Dust Extractor - Advice Plz

[Nahil.R]

I currently work in a room that's around 8 x 4 meters (around 26 x 13 ft) so its pretty cramped in here and can get very dusty so I am basically in a mask most of the time I am building.

I have no idea about extraction systems but was wondering what recommendations you all have. An ideal setup for me would be a relatively small system that doesn't need to be linked with a duct to the outside (if such a thing exists).

Any help and recommendations would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,

Nahil.

[printer2]

I want great hp, I want it efficient and I want it cheap.

Kind of like having a good dust collector that is effective, small and efficient (not ducting it outside).

[charles Tauber]

There are several stages to dust control. The first stage is to capture dust where it is created, as it is created. For hand-held tools like orbital sanders, one can purchase tools that have a port to be attached to a portable dust collector, often referred to as a "shop vac" after the brand of that name. They are available in a wide variety of sizes, shapes, noise-levels and prices. This is one of many examples: https://www.amazon.ca/Shop-Vac-59893...0828722&sr=8-5. Shop vac's usually have relatively low air flow compared to other means of collecting dust. At one extreme, their noise level is on-par with a jet aircraft engine, 120 dB, while at the other extreme, relatively quiet at 70 dB.

I recently purchased a hand-sanding block made by Mirka that is designed to attach to a shop vac. It reduces the airborne dust due to hand sanding to near zero.

Another option for collecting dust at its source is a down-draft table. It probably is not very practical for a very small shop due to the amount of space a down-draft table consumes. Essentially, a down-draft table is a rectangular box with holes in its top surface. Work is placed on the top surface and a vacuum is attached to the box to draw air through the holes in the top surface. As it does so, it draws with it dust created from sanding or similar operations. This is a pretty typical arrangement: https://www.amazon.ca/Grizzly-T10115...0830697&sr=8-2.

For some stationary machinery, such as bandsaws, sanders, table saws, etc. one can attach a shop vac, but the relatively low air flow makes them relatively poor at capturing much of the dust. The typical air hose size of 2" is smaller than the relatively common 4" diameter dust port on many such machines, though a reducer can be used to make the 2" hose attach to a 4" or 6" dust port. What is often used for such machinery is a canister-style dust collector. They come in portable units - on wheels - and larger stationary units that sit outside or in a corner. In either case, the dust collector is attached to the machinery via a flexible hose or rigid, dedicated ducting.

This is one example of a typical probable unit: https://cdn-1.mysagestore.com/d649c6...C/KC-3109C.jpg

Canister dust collectors are usually rated in terms of how much air they move, often in cubic feet per minute (CFM) or litres per minute. How much air flow you need depends upon the type of machine, the length of hose or ducting, how many and what type of flow direction (gates) and other factors. Canister collectors usually have 4" or 6" (or approximate metric equivalent) diameter ports for similarly sized hose.

Canister dust collectors do not need to be vented to the outdoors, instead including their own dust filters. The larger industrial units can be very loud and are often situated in isolation or outside, away from primary work areas.

The last stage in dust collection is an air cleaner that contains air filters for trapping airborne dust particles. These are used to clean the air in a room, rather than collect the dust at its source. These are usually stationary units, often rectangular boxes, that can be hung from the ceiling or similar location. They, too, are usually rated in how much air they move (filter) in a given time (e.g. CFM). Sizing one is based upon the volume of air in your shop that you want to filter, and how often you want the unit to filter the entire air volume. For example, if you have a shop with 100 cubic feet of volume and you buy a unit that moves 10 cubic feet per minute, in 10 minutes it will have filtered the volume of air in your shop. In other words, it will filter the air volume 6 times per hour.

This is a typical example of an air cleaner: https://www.amazon.ca/JET-708620B-Fi...0829884&sr=8-4.

My shop is not too much larger than yours. I have a shop vac that I attach to hand held tools, such as sanders, routers, etc. I have a portable canister dust collector (600 CFM) with a long 4" diameter hose that I wheel around and connect to bandsaws, tablesaw, jointer, thickness sander, lathe, etc. I also have a ceiling-mounted air cleaner that is, if memory serves we correctly, about 400 CFM. Depending upon what I am doing, I will also wear a dust mask. That combination keeps the dust pretty well under control in my shop.

