digital_trucker

Anyone built their own? I'm looking for ways to keep the dust down in my basement.

Rick W

My Feedback: (20)

Hey,

Funny you bring that up, I'm building a sanding table as we talk. I found the plans in the Winter 2007 issue of the Woodworkers Journal. Very easy to build at a reasonable cost. Uses a shop vac.

Rick

Sent ya a PM...

elcam84

My Feedback: (2)

Make a box with a peg board top and hook a vacuum up to it. You will need some baffling inside to even out flow.

Do a search on downdraft sanding tables on Google or woodnet.net forums.

digital_trucker

Shop vacs are too noisy for me here. I'm thinking I might be able to do something with a squirrel cage.

Newc

I built one about a year ago and wouldn't be without one now. I thought that I had some pictures of it during construction, but can only find one of the completed table and have attached it. Basically it is 36" x 24" x 6+" box. The sides are from 1" x 6" and there are three (I think, maybe just two) crosswise baffles made of the same wood. Through one end and the baffles I cut holes for a 4" diameter PVC perforated pipe that runs the entire length of the box and then I drilled more and larger holes in the pipe (and around the perimeter of the piping) to give greater air flow. The number and size of these holes was developed by trial and error to get a good vacuum going. On top is a Masonite perforated pegboard with 1/4" holes and on top of that is antiskid elastomer that is used for shelving, drawers, etc. that has been glued on using contact cement.

I originally planned to use a pretty good sized shop-vac, http://www.sears.com/sr/javasr/produ...cemldffidfki.0 but soon found that it didn't have the amount of air flow to do a decent job. In fact, my original design and first build was with smaller wood and piping to accommodate the shop-vac 2 1/2" hoses, but this was scrapped after the first tests. My testing was pretty simple - see if cigarette smoke (Yes, I'm one of those dummies!) will get drawn down into the box. If this won't get drawn down then dust certainly won't. As a result of the failure of the shop-vac version I bought a Delta dust collector http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?actio...400&lpage=none that has significantly higher CFM than you will get from any shop-vac and built the second version that works very well. It's the CFM that is what you need, not the unit HP, which is what is advertised for the shop-vacs. I connect the pipe shown on the box to the hose from the dust collector with a 90 degree elbow http://www.acehardware.com/product/i...archId=1260922 that's attached to the hose. I'm fortunate that my workshop shares a wall with a crawl space and I have the dust collector on the other side of the wall with the on/off switch for the outlet used for the collector on the workshop side and the hose http://www.woodcraft.com/family.aspx?FamilyID=1780 running through the drywall, so the collector doesn't take any room and the noise level - which is already lower than a shop-vac - is non-existent except for the sound of the air through the box. For storage I have an eyebolt on the end without the pipe and this is used to hang the box high on the workshop wall, out of the way. I have felt pads on the bottom to further muffle sound and vibrations and keep the box from sliding around.

I've used this now for all the sanding on my planes in the past year as well as recently sanding a couple of end tables (Hey, sometimes we have to cross off something from the wife's "Honey do" list!) down to bare wood for refinishing (using my Black & Decker Mouse), and the rest of the shop remains dust free - quite a difference from before using it! By the way, I also got an adapter http://www.acehardware.com/product/i...archId=1260759 that will reduce the dust collector hose to fit a shop-vac hose and use the dust collector as a really good vacuum for the rest of the shop.

Good luck. I'm sure that you'll be glad you built it.

chashint

I didn't build my own.
I reclaimed my son’s bedroom when he went to college to use for my airplane workshop and since it is in the house I had to make a pretty good effort to control the dust.
I have the Delta dust collector along with the Delta downdraft table and I am very happy with it. It is fairly noisy but of course it only runs when sanding operations are underway.
It works good enough that I can use a bench top belt sander sitting on the downdraft table.
There is also an old squirrel cage fan I got from a surplus equipment rack that I have put a furnace filter on and it sits on my workbench, it runs whenever I am working on anything, it collects its fair share of dust too.

Rick W

My Feedback: (20)

Digital,

Went shop vac shopping last night. I have an old Craftsman that will deafin you when it runs. I checked several tool stores as well as the big home centers. I decided on a Ridgid from Home Depot. I was suprised at how quiet it was. You might check it out.

Finished the sanding box, sorry no photo dead battery in the camera. The article in the mag. left a lot to be desired but it came out really good. Now on the the test phase.

Rick

elcam84

My Feedback: (2)

For a quiet vac you have to go with a Fein(somewhat pricey) or a Festool (very pricey). The fein is a good vac. I'd like the Festool but it's $400.

Newc

chashint - I completely agree with your setup of the Delta dust collector, as I mentioned in my earlier post. My Delta is quieter than my shop-vac, though, so I would suggest you check to see that all assembly bolts are good and tight. Your mention of using a bedroom triggered a comment I should have put in my earlier post. While in the design phase of our new home I thought about how to keep dust and odors from my workshop from entering the rest of the house and came up with something that's very simple and works like a charm. My workshop is within our oversized garage and is an integral part of the HVAC system. However, when it came to the running of ductwork I had the HVAC folks not install a cold air return. They were against this as it would reduce the effiiciency of the heating anjd AC to the workshop, but since it was my $ they did as 'suiggested'. The result is that conditioned air comes into the room but doesn't ever return to the furnace/AC (I also have a quiet but high CFM exhaust fan) and there have been absolutely no odors in the house, even when spray painting KlassKote paint. You may want to completely block off the air return in the room you are using and put a threshold sweep under the door.

Or do what some of my friends do as soon as their kids go away to college - fill the room with concrete so they have no place to return to!

elcam84

My Feedback: (2)

To start off I'm a woodworker with a full line of machines. A dust collector is really overkill for building planes IMO but... One of the best deals in a small dust collector is from Harbor freight. Their 2HP dust collector can be had on sale and with a coupon for as low as $120.

Now the bags it comes with are junk. They are just canvas. You can get very low micron bags from many suppliers as long as you get one for a 20" rim. I have a set of bags from a company that makes them for the industry. Very nice bags and they will improve the amout of air the unit sucks too. When I got them they were $70 shipped for the pair. The lower is stock size with a window in it. The upper is 4" larger in diameter (more would be nice but the cost goes up because the material is only so big) and it is taller and just barely touches the ceiling.

Now another route to go is with a canister filter. Wynn is the most popular one. They have two different quality ones both work well one is washable if ever needed. To clean it you just whack it a few times and blow it out with an air hose. The big benefit is the lower bag can be a plastic bag and just taken off and thrown away. Yes a couple delta versions do this with a regular bag on top and I can do the same with mine with the large bag but... Once you use them for a while you will realize you are loosing allot of CFM.


Like I said IMO a DC is overkill. Also the bags I have and the wynn filter will filter out all the dangerous size dust that is created. Also balsa dust tends to be very fine and will plug a bag or filter up quicker. Just keep that in mind.

Pumping all that air outside is doable but can get very costly. If you are sucking 650CFM out of the house that's allot of air you have to bring in from ouside to heat or cool. This is why home woodworkers run these high effeciency filters on their DC.


Personally I'd use a downdraft table with it's own fan and filter. If you need a large area you can use a HVAC blower motor mounted in a box under the table with good filters (white ones).
If you need a smaller version you can get a long squirrelcage fan from a surplus supplier and use it as your fan.

Go with the first option if in a shop or garage and option 2 if you need for indoors.