# Dust Collector Setup Journey



## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Its been long overdue, time to get the dust collection system setup and plumbed in.

I must have pages and pages of layouts, pricing, notes, etc.

Here's what Im going for:

2 stage, using thein baffle above a 55 gal steel drum, into a basic filter bag/plastic bag. All of this plus an air compressor is going to be housed in a "closet" of sorts attached to one of the dividing walls in the shop.

From there it'll angle up along the wall to the ceiling and then run along a 40 foot wall. There will be 4 vertical down branches of piping to various machines (drill press, bandsaw, disk sander, lathe). There will also be a section that turns and then come down in between the table saw and planer all the way down to the ground almost acting as a pillar. At the base of that figured I might as well have a floor sweep. 

Using all soft bends of course, and going to be making all the machine specific end collectors which will give me the best amount to pickup. 

Blast gates are going to be made as well, still cant decide the pro/cons of using a self cleaning vs total enclosed version. 

While I'm doing the dust collection I am also going to piping in a fume extractor that runs off a squirrel cage fan and pulls from the paint booth and also the forge / welding area. 

So follow along as this process gets underway. I'll post pictures as I get updates done on it.


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## difalkner (Nov 27, 2011)

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with because I began doing the same thing and then became inundated with work (not a bad thing!). Modifying the DC will have to wait...

David


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Update:

Was only able to work for a few hours because of opening weekend of duck season but got a little progress done.

The closet is somewhat framed, more to make sure everything fits and how to mount the motor of the dc. 









I used some 3/4" particle board and meticulously layed out the thein baffle design.









The side wall is just some 1/4" ply cut to 6". Had to slowly bend and dampen to keep it from snapping. So little by little and adding water to relax the fibers, I was able to get it to fit in the recess.









There is going to be supports on the inside and outside of the piece using 3/4" metal conduit tubing. It was the best thing I could think of that wouldn't hamper the flow inside. I've recessed the holes at this point, still need to cut and dry fit everything before the big glue up.









Here is how I left it.









Next up is to make a tube that goes from the motor to the top of the baffle. I have an extra 55 gal drum that will be perfect to cut and make a 6" tube out of it.

Once that is all done and casters put on the drum, I will have a finished height of everything and will be able to mount the blower onto the wall. Still need to add some support to the wall though.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Update over thanksgiving weekend.

Got the thein baffle glued up and filler added to clean up the edges. 



























The next issue was connecting the top of the baffle to the intake of the blower. The barrel is on casters and the blower is fixed to the wall, so in order for the baffle/barrel to side out to be cleaned i needed to make a removeable flange to slide out. here is what i came up with. 



















Here is where I ended up this weekend. Still have some filler work to do and finish painting. also need to make the inlet connection for the 4" pipe.



















I was thinking of something yesterday and wanted some input on what you all think. Normally the blower would go to a filterbag/ plastic bag like on most other dust collectors. Ive heard the bags have some issues, so what about instead making a cube of air filters instead. i would still use the plastic bag on the bottom but on top have removable filters just like a air cleaner. I still need to do the math on air flow comparing the size of the bag to the 5 sided cube top using 30 x 30 in filters ( and the multitude of filter types) but i kinda like the idea of removable and washable filters instead of the bag filter.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

So weekend update. 12/16/2019

The inlet to the thein baffle got cut out and glued in place. 










I was able to get a flashlight inside to get the next two pictures showing how the inlet pipe lines up perfectly with the wall of the baffle. This should lessen and issues with turbulent flow and dust piling up in the corners.




















Next up was the hard part of getting the motor mounted at correctly the right height to allow the flange between the motor and thein baffle to seal.










Also needed to make sure everything would fit inside the soon to be boxed in closet. 

Lifting that motor while simultaneously ratcheting in the lag bolts was awful. It was super heavy and one slip meant motor was broken and probably foot along with it. I definitely should have waited for some help or used some sort of mechanical lift but some times you just gotta cross your fingers and do it quick.



















So that its as it sits. Bought all the piping and connectors for the mainline and drops as well as the hangers. I have to add a new 220v line from the panel specifically to the dust collector. I have a line running already but the planer and the dust collector (which is the biggest dust/chip making machine is need sucked up) is too much for the breaker. 

