# Venting to the outside?



## Woodified (Mar 19, 2016)

I'm looking into buying a dust collection cyclone system for my small shop. I'm stuck on whether or not to vent the system to the outside vs buying the large filter. My shop is in my basement and is heated with the homes central ducted heat pump, there are no gas burning systems in the house. I like the idea of sending all the fine particles outside; However, I'm worried about sending all my heated air from my shop and the rest of the house outside with the fines.

Is venting to the outdoors realistic for a heated shop? Does anyone have a heated and/or cooled shop that your dust collector is vented outdoors?


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## _Ogre (Feb 1, 2013)

> Is venting to the outdoors realistic for a heated shop?


i'm gonna go out on a limb and say no
here in michigan, it would be financial suicide
even in florida on the rare day you have the heat on it would chill your house down to ambient temp fast


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## Steve Neul (Sep 2, 2011)

Sounds like you either need to buy or rig an air purifier to remove the airborne particles. If you are cramped for space you could draw the air out of the shop, through a filtration system and then put the air back in the basement. The dust collector is just for larger particles. The fine dust that is a problem will go right through the dust collector filter bag.


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## furnacefighter15 (Jun 21, 2020)

Im in chicago. My dust collector vents outside. 

Few questions: How often are you running the shop? 

How many CFM of collection? Take the rating and cut that by 65% and thats what your gonna realistically be able to flow.

If its a typical 2 to 3 HP collector, its no different then venting your kitchen stove outdoors.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## redeared (Feb 7, 2019)

I vent my dust and VOC outside from my basement, I think it is about 500cfm with a 4" dryer hoses with blast gates between the drier and shop. Works fine for me and the wife doesn't complain about the smell upstairs, keep in mind it only setup for airborne dust not individual equipment I use the shop vac for that.


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## HoytC (Dec 30, 2019)

Woodified said:


> ...Is venting to the outdoors realistic for a heated shop?



Where are you located? That makes a difference.


Be sure you have an air inlet in your shop. You probably don't want to be trying to suck air from the rest of the house through whatever leaks you might have.


Cost depends on what kind of temperature difference you are trying to maintain. You will lose about one BTU per hour per cfm for each degree F temperature difference. For example, 68F inside and 38F outside at 500CFM is about 30x500 = 15,000 BTU/hr heat loss. At $15 per million BTU that's about $0.23 per hour. Your cost per BTU I'm sure is different, but should be in the same range.


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## NoThankyou (Mar 21, 2018)

Simple math. 

1500 Square feet of house
1250 Feet per minute of dust collector
It will exchange the air volume of the houses in less than 10 minutes. That is what you are dealing with. Nothing is perfect, so make that 20 minutes. It doesn't really matter you are still going to lose the heat in the volume of air. 

So build yourself a closet to fit the dust collector with good size furnace vents in the wall and door. Any un-trapped or loose dust will be in the closet. If you build a 33 gallon trash can separator, you can leave that outside the closet. 

When I'm in the shop, heavy. I empty the trash can part about once a month and the fine particle bag about once a year or so.


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## Woodified (Mar 19, 2016)

Steve Neul said:


> Sounds like you either need to buy or rig an air purifier to remove the airborne particles. If you are cramped for space you could draw the air out of the shop, through a filtration system and then put the air back in the basement. The dust collector is just for larger particles. The fine dust that is a problem will go right through the dust collector filter bag.


Thanks Steve. I have an air cleaner unit and a mobile cart with a shopvac with a small cyclone however I'd like something tucked in a corner of my shop so I'm not dancing around the cart, stepping over the hose, and power cable.


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## Steve Neul (Sep 2, 2011)

Woodified said:


> Thanks Steve. I have an air cleaner unit and a mobile cart with a shopvac with a small cyclone however I'd like something tucked in a corner of my shop so I'm not dancing around the cart, stepping over the hose, and power cable.


The unit will draw air regardless of where it's located. You might put the air cleaner on a shelf on the wall out of the way.


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## Woodified (Mar 19, 2016)

HoytC said:


> Where are you located? That makes a difference.


