I’m tired of tripping over shopvacs so I’m ready to take the plunge and get a dust collector. The Harbor Freight 2hp unit looks good to me. My shop is in a walk-out basement. To manage the fine dust issue I am thinking of running a 4″ hose through the wall and locating the DC outside. This will put the noise outside as well as the fine dust. I live in New Hampshire so exposure to weather will be an issue. I imagine I can build a sort of mini shed to protect the DC from rain and snow.
Good idea? Bad idea? Comments and input are welcome.
Lance
Replies
Dear Rec,
I am south of you here in CT, so we get the cold, just for not as long. Well, when it used to get cold anyway! I think that is a good set up. I have my cyclone inside and have the exhaust piped outside, but it I had to do it again, I would put the whole deal outside, in a dedicated "area". DCs aren't cheap, so I wouldn't skimp on the enclosure. I have had my DC sitting idle, in an unheated shop, for months at a time, go in, fir it up cold, with no problems, so being "outside" should be about the same. The other plus, with a remote location, is that all of the dust is now outside the shop. With my setup, I have to open up the dust bin, in the shop and carry it outside, which after the 300th time, seems a bit dumb. The only plus about having it inside the shop is that I can easily see when the DC needs emptying, but overall, I think that is a good setup.
Best,
John
Although freezing temps isn't a problem here in northern CA I located my 3hp dust collector in an extension to a shed outside my shop. Did it to save space in the shop and keep the noise to a minimum. I insulated the shed to reduce the noise that neighbors might otherwise hear. Works great. Only issue is the tendency to forget to occaisonally forget to check the collector bags....out of sight....out of mind! Made for a few messy clean-ups over the last 6 or 7 years. On the positive side I have more space in the shop and the unit is extremely quiet both in the shop and in the neighborhood.
Joe
Lance,
If you heat your shop then you should try and reroute the cleaned air from the externalised extractor back in to the shop, otherwise you will throwing away a lot of expensive heat.
Lataxe
I agree with you completly but you must know you will be drawing down upon you the wrath of He Who Knows All and his minions for that statement.
(I really am going to bed ....really I am...no really....)
Since the house is on fire let us warm ourselves. ~Italian Proverb
Lataxe,
Good point about the heat, that did occur to me. If I do try to return the air to the shop that gets me into 1 micron (or less) filtering. The additional cost and maintenance of fine filters is something I would like to avoid. I guess I can just see how bad a problem it is. If 10 minutes of DC useage sucks all the heat out of the shop that is going to be a problem.
Lance
Lance,
That darn money is a nuisance, isn't it. I often wonder who's got the million quid I could use and therefore should have. :-)
My sucker does 1000 cubic metres per hour. That would exchange the air in my (admittedly small) shed after just 3 minutes, were it to vent outside.
The cost of the 0.5 micron filter was about $200 (£110). How soon would I use up that much electricity to reheat the shed, say 50% of my shed time (ie in cold weather) if I didn't need the filter because the sucker was elsewhere? It would probably take quite a while, I suppose.
On the other hand, if the sucker was on for a significant time in the shed, the heater wouldn't be able to catch up. Then again, the heater is really to keep the humidity down as much as the temperature up. I can always put a coat on.
Oh, these financial equations are all too difficult!
Lataxe, in a warm but sometimes noisy shed.
Dear Rec,
Lataxe, makes a good point. In my set up, I exhaust outside with no filter, just the cyclone. I do end up pumping out quite a bit of heat, so I try to group together my machining at times when I am not gluing. I heat with wood, so it takes a bit to bring the shop up to temp and keep it there for gluing. A couple of on/off cycles aren't too bad, but a half hour cools the shop quite a bit. One thing I do to try minimize heat loss is to crack open a window near the machine that I am operating so that I am (hopefully) drawing some cold air into the DC and not just my heated air. If you keep the DC outside, if you run a cyclone, you could pipe back into your house to a filtered setup, to avoid losing heat. In a " bag over bag" (my term) setup, I'm not sure how you would do it although I'm sure there is a way.Best,John
John,
I would be more worried about pulling CO and other dangerous fumes/gasses from the wood stove as you would be creating a negative pressure in the shop and keeping the stove from venting properly.
CO poisoning.....this could explain a lot. ;o)Regard it as just as desirable to build a chicken house as to build a cathedral. Frank Lloyd Wright
Dear Ren,
That occurred to me as well, but my shop is drafty enough that make up air is not a problem, for extended DC use, I typically open one of the overhead doors a bit by resting it on 2x stock. I've test run the the DC with everything closed up and the stove in various states including having the front doors open and I draw exactly zero from the flue. Even with a fire going and the doors open, there is no change in the fire. Still, I make it a practice to at least crack a window, when I first open up shop no matter what the temp. "just in case". How about you? Do you ever have issues with clogging your furnace filter or dryer? Speaking of which, do you have make up air for those two bad boys? A lot of homes don't, but I think that they make good sense. I have my oil burner piped so that it pulls directly from outside. That way, I am not sending "inside" air up the chimney and possible CO or back puffs are reduced.Best,John
Same method - window or door cracked.Regard it as just as desirable to build a chicken house as to build a cathedral. Frank Lloyd Wright
Lance, what you propose will work just fine and you can also pipe well-filtered return air back into the basement using a small exhaust fan. The main thing is to prevent dampness on the bags or pleated filter elements. My concern is more to your intent to use 4" ducting to the DC. This small diameter ducting is woefully inadequate and will unnecesarily increase the static pressure and reduce cfms. You should consider at least a 6" main line if you want to achieve the full potential of the larger impeller.