Also while this was all going on I was constructing a new ceiling air filter (the 20" box fan and 3 furnace filter type). I can upload some pictures of that if you want more info. it seems to work very well and getting the small stuff out of the air.


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## John Smith_inFL (Jul 4, 2018)

excellent tutorial !!
thank you for taking the time to document your journey.
hope to see another update in a month or two of how it is working.

.

.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Not a big update but began getting the mainline laid out to where i want the drops to be and securing it to the ceiling joists. Still need to figure out what I'm going to do about blast gates (whether make them or just buy them). Also the cheapest 4" flex hose I've been able to find that has steel coils reinforcement is from harbor freight for 10ft for $15. still need to order those. You can also see in this picture the box fan air cleaner i got installed and has been great for keeping the fine particles from floating around. I've noticed a difference just in the last two weeks with far less fine dust settling on all the horizontal surfaces in the shop.









Been busy with 3 other projects over the holidays. One is a lathe stand for an old (1940s) craftsman lathe. the next is a jointer base cabinet, and last but certainly not least is a router plane I'm making as a late Christmas gift for my dad. I'll be making separate posts for those project pieces.


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## Rider351 (Aug 11, 2018)

Well my DC is almost done. Still some changes to make to take 4" pipe to the mitre station vs 2" PIPE.
The Grizzly 860 is louder than I expected and had to drop new electrical into the garage since the Griz blows the breaker too much. Should have gone with the quieter JET unit but the wife said that was over budget...where have my rights gone????

Anyway, system works good.Still need to come up with a way to catch some of the sawdust that falls under the Dewalt Contractor saw. Still nice to have the dust mess in control.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Rider351 said:


> Well my DC is almost done. Still some changes to make to take 4" pipe to the mitre station vs 2" PIPE.
> The Grizzly 860 is louder than I expected and had to drop new electrical into the garage since the Griz blows the breaker too much. Should have gone with the quieter JET unit but the wife said that was over budget...where have my rights gone????
> 
> Anyway, system works good.Still need to come up with a way to catch some of the sawdust that falls under the Dewalt Contractor saw. Still nice to have the dust mess in control.



Nice looking setup, where does that flex hose to the left of the one entering the cyclone go?

I am trying to avoid the loud noise by having it all in a separate closet of sorts in the shop. 

What I am using for the table saw is just a upside down pyramid made of 1/4 ply with the hose attached to the bottom. They sell black plastic table saw bottom plates for pretty cheap that you might find solves your problem. Unfortunately contractor saws didn't have dust collection in mind like the solid base saws do.


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## 12penny (Nov 21, 2008)

Nice setup. Lots of work and well planned. Have you thought about running a ground wire inside your PVC pipe and running it to ground? Not so much for explosion protection but to eliminate those pesky static shocks. Sometimes they can hurt. Metal ductwork accomplishes the same thing with a simple ground wire from duct to dust collector.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

12penny said:


> Nice setup. Lots of work and well planned. Have you thought about running a ground wire inside your PVC pipe and running it to ground? Not so much for explosion protection but to eliminate those pesky static shocks. Sometimes they can hurt. Metal ductwork accomplishes the same thing with a simple ground wire from duct to dust collector.


Sure did, I'm definitely on the "not gunna cause an explosion" train but its an easy add on to avoid the static zap. Went to the home store and bought 100ft of braided copper bare wire. at this time im just getting all the pipes cut and drops positioned where i want them. Ill add the wire when I go to finally seal the pipe connections.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Well 2 months later and a big update,

Got the wiring for 220v over to where the D/C closet is.










The filter bag has been mounted and connected to the blower.

The main line has been installed along the wall, not all the drops and machine connections are in yet though.










My way of running a ground wire through the system was on the straight pieces run a wire inside from end to end with bolts. On the joints the wire would hop over the connector and attach to the next straight piece. This picture should help get an idea of what I'm trying to describe.










Currently the tubing is just held together with some duct tape, going to go back and silicone and aluminum tape it to seal it.

Then began the testing.

