ROS/ DC Connection

[efgh]

I went to Lee Valley the other day and bought two adapters, a 1.25" to 2.5" and a 2.5" to 4". My goal was to see if I could hook my randon orbital sander up to my dust collector. When I took the dust collection bag off the sander to attach the smaller adapter, I noticed the 1.25" end had a "ring" running around the outside about an 1/8" of the way from the end. This prevents the adapter from going into the dust collection output of the sander far enough to make an adequate connection. So, before I remove that "ring" in some manner, has anyone else attempted to connect their ROS to a dust collection system? If so, how did you accomplish it? I'm thinking I might have to go buy a short section of 1.25" or so connect the sander to the adapter.

TIA.

[Mike]

When I did this with a shop vac, I found that the suction from the vac travelled thru to the holes in the sanding disc and pulled the sander down onto the workpiece. Since I was using my 6.25 HP Rigid shopvac at the time, the suction was too much for the ROS to work correctly. Also, the shop vac seemed to be straining quite a bit, since the was not very much air being pulled through. I think that continued use this way would burn out the shop vac.

Those things combined with the hellacious amount of noise made me give up on it. What I did find that worked very well was to strap a furnace filter to the back of a box fan and set that close to where I was working. Any dust that didn't go into the ROS bag got pulled into the filter.

Worked very well and I didn't have to fight with the vac hose either.

Mike

[Mark Jerde]

My understanding is that the motor is working less hard -- after all the RPMs are higher.

-- Mark

[DonkeyHody]

Porter Cable makes a nice little 1" flexible hose with a 3/4" or so soft rubber end that slips right over the dust tube on my PC sander. Amazon.com I think. IIRC it was rather pricey for such a simple little item. It has an adapter to size up to the 2.5" hose from my shop vac. My vac has variable speed so I can slow it down to an appropriate amount of suction. This little hose has proven quite handy because it's sooo much more light and flexible than a shop-vac hose. It doesn't hinder the motion of the sander so much.

DonkeyHody "If your only tool is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail." - Abraham Maslow

[Toller]

You want to use a shop vac, not a DC. A DC won't move much air through a

1.25" tube. I have done it for years without hurting anything.

[marks542004]

when I did mine i used a length of shop vac hose that fit over the sander port.

I left the gate valve open mostly to my table saw and found the sander still had adequate suction.

[Patriarch]

"DonkeyHody" wrote in news: [e-mail]:

IIRC, about $30. Works well, particularly if the duct tape is well made.

Patriarch

[Michael Faurot]

I have a Rigid shop vac and two Rigid sanders. The hose from the shop vac fits into the sanders perfectly, after removing the sanders' dust collection bags. So it's essentially just plug-and-play to hook the sanders to the shop vac. I also have a dust collection system with the standard 4" flexible tubing. If I want to use the sanders with the DC, all I do is remove the hose from the shop vac, hook a sander to one end of the hose, stuff the other end of the shop vac hose into the 4" tubing for the DC, and then stuff a towel around shop vac hose. Sure it's a hack, but it's quick, it's easy, and it works. :)

After having used the sanders hooked to both the shop vac and the DC--I've found having that extra vacuum hose hooked to the sanders makes them too cumbersome to use. So I don't really bother anymore, unless I'm going to do a *lot* of sanding.