dust extraction opinions

ennisa

Currently I am using an old bagless hoover that some body was about to throw out, ironically it doesn't suck! As in it is crap, it is barely able to hoover up sawdust from the floor never mind sucking chips out of the router table or sawdust out of the table saw. At some stage soon I will need to get something better. I see that Lidl have these parkside hoovers that are about 70 euro, they have a plug socket for simultaneous starting and they are bagless etc.. so they are designed for the workshop. Also argos have a wet/dry bagless for about 60 euro called an earlex wd100. Has anybody used either of these, or does any body use a different one that they could recommend? Obviously there are dust and chip extractors that I can buy that start about 500 euro and will do an excellent job but I have neither the budget nor the space for that and it is probably overkill for my little shop. A portable hoover would suit better as I don't mind changing it from one tool to the other ( I can only use one at a time anyway )

What you all using ( if anything ) and what would you all recommend?

Thanks everybody

SpitfireIV

Aye, thats next on my shopping list too! Jeez, it seems like you'd never be finished buying stuff!! I bet it was the planer that made you realise the need for adequate dust/dirt removal!

I was looking at a couple of the Fox dust extractors over on Rutlands, they start at about €200+. But once you get the extractor then you have to fork out for piping, connections, etc etc and all those added together aint cheap either! :rolleyes:. Guess I'll carry on using the ol' brush and dustpan for the timebeing :pac:

ennisa

Hi croppyboy,
the planar did have something to do with it all right but It has been on my list for a little while. The planar, to be honest, is not that bad but I think that is mostly because the chip chute fills up and keeps the chips in, i wanted to get a hoover that i can attach to that to try and keep it clear so that i don't have to stop and clear it out when the chips start to fly out from under the guard as they have no where to go. I will have to look into seeing if there is a way that i can angle the chute down so that gravity will help. I don't mind spend 50 or 60 euro on a shop-vac and then a bit more on some hose adapters, it's still cheaper than €200 but yes, the buying never ends. I have to get a bandsaw at some point too

I saw a quote recently that said - "My only fear is that after I have gone my wife will sell my tools for what I told he I bought them for." I try not to lie about how much things cost but sometimes I just want them soooo much

Take care

Fingalian

Hi ennisa,
I have one of those Lidl/Aldi hoovers hooked up to the router table , when you switch on the router, the hoover powers up.It works ok but the hose can get jammed up if your are really hogging off stock. I was thinking of getting one of those small filter units ( about the size of a microwave) that hang from the ceiling to suck up all the small airborne stuff, until I get the cash together to build a proper system with 100mm hose and a central cyclonic unit. If I'm milling mdf I usually wear a respirator as well, just a normal one not one of the powered ones.
Cheers.

ennisa

Thanks Fingalian,
I need to pick up a respirator too!! Should probably be wearing one of those when power sanding. Feel a bit like somebody from a Haz-Mat team with all that gear on though!! You only have one set of lungs though!

Where could one get some adapters for hoses etc to size them up/down. I have seen a bucket of hose bits down the back of macquillans but I am not sure if it is feasible to size up a normal hoover hose to 100mm or so and still get some usable suction?

Thanks again Fingalian.

ednwireland

i got an record power rsde2 for last birthday seems to cope with the dust pretty well

aerosol

I have a record powerRSDE2, its ok but not worth the money I paid. Think I told the wife it was 50 quid;)

I came across this the other day....
http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=10520&highlight=

and also this...
http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=10681&highlight=

The guy who did them is very clever,made loads of jigs n bits n bobs. Its possibley something you might try.

ennisa

That second one looks very interesting and has the added benefit of not needing a bagless vac to begin with, any old vac once it sucks good and can be adapted might do the job, most interesting.


Thanks for those aerosol it never occurred to me to look and see what people had bodged together.

JoeB-

I have both the record RSDE1, and TWO of the LIDL wet/dry vacuums.

I would recommend both... the RSDE1 I bought from McQuinnlans at a trade show, about 170 I seem to remember, always better prices at trade shows.

I bought one LIDL wet/dry vacuum, and was so impressed I bought a second, at 70 includes VAT is amazingly cheap. I hung my first wet / dry from the 12ft ceiling, with the hose down and an extension lead into the autostart socket.. so I can connect several tools easily and it's very handy. The second one is in case the first breaks, and to bring with me when fitting kitchen etc.