Nova Scotia. It gets cold in the winter


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## Woodified (Mar 19, 2016)

furnacefighter15 said:


> Im in chicago. My dust collector vents outside.
> 
> Few questions: How often are you running the shop?


Mostly just on the weekends


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## FrankC (Aug 24, 2012)

How would you feel if your neighbour dumped raw sewage in your yard?

My guess is probably the same as they feel with you polluting the air they breathe, you may like the idea of sending the fine particles outside, I doubt they feel the same way.

Pollution is pollution, act responsibly!


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## redeared (Feb 7, 2019)

Wow that was a little extreme, It's not like we are operating a chemical factory or a sawmill in our shops. Or should everyone install micron air filters and make their shops air tight so no VOC's escape?.
There are always fine particles in the air, it is called nature, my compost pile releases ammonia, CO2, and probably some methane. Every leaf and tree that falls in a forest, or swamp produces the same.


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## FrankC (Aug 24, 2012)

If those particles aren't doing any harm why blow them out of your shop in the first place?


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## Tool Agnostic (Aug 13, 2017)

I would like to understand this issue better.

Clearly, breathing sawdust is very harmful. Sawdust is also annoying if it gets on your things and you have to clean it up. Obviously your neighbors don't want to breathe your sawdust, nor do they want to clean off your sawdust that lands on their stuff. Obviously, if you live in an urban or suburban neighborhood where neighbors are close together, you shouldn't blow the sawdust outside your shop where it can impact your neighbors.

What if you live in a rural area where the nearest neighbor is far away and would not be directly affected by your sawdust? Is ordinary sawdust a significant environmental pollutant?


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*I think I get the issue here ....*



FrankC said:


> If those particles aren't doing any harm why blow them out of your shop in the first place?



It has to do with particle size and concentration unless I'm all wet. The finest particles are the most harmful, especially in concentrated doses like a closed shop atmosphere. If they are large enough to see get deposited on the neighbor's Corvette, you would have a problem. If not, probably no cause for concern. My nearest neighbor is 200 ft or so away, but I still collect my dust in a DC and compost it back to "modified" earth with no "ill" effect or calls from the EPA. 

Walnut dust is harmful to horses for some reason, so do not mix that with any other sawdust, especially for animal bedding.

I think if you turned out your bedroom lights and held a bright flashlight upwards, then shook the bedding on your bed you would see a constellation of dust particles in the air. So, best not make any sudden movements in the bedroom just to be safe ........lest you disturb neighbors.
:|


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## GeorgeC (Jul 30, 2008)

This thread has gotten rather ridiculous. 



George


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

*Of course George !*

But you need to have a sense of humor or it's just isn't any fun.:wink:




GeorgeC said:


> This thread has gotten rather ridiculous.
> 
> 
> 
> George


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## redeared (Feb 7, 2019)

My vent is just for the very fine airborne matter, saw dust that I vacuum up gets composted, its not like raw sewage on someones lawn


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## ChuckBarnett (Jan 5, 2013)

woodnthings said:


> *I think I get the issue here ....*
> ...Walnut dust is harmful to horses for some reason, so do not mix that with any other sawdust, especially for animal bedding.


I was not aware that Walnut dust is an animal hazard. So what do you do, dump things and run a separate batch of sawdust, etc when working with Walnut?


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## TimPa (Jan 27, 2010)

OP you can put a diverter on your output, where you can select if it is going outside, or back into the room. then you can choose depending on the weather and what you are doing at the time...

fwiw, probably with 5' of the house, 99% of the particulates have fallen from the air.


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## woodnthings (Jan 24, 2009)

ChuckBarnett said:


> I was not aware that Walnut dust is an animal hazard. So what do you do, dump things and run a separate batch of sawdust, etc when working with Walnut?


Only if you raise horses, but to be certain look up walnut dust to see if it's "toxic" to compost in vegetable gardens. I kinda think once it's totally composted, it may not be harmful .... I donno? If you do "dump", it probably best to dispose of it in the trash pickup.
Some folks, old school, have used one leg of a woman's pany hose on the discharge outlet of the clothes dryer vents, so why not on the dust collector?


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