my machine volume is modest by comparison, and will be [hours] 85% bandsaw and 15% joint/plane [I may even outsource those steps] the Harvey would be in my wheelhouse.

I'll have moved in range by the end of the year, and looking at this issue 2Q 2025. Hold out til I get there. We'll talk

[Mike Rambour]

well darn...I was thinking of getting rid of V series Oneida and going with the Harvey. The Oneida is taking up too much floor space and I considered moving it outside but to keep below roof line, I would have to go to a smaller dust bin. Also didn't like the idea of putting a big hole in the garage wall for the ducting. The Harvey, I have a spot for under a tall bench so it would free up space AND to me quite importantly be quieter. But reading here, some are not happy with the Harvey on some tools I use a lot.

[Jim Becker]

Mike, the Harvey is a good unit and performs well within its capabilities. Where Brian (and I) are coming from is that things get less desirable for "big" tools that produce a ton of material and/or big, fluffy stuff. (there's that word again I keep using. LOL) Brian's shop with the new machine has grown quickly with big tools and he does production work. I like wide boards, even though I do only a tiny fraction of the amount of work that Brian does, so that's come into play because of how my jointer/thicknesser works. I really can fill the bins very quickly. The Harvey performs extremely well for every tool in my shop other than the jointer/thicknesser and to keep things real, the small cyclone I started out with in 2000 had a similar issue which is why I upgraded to a bigger one a couple years later. I think if I had a spiral/helical head, other than volume, there'd be no reason for me to even consider a change, honestly. So don't write the G700 off without carefully considering how you use your tools and what kind of material you prefer to work with. It's a good value for the money and the performance is good...they actually do provide fan curves like Oneida which is rare from what is more of a mass marketer.

[Brian Holcombe]

well darn...I was thinking of getting rid of V series Oneida and going with the Harvey. The Oneida is taking up too much floor space and I considered moving it outside but to keep below roof line, I would have to go to a smaller dust bin. Also didn't like the idea of putting a big hole in the garage wall for the ducting. The Harvey, I have a spot for under a tall bench so it would free up space AND to me quite importantly be quieter. But reading here, some are not happy with the Harvey on some tools I use a lot.

Mike,

Between the V system and the Harvey, the V-system is much better. One of many issues I have with the Harvey is that you have to run the Duct either at floor level or you have to commit at least one 90 degree elbow almost immediately.

One of the biggest things to avoid is turning the air directly before the impeller, with a cyclone inlet at ceiling level or near ceiling level it's much easier to have a straight shot into the DC so that the dust has some speed.

The biggest issue was that I feel the CFM was too low. I could not get it to collect well off the shaper or the planer. The planer has a huge plenum but the shaper does not, it has a normal sized hood. When running the shaper I would get sprayed with dust constantly and have to vacuum up the shop afterward.

Actual sawdust or sanding dust is probably fine but shavings would flow into the filter and clog the filter (which is a compounding problem once it starts) I had to clear the filter after every bag, often multiple times per bag and Harvey told me I should be replacing the filters after 6mo of use. By comparison my Oneida filter is probably 10 years old and I blow it out every few months, the system continues to work even when the filter is pretty clogged.

Overall, the footprint difference depends a lot on situation, in my shop the Harvey took up much more space than my oneida V series and also the EF5 because of how weird the layout was.

The EF5 is really impressive, I have more than an optimal number of 90 degree turns on the route to the planer and the shavings coming out of planer are moving very fast.

[John Pendery]

Brian, slightly off topic, so I apologize to go off on a tangent. What brand of pneumatic clamps are you using on your shaper tenoning table? I have the same Panhans table on one of my shapers, and I’ve been wanting to add air clamps. I’ve browsed through Festo’s website, but thought I’d ask as I like your setup!

