Shop Design for Dust Collection

[rich]

Hi, All, Just got a Delta dust collector ??-750 I think, and will pick it up at the end of the month. (Two houses, one old human butt) I also ordered a cyclone garbage can top, and a bunch of hoses, clamps, gates, and elbows from Veritas. My shop is a 4 car garage, minus room for the wife's car. My question is what to consider when installing this dust collector. The table saw does not move yet, the plainer and jointer are on lockable castors, and the drill press may in the future. And the hand held router makes a GIANT mess when I cut dovetails.

Do I put this in a corner, out of the way, and run pipe around the shop, or what? Maybe fixed hose up high, with flexible hoses coming down every 8 feet or so? Or find a dedicated location for each tool and hard wire in the dust collection?

I'm open to any and all suggestions. Thanks in advance for the help.

Rich.....

[Charley]

I'm not familiar with your particular model dust collector, however, from your comment about the garbage can top it appears to be one of the large portable 2hp or so units with a 2-4'' intake port. Since these units loose efficiency very quickly with longer lengths of suction hose and they are frequently barely adequate to begin with, I would make a roll around base to hold the dust collector and the garbage can so I could easily move it around my shop. I would then move it from one machine to another as my work flow required. Using it this way would give me the maximum efficiency possible at whatever machine that I use.

[Chris Friesen]

If it's the 50-760, then it's a 1.5 HP model. I own one of these.

Those cyclone lids work great for shop vacs, but not so well with dust collectors. If the collector is moving enough air to do a good job, it can suck the cyclone bin empty.

Assuming the collector is the model mentioned above, it's not powerful enough to do a proper job when hooked into a central system. It will perform best when hooked directly to the tool with a bare minimum of pipe/hose.

Your lungs will be safest if the collector is run outside the garage so that the dust that makes it through the bags blows away.

The combination of these factors basically means running your tools as close to the entrance as possible. Use a fitting to connect the 5" port on the collector to a short length of 6" duct, then use a short length of flex hose (or split to a couple of 4" flex hoses for above/below collection on the table saw).

See Bill Pentz's website for a lot more information.

[rich]

Thanks! The Bill Pentz website looks like just what I needed!!!

[brianlanning]

For small handheld machines like the routers, you might want to consider using a shop vac. The dust collectors won't have much grunt when you hook them up to a 2.5" hose. I'm thinking about this thing called the GUV which looks like a cross between a shop vac and a house central vac machine. Oneida also sells this mini cyclone thing for shop vacs. That looks like an ideal arrangement.

brian