Home made dust collector

[danimal]

For those using a vacuum line on their shapeoko machines, what diameter of vacuum tubing do you have going into your vacuum clamp mount?

I am debating between 1.25in and 1.5in. I really want some flexibility like in the 4in clear plastic stuff but it seems to be much stiffer for the under 2in stuff.

Honestly 1.25 is plenty due to the volume of chips being removed while operating. Most small to mid size wood tools have 1.25 hose ports, with things like planers and jointers using 2 or 4" tubes for chip and dust removal. The air volume through the 1.25 using the smallest shop vac available is impressive and I have problems with it sucking my dust shoe into my end mill. Either will work fine, with the same results so I would go with what is cheaper and easier to set up. The majority of small household grade vacuums and shop vacs have 1.25" hoses.

[danimal]

Nice work.

I did something similar except I was lucky enough to get a 20 gal barrel from work for mine. I went through the side with the hose that connects to the vacuum and used a tube of silicone caulking to seal around it. It creates a nice mini cyclone with the smallest shop vac you can buy and no loss of suction from dust in the filter. No telling what it would do with a real vacuum.

No I just have to get it wired up so it comes on and turns off with gcode. I even have the relays for spindle/vac control but haven't put the time in to make it happen. I like to use the machine as much as tinker with it.

I have been experimenting with this as well. I still need to build yet another new enclosure since I transitioned over to linuxCNC before I can really devote much time to setting them up. But before that I need to get my limit switches installed again. It seems like my CNC parts to projects ratio is about 80/20 meaning that 80% of the time it is running I am building a part for itself. I am sure that I will be completely satisfied with it after just this one last upgrade...

[Woodworker]

Here is a video of Mathias building his own blower for his home mad cyclone. Looks like a good CNC project.
http://woodgears.ca/dust_collector/cyclone.html

[twforeman]

I got inspired by your post and stopped on the way home to buy the parts to make my own version of this.

I took some photos and will write it up in a day or two.

[danimal]

Here is a video of Mathias building his own blower for his home mad cyclone. Looks like a good CNC project.
http://woodgears.ca/dust_collector/cyclone.html

He did a pretty good write-up. I was thinking that my build would ultimately head in that direction, but after a cheap funnel worked as well as it did I don't think I would go through all the extra work. Also it looks like the funnel being open in the middle allows the really fine dust to drop down instead of building up on the flat internal plate. I still might make an internal plate like this for comparison down the road if I happen to find a good piece of wood for the project, but I want to give my setup a chance at some long term running and see how it fares.

[Woodworker]

Understood. There has been a lot of talk lately about dust collection and there is a lot of info on the woodworker forums. I won't have a problem with dust collection, I will run run another line from from my 5hp cyclone.

[danimal]

Understood. There has been a lot of talk lately about dust collection and there is a lot of info on the woodworker forums. I won't have a problem with dust collection, I will run run another line from from my 5hp cyclone.

I wish I had that option. My main problem is the really fine dust from 3D finishing passes. I have milled primarily in plastic and aluminum up to this point, but now that I am performing larger and larger projects in wood it has been killing me. I have also thought about making a fine dust collection bag and a cap for my shop vac then taking off the internal filters all together. The calculations for that are a little more complicated though.

[Woodworker]

Here is a small cyclone that acts as a prefilter. It seems to have good reviews and may help in your circumstance.
http://www.woodcraft.com/Product/202101 ... ckets.aspx

[Ing Chao]

How about something like this:




It's not exactly home made- just re-purposed a bit.

[Little Hands]

danimal (all),

This works too well! I can run for hours... The Shop Vac. is clean (can/filter). I Copied your design with a few mod's. Nice post! Thanks!

ps: funnel cut size can be adjusted, start with a small hole +- and adjust accordingly.... ?