[mirwa]

My wood work room which has bandsaw/tablesaws/belt sanders, thicknessers, spindle moulders etc etc is 30ft long by 15ft wide.

I have one large extraction unit, with 5 micron filters it is connected to all machines via solid and flexible ducting and I open and close a waste gate at each machine as I need to use it

The room also has two overhead air filtration units which filter the air to 1 micron, I still cough my guts up if I dont wear a mask, joys of long term exposure makes you extra sensitive.

No matter what you put in place nothing beats personal protection.

I recently bought a self contained air hood that is a face shield and filter unit and swear by it.

Steve

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by mirwa

I still cough my guts up if I dont wear a mask, joys of long term exposure makes you extra sensitive.

Ditto.

I recently bought a self contained air hood that is a face shield and filter unit and swear by it.

I have a 3M Airstream version that I've quite liked. Essentially, it is a hardhat with a shroud to which a motor and fan delivers filtered air. However, it is quite loud given that the fan and motor are in the hardhat - the massive, heavy, expensive battery is worn at the waist.



I wear earplugs or ear muffs when using it. In the last year, I've developed ringing in my ears. It is made worse when using the Airstream, which I use mostly when using the lathe. I've been tempted to try the other brand that has the motor and filters mounted at one's waist.

What brand/model do you have?

[mirwa]

Originally Posted by charles Tauber

What brand/model do you have?

It was expensive, but well worth it, I also use it when buffing guitars, riniging in your ears is Tinnitus, I started getting that over 24years ago, you get use to it .

https://www.carbatec.com.au/airshield-pro-respirator

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by mirwa

It was expensive, but well worth it,

The Trend Airshield Pro is about 1/2 the price of a new 3M, although I bought mine "reconditioned" for somewhat less than new. There are a couple of newer brands that are equally expensive.

[Nahil.R]

Thanks guys for the very detailed responses!

[printer2]

The thing is the more convenient and small the dust collector the less it will filter the real small particles that can pass through the dust collector. Seems the guys still use PPE to protect themselves.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by printer2

The thing is the more convenient and small the dust collector the less it will filter the real small particles that can pass through the dust collector.

Not necessarily. For example, I have a "shop vac" with a HEPA filter rated to capture particle size down to 1 micron or less.

Seems the guys still use PPE to protect themselves.

Yes. Hearing and breathing. For some things, face shield, gloves and smock or apron.

However, some machines/tools produce huge quantities of dust and some effective form of dust collection at the source is essential else one would be working in a literal cloud of dust, not to mention the dust settling as a thick layer coating everything in the shop. A cloud of dust can also be a fire hazard.

There is a lot to be said for hand tools in that they produce very little dust and noise and, generally, don't require much in the way of protective equipment.

[tadol]

A good air cleaner - essentially a variable speed fan in a box with a filter on the intake - is a really good thing to have. Especially of you are not trying to bring fresh outside air into your workspace. The finer the filters you use, the more frequently you need to check/replace them, especially if you’re serious about getting down to single digit microns. A good and very effective practice is to get a respirator face mask that is extremely comfortable and fits well, and get used to wearing it most all the time - if your wife has to ask you to take it off when you come in for dinner, you’ve found it -

[Nahil.R]

Originally Posted by tadol

A good air cleaner - essentially a variable speed fan in a box with a filter on the intake - is a really good thing to have. Especially of you are not trying to bring fresh outside air into your workspace. The finer the filters you use, the more frequently you need to check/replace them, especially if you’re serious about getting down to single digit microns. A good and very effective practice is to get a respirator face mask that is extremely comfortable and fits well, and get used to wearing it most all the time - if your wife has to ask you to take it off when you come in for dinner, you’ve found it -

Hahaha, still single so I can walk around in a space suit if i had too LOL.