[Chris Parks]

I installed a CV Max the plastic version of Brians cyclone in a small commercial workshop and using a VFD we wound up the motor speed to increase the air flow and it worked very well. The workshop has a 24" straight blade thicknesser and that quickly became a huge problem as the volume of material coming off the thicknesser filled a drum so quickly it was killing the work flow so the owners re-installed the bag unit that we had removed. I suspect if the thicknesser had a segmented head the problem could have been managed but sadly that wasn't the case. We tried adding a Y piece under the cyclone outlet and then adding a second drum but that still wasn't enough capacity to prevent having to stop work and change drums which were 205 litre. The intention was to use 205 litre plastic drums with lids held on by a steel band and the drums were taken away by a local farmer emptied and returned and when he returned there were more drums ready to go. If the thicknesser was not used the system worked well but that was not always the case

[Brian Holcombe]

Brian, slightly off topic, so I apologize to go off on a tangent. What brand of pneumatic clamps are you using on your shaper tenoning table? I have the same Panhans table on one of my shapers, and I’ve been wanting to add air clamps. I’ve browsed through Festo’s website, but thought I’d ask as I like your setup!

No worries, I made the clamps for the shaper tenoning table, the cylinder is from Bimba and the table mounted setup is from a motion company called SMC. They both work great, on another machine I made sure to use the identical cylinder diameters on all of the air clamps so that I could use one regulator to control the entire thing.

[Jim Becker]

I installed a CV Max the plastic version of Brians cyclone in a small commercial workshop and using a VFD we wound up the motor speed to increase the air flow and it worked very well. The workshop has a 24" straight blade thicknesser and that quickly became a huge problem as the volume of material coming off the thicknesser filled a drum so quickly it was killing the work flow so the owners re-installed the bag unit that we had removed. I suspect if the thicknesser had a segmented head the problem could have been managed but sadly that wasn't the case. We tried adding a Y piece under the cyclone outlet and then adding a second drum but that still wasn't enough capacity to prevent having to stop work and change drums which were 205 litre. The intention was to use 205 litre plastic drums with lids held on by a steel band and the drums were taken away by a local farmer emptied and returned and when he returned there were more drums ready to go. If the thicknesser was not used the system worked well but that was not always the case

Sounds like for your shop to use a cyclone you'll need to have an airlock system with a a large bin, either "right there" if space allows or with a large bin elsewhere, such as outside, with a distribution blower to empty the airlock. (The airlock and distribution blower are synced)

[John Pendery]

No worries, I made the clamps for the shaper tenoning table, the cylinder is from Bimba and the table mounted setup is from a motion company called SMC. They both work great, on another machine I made sure to use the identical cylinder diameters on all of the air clamps so that I could use one regulator to control the entire thing.

Thanks, Brian. I’ll take a look at those cylinders and SMC components. I have the airtight setup on my sliding table saw and love them, but am getting tired of moving them from one machine to another. I’m interested in at least looking into the prospect of making up some of my own. While it works, the eccentric hold down clamp is the weak link on the Panhans shaper table.

When you say you use one regulator to control the entire thing, do you mean you have foregone dedicated regulators at your machines and feed them from one central regulator that branches out to each machine?

As always, very nice work!

[Brian Holcombe]

Thank you!

Sounds good! Mac’s stuff is top tier for sure.

I have a main regulator on the compressor, then a regulator at each machine. On this machine I didn’t want to split off from there into multiple regulators for each clamp as it is more complicated than planning around a standardized bore for the clamps. I have a 1.5” bore on the Bimba clamp and a 25mm on the SMC but on later iterations of this same idea I went to a 1.5” bore on everything.

I had the eccentric clamp for a while but it slows things down a ton and doesn’t hold as well.

[John Pendery]

Ok that makes more sense than what I thought you might have meant. I might make a feeble attempt to duplicate your set up there if you don’t mind!

I spoke to Mac a while back, and I think he makes a setup specific to that bolt on sliding table, but if I had Mac’s clamps everywhere I wanted them I think I’d have to file for bankruptcy! They are worth every penny though as his stuff really is outstanding.

Yeah the eccentric clamp is a bit of a drag when doing a bunch of parts. It might be my imagination but I swear it loosens a bit under repeated heavy use.

Thanks again for the tips! Running both clamps on the shaper with one regulator is a great idea!