Doug
I agree with Doug: avoid the 4" hose and use rigid that's at least 6"; minimizing static pressure is always a goal with DC systems, and extending the distance to your DC with flex hose will only exacerbate the problem.
You also might want to think about adding a blast gate to block outside air from entering your shop through the ductwork when the DC isn't running.
Good luck,-Jazzdogg-
"Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive." Gil Bailie
You definitely should recycle the filtered air back into the shop and not rely on "crack the window" or "2x under the door" active type solutions, or even the "it is drafty enough..." Conditions change, heat is added, A/C is put in, etc. I have been in shops where someone (thinking themselves enlightened) sealed up the make up air and the d/c sucked the gas fumes down the chimney (path of least resistance), into the shop and damn near asphyxiated us all. The tell was that it took two hands to open the out swing door! The person that almost killed us and most of the fellow cretins in the shop did not even understand how it happened, even after it was explained to them!
Once you condition the air any way - dry it, wet it, heat or cool it; then run it thru the d/c filters and back into the shop and the pressures are balanced, no fumes to deal with, no active remedial steps need to be taken, and anybody can work anytime, safely and securely. Just because it is a hobby doesn't mean it doesn't matter.
Dave S
I just finished building my exterior shed dust collector system. I brought the ports, (4) up through the wood floor. The noise is much less although the sound does come in through the ports more than I thought. The door for my shed needed to be vented to let out the air when my unit is on, (3 horse, double bag).
Blair
Blair,
What did you use to build the shed? I'll be building my shed on a concrete slab and right next to the house. It's also underneath my deck so the location is pretty sheltered already. I'm thinking I will put the DC up on concrete blocks. For the shed itself, I'm planning on exterior grade plywood painted with exterior house paint. I thought I'd put louvers in the shed door for exhaust ventilation.
Lance
I did build the front door with slats that are open. I used all redwood (because I had it) but matched the rest to the building. My shop is not connected to my house but I built it to match the other buildings. I used Hardy boards for the exterior.
I'm new to this forum and just joined the Fine Woodworking.com connection.
To see my website go to saratogatreeservice.com
Check the veneer section and go to the projects area to see my work bench in progress.
Blair
The others are right about tye 6" duct however the motor you have on the HF DC is closer to 1 1/2 HP than 2 HP in line with this thought I am not sure I would try running 6" ducting unless others here can show that this particular DC can handle the volume of air the 6" ducting will allow into the DC fan & not overload it.
Thanks to everyone for their input! I finished building a shed for my dust collector outside next to my shop and I want to show off the results! It was a pretty big project. The first thing I discovered after getting the DC (2 Hp Harbor Freight) was that with the paltry amount of electricity I had in my shop I couldn’t run the DC at the same time as anything that made dust without tripping a breaker!<!----><!----><!---->
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I got an electrician in and based on advice from him and threads in this forum I now have tons of outlets, my table saw is rewired to be 240 volts and is on its own circuit, and I have a dedicated circuit going to a GFI outlet outside behind the shed. BTW the electrician was excellent. He’s a woodworker himself and has wired many shops including commercial operations. If anyone in the <!----><!---->Southern NH<!----> area would like a referral, let me know.<!----><!---->
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I thought I would need to make a big hole in the wall to carry the dust outside, but then I noticed that I already had a big hole in the wall! ;^) At one time there was a wood stove in my shop area and I was able to snake a 4” flexible hose out the flue and down to the ash empty-out outside. <!----><!---->
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The shed is 12” from the house and situated under a deck so it will not get the worst of the weather. I built it from pressure-treated 2x4’s and exterior-grade plywood. As long as I was building a shed I decided to make it bigger than needed for the DC and provide storage for some lawn tools that were taking up valuable shop space! The shed is 48”x60” by 80” at it’s tallest. The roof slopes down about 8” to the front. It’s open at the rafters (covered with screen) and has 18” louvered windows in each of the two doors for free exhaust from the DC. I built a cover to seal around where the hose goes from the house to the shed. <!----><!---->
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The materials cost me about $350.00. I put a garbage-can cyclone inside and most of the sawdust ends up there. I mainly did that to prevent small pieces of wood that get sucked up from ending up hitting the DC impeller. I still need to tighten up the intake on my table saw, but I get almost zero dust in the shop from my joiner and router table, and very little from my planer. The system is working great and I’m pleased with it. <!----><!---->
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Lance
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