Do you guys do anything special with your old hand plane shavings (other than throwing them away)? I collect 'em up in a bucket or box, then use them as kindling in my barbecue, or sometimes for packing material, especially if it's a gift I've made in the woodworking shop.
compost pile. The long shavings clog up the impeller on my dust collector so I stopped sucking them up and use a broom instead...
John
With walnut shavings as with all juglans, I toss them. At the price of walnut around here though, that usually isn't a problem.
If they are planer shavings, I save cherry, oak and maple for grilling flavor or for a short barbecue. End pieces, small drops, etc. all go into the BBQ pile as smoking wood.
It there is a lot of shavings, I use them for compost in my herb garden, or with a bunch I try to get them on my tomatoes as compost.
If it is sawdust from the saw, I save as much as possible for refinishing work. For the old fashioned method of using he sawdust as a mild abrasive, cleaner, and liquid absorbent good sawdust from a saw can't be beat.
Robert
You too? I've run into the same thing, the shavings are so thin they are sucked through the cyclone and catch on the impeller inlet grid.
"Steve Turner" wrote
There'a a fairly complete list of folk's ideas on my webiste at:
Jeff
shavings and sawdust that comes from my workshop. Most gets spread around as mulch and gets treated with nitrogen, with some going into the compost bins along with other materials for more rapid breakdown. ( She has a commercial type mulching machine which shreds the ever increasing green wastes from her gardens.) As a result, the level of our block is slowly being built up, - in another ten years, we might be overlooking our neighbors from the garden. ; )
diggerop
On Mon, 9 Nov 2009 08:41:26 -0000, the infamous "Jeff Gorman" scrawled the following:
Good one, Jeff. Frank Klausz calls 'em "Hungarian paper towels."
-------------------------------------------- Proud (occasional) maker of Hungarian Paper Towels ======================================================
throwing them
barbecue, or
woodworking shop.
Some go to the compost pile after sitting on the ground for 6 months. Aged, it makes perfect blueberry bush mulch. I've used to cover muddy areas in the backyard or isles in the garden. I've got a few extra-large hickory trees and use the dead branches for BBQs.
----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark & Juanita" Newsgroups: rec.woodworking Sent: Sunday, November 08, 2009 8:59 PM Subject: Re: Plane shavings
Yup.... It took me a while to figure out why my dust collector wasn't sucking well any more... thought I had a clog in the spiral pipe somewhere and ran snakes through with no affect. I finally pulled the inlet off the impeller housing and it was snarled up like a rat's nest. I didn't expect anything to get past the collection barrel so it didn't occur to me to look there until last. ;~)
John
"John Grossbohlin" wrote in news:T8WdnZcPoKp5rWfXnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.com:
What kind of snakes do you use to unclog your pipes? Did it take them long to respond to the flute?
"Not only is the rattler in the corner for small rodent control, he also keeps my dust collection clear!"
Puckdropper
50' manual drain snake... generally obey's hand commands but sometimes takes it's own path. No flute needed. ;~)
John
We must have the same shop and follow the same troubleshooting methods. :-( Now, whenever the system starts behaving poorly, I go to the impeller inlet first.
Me too. My DC also had a grate across the inlet protecting the impeller, which was where my blockages occurred. - even with planer chips on occasion. I cut that out and its been trouble free ever since. I probably should make a collector drop bin and situate it in the line before the impeller to take out the heavier stuff. (Should won't necessarily eventuate in will) It would prolong the life of the impeller significantly.
diggerop
On Wed, 11 Nov 2009 23:12:21 -0700, the infamous Mark & Juanita scrawled the following:
I'd stick some fiberglass screening over the impeller intake/collector outlet so it didn't happen again. At the first sign of problem, I'd empty the snaky shavings out of the collector and continue on.
What'll you do? ;)
-- You know, in about 40 years, we'll have literally thousands of OLD LADIES running around with TATTOOS, and Rap Music will be the Golden Oldies. Now that's SCARY! --Maxine
I've got a cyclone, the plane shavings are light enough that they don't fall out into the cyclone, but get carried directly to the dust collector. Get the right length and orientation and they plug up the grate like you said.
... snip
First sign of trouble, I go directly to the impeller inlet. Not sure what the fiberglass screening would do for me, I'm not seeing it.
Oh my, now that's a visual I'm not sure I needed. Sagging tattoos and wrinkly rappers. Blecch!
Yup, the plane shavings just float in the airstream... The longer and thicker the shavings the less of a problem this seems to be. However, to borrow a phrase from Steve Knight, "light fluffy shavings" sail right through and get snarled on the impeller. Maybe I need to do a proper sharpening on the impeller blades so they get chopped up.... that ragged grinder edge just seems to snag the shavings instead of slice them up. Now there's a new thread for sure... sharpening impeller blades! Look for it! LOL
Chips of low density woods like air dried white pine, from very light cuts on the jointer or thickness planer, tend to float through my cyclone barrel too and end up in the filter bag.
Do you have a real cyclone or just one of those barrel thingies? I've never had shaving of any kind or even much dust go into the filters on my cyclone.
On Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:00:25 -0700, the infamous Mark & Juanita scrawled the following:
Screen the outlet from the cyclone. It'll keep the 1-molecule-thick shavings in the can, not in your impeller.
Like she said, SCARY!
-- You know, in about 40 years, we'll have literally thousands of OLD LADIES running around with TATTOOS, and Rap Music will be the Golden Oldies. Now that's SCARY! --Maxine
... snip
Mine don't get to the impeller, they get stuck on the grate into the impeller making the DC lose suction.
Oops, sorry about that, I had forgotten about *real* cyclones. No, I have one of the trash-can plastic cover things. It gets most planer, jointer and table saw waste. Only the really lightweight stuff gets into the dust bags.
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