First test was just to see if the thein baffle and blower and filter bag would work, ie not connected to any sort of PVC piping. Well, both the top and bottom filter bags flew right off and made a huge mess of fine dust in the air. Fans, open windows, and me leaving for a while and it was back to testing.

The second test I completely removed the bags and ran it, expecting when I hand fed some table-saw sawdust for it to blow out the end because no filter bag was attached. To my amazement, the thein baffle caught just about all of it. This was great news. I'm sure some super fine dust still made it past the thein baffle but that's what the filter bag is for. I strongly suggest full lung protection while doing this kinda testing.

Third test was to connect it to the PVC mainline and hand feed some sawdust into one of the drop downs. I duct taped a small piece of plywood to the other 3 drop downs to act as temporary closed blast gates. This worked fine and had plenty of suction.

Last test was to crudely hook up just the planer to the system and run through a board. It performed very well and was a sign of great relief after the work I've done.









Next up will be to seal the PVC, install blast gates, flex hose connect to the machines and at sometime enclose the dust collection closet for a little noise reduction.


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## djg (Dec 24, 2009)

How big is your DC motor and blower? I have a 1100 cfm DC and originally a long run like yours. Chip pick up at the end was terrible. I finally cut the system in half. Is your DC sized accordingly to your piping? Maybe you've touched on this already and I missed it.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

djg said:


> How big is your DC motor and blower? I have a 1100 cfm DC and originally a long run like yours. Chip pick up at the end was terrible. I finally cut the system in half. Is your DC sized accordingly to your piping? Maybe you've touched on this already and I missed it.


The picture might be deceiving but it is only 28 ft from end to blower. Although the last drop down is for the drill press so that might be an issue but we will see. As far as sizing everything, the 2Hp grizzly DC was a hand me down, and I went with 4" pvc because I didn't feel like paying for 6". So its gunna be a trial and error kinda thing. Honestly though I have about $100 into it and as long as I can cover the planer , table saw, and disk sander, all the other hookups are just icing on the cake.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

Now that the planer is connected, the next machine to tackle is the table saw. Now I have a 80's era Grizzly saw. I guess you would call it contractors saw, because it has the exposed motor off the back and the bottom is open.

This saw was always unbalanced. When my dad first bought it he bought the right hand extension wing only, he always said he wished he'd gotten both. It would want to tip over to the right if you leaned on the right wing. to combat this i added a base bracing like two big feet that extend to the right. bolted to the saw base this counteracts the tipping motion.









I also added these great leveling feet made out of hockey pucks. Ill make a post about just those sooner or later, there great.










These kind of saws did not have dust collection in mind when they were manufactured. But no problem, little bit of thinking, whole lotta cardboard templates and we now have a solid base that funnels the sawdust to a 4" outlet. 

































Sealed the gaps with asphalt sealant. this is the same stuff i used to seal up my media blasting cabinet. Dries, but doesn't crack once dry. I've had good experiences with it so far.

















But whoa, that would be too easy. we also need to work on covering some of these opening all around the saw, create some more suction to direct the chaos of wood chips when your running it. So a back plate with some magnets that slips between the motor and the saw body, check.

Now where the saw body and the cast iron top meet has some gaps as well, you wouldn't think it because who looks under there, but yea those got filled with spray foam. (pretty curious on how this will work, its either gunna be a home run, or a total failure and pipe clog)









Got some rewiring to do on the saw, wanting a longer plug in cord instead of daisy chaining an extension cord, and then its reassembly and testing. 

Taking the whole table saw apart might have been overkill, but it gave me a excuse to do a deep clean and mechanical maintenance that often times gets overlooked.


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## JDaveB (Mar 1, 2020)

Awesome setup, can't wait to hear how it works when you get done, I'm about to install one myself. Thanks.


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## jeff100 (Nov 20, 2019)

JDaveB said:


> Awesome setup, can't wait to hear how it works when you get done, I'm about to install one myself. Thanks.


As far as the thein baffle goes, it has been great. I've only ran it from the planer so far but not a single chip has made it into the filter bag yet. Well see how that continues with the finer chips/dust from the table saw but it surprised me how efficient that thein baffle was for getting rid of the planer chips.


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