I should add that most of my 'dusty' work is limited to just sanding mostly and using a dremel moto-saw .... so there isn't a significant amount, the problem is it covers everything in the room with a fine layer of dust. I still do not have a thickness sander or bandsaw so dust is not at such an extreme.

I am thinking I could probably get away with using a shop vac and some sort of mask?

What do you think?

[printer2]

I have one of the portable dust collectors with the canvas bag to collect the dust. It moves a lot of air and can get bigger chips from routers and table saws. The down side is that they do not grab the smaller particles which then get circulated in the room. I am at odds with this. I did not know of the hepa filters for the shop vac, I can see it as being sufficient for a lot of what I do. Could live with the noise of a shop vac, I am a great believer of wearing hearing protection. I used to use an old household canister vacuum cleaner to collect the dust from my home made thickness sander. It caught all but the bigger particles and those I could just brush together and clean up. It could also collect the fines off the bandsaw and router, which are the problem ones that float away.

[charles Tauber]

Originally Posted by printer2

I have one of the portable dust collectors with the canvas bag to collect the dust. It moves a lot of air and can get bigger chips from routers and table saws. The down side is that they do not grab the smaller particles which then get circulated in the room. I am at odds with this.

I have the same type. It was a "freebie" when I purchased my thickness sander. I use it for at-the-souce dust collection and use a room air cleaner to catch airborne finer dust particles. When necessary, I also wear a dust mask. There are newer canister types that have better filtration and are easier to clean.

I did not know of the hepa filters for the shop vac, I can see it as being sufficient for a lot of what I do. Could live with the noise of a shop vac, I am a great believer of wearing hearing protection.

Festool makes a HEPA filter "dust extractor". It is intended to be attached directly to tools - particularly their tools - and isn't really a "shop vac" as such. Like the rest of their tools, they are expensive, but work well. When attached to their - or Mirka's - tools they provide near 100% dust extraction. There are likely other dust extractors and/or shop vacs that offer HEPA filtration.

A variety of shop vacs are now made that are relatively quiet, in the 70 dB range. (Fein, which claims 60 dB, isn't. It is low 70's.)

In the old days, little thought was given to designing machines and power tools with dust management. These days, many machines and power tools come with built-in mechanisms to facilitate dust collection. For me, inclusion of some effective means of managing dust is one of the criteria I use in choosing tools. So, one way of managing dust is to use tools that are designed to facilitate doing so.

I used to use an old household canister vacuum cleaner to collect the dust from my home made thickness sander.

I used to use a shop vac to collect dust from my home made thickness sander. It was terribly inadequate and isn't a practice I recommend. I used to use a lot of ebony for backs and sides and after a session of thickness sanding it, I'd look like a coal miner. I became so sensitized to ebony dust that if someone as much as took a piece of ebony and ran a sanding block across it once, I'd start sneezing from the opposite side of the room.

[tadol]

You can get away with holding your breath, or running a breathing tube to the outside. But as you note - a fine layer of dust tends to start covering everything, and that will pretty much happen no matter what kind of vacuum you use - and I would emphasize, the better the filtration (the smaller the particles it can remove) the more frequently the filtration unit will need changing, and the more expensive it will be. It’s one reason why layered filters can be nice - the coarser (cheaper) filters can be replaced more frequently and cheaply.

But a good shop vac, attached to tools or strapped in place to pick up the great majority of your chips and larger particles, will do a great job. Even with a HEPA filter though, you’ll get a fair bit of dust and particles into your general environment, which is where having an air cleaner running can help pick up all that, making your shop generally cleaner, and you may even notice you’re breathing easier when working, even if you aren’t running power tools or sanding. I only realized this when I found one of these units used, and mounted it my shop just to give it a try - it made a huge difference, and when I saw how filthy the filters got in a relatively short period of time, made me realize how much my dust collector and shop vacs were missing. I now have 2 of these units, one in my power tool room and one in my general shop.

I’d get a good shop vac first, but then I’d look into buying (or building!) a nice air cleaner - no affiliation, but this one looks decent -

https://ibuildit.ca/projects/shop-air-cleaner/