The RSDE1 with a 100mm hose is more suitable for planers, spindle moulders etc, and router tables (if taking loads off) as router bits in tables can produce large splinters which clog smaller tubes,

The LIDL ones are more suitable for hand held tools, i.e sanders, biscuit jointers, probably not suitable for larger or high volume machines as hose is only about 35mm diameter.

I was going to but a massive one from Axminster, the 1,200W, 2200 m3/hour which is on special for about £220, great offer as it moves more than ten times the volume of air when compared to the RSDE1.. but delivery was £100 so I cancelled, not sure now, maybe I should have just got it anyway... (I have a new large bandsaw and table saw so could do with a installed system.)

Cheers
Joe

ennisa

Joe,
thanks for that, it is always going to be a trade off for me between what will get the job done and what i can afford to do a decent enough job. £100 delivery seems a bit much when rutlands were willing to send this http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psProdDet.cgi/F22564 to ireland for £36 is the one from axminster that much bigger. The planar shipped in a box that was about 2' high by 2' deep by 4' long. See this post for the details from croppyboy, he was talking to rutlands about it.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055427959

Thanks for your input Joe, where was this trade show that you were talking about? Are there many of them in Ireland, I see them online in the US all the time, the Atlanta trade show etc... but I have only ever hear tell of one in septmeber in cloghran called woodworking ireland. http://www.nelton.co.uk/Template1.asp?PageName=Woodworking%20Ireland%202009

Are there others that you know of?

Thanks again

MathsManiac

I'm also in the market for a cheap-and-cheerful solution to this problem.

I don't see that vaccuum cleaner in lidl's current or forthcoming offers. Have you seen it in store?

Also, I only see two Earlexes in Argos, and I was already checking them out. One is €85 and the other is €130. I reckon you'd need the dearer one, as it has the power socket for simultaneous power on with the tool, which the cheaper one doesn't. Also, even though the cheaper one says it includes a power-tool adaptor, I'm not so sure - if you look at the pictures, there's an extra plastic thing lying beside the dearer one, and it looks suspiciously like an adaptor.

I almost bought it but didn't, as I was thinking that Lidl might have a cheapie sooner or later! That's why I'm interested to hear if they do!

aerosol

Mathsmaniac, I'm not sure if its the one being talked about but I saw a vac in Coolock's Lidl couple of days ago.

Ennisa there's a show on in the RDS in Oct:-
http://www.woodmachineryexhibition.com/
I meant to go last year but couldn't make it.

SpitfireIV

ennisa wrote: »

Joe,
thanks for that, it is always going to be a trade off for me between what will get the job done and what i can afford to do a decent enough job. £100 delivery seems a bit much when rutlands were willing to send this http://www.rutlands.co.uk/cgi-bin/psProdDet.cgi/F22564 to ireland for £36 is the one from axminster that much bigger. The planar shipped in a box that was about 2' high by 2' deep by 4' long. See this post for the details from croppyboy, he was talking to rutlands about it.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055427959

Just to add to that, I contacted Rutlands to ask for a delivery price for the P/T and was quoted £31.05. So, I went ahead and ordered the P/T. By default the postage for Ireland is €15 I believe, so thats what I was charged until I was contacted the next day by the customer service to tell me that orders over a certain size/weight were extra, and wanted to charge me €40 for delivery (by right thats there normal charge for larger items like the P/T, small table saws etc). So I contacted them saying that I had been quoted €31.05 by a member of there staff, so, I got the P/T shipped for that price

As I mentioned, delivery for larger items is €40 I believe. Smaller items are around €15. I got a couple of packages from them. The first had 4 54" sash clamps, a 9" table vice (very heavy!) a number of blades, glue, cord clamps etc etc. All shipped to me for 15!

aerosol wrote: »

Ennisa there's a show on in the RDS in Oct:-
http://www.woodmachineryexhibition.com/
I meant to go last year but couldn't make it.

Meet up then lads? :P

aerosol

Meet up then lads?

I'm planning on going again! I'll chance be in the bar over the road;)Every exbo I go to I end up needing a sit down and a pint to recover from lumping bags full of brochures and free pens around!!

ennisa

mathsmaniac, i saw that parkside vacum in the lidl on moore street about a week ago there were a couple there, i THINK they were about 75 euro. I know people who have rang lidl and they have put items like this aside for them so they could come in and collect them later that day so you might try ringing them and asking if they will hold it for you.

aerosol do you know if that show is open to the public? I checked the site but the registration is closed, the other show in cloghran in september is only open to the trade, i emailed them to ask.

I have to say that i am still quite interested in the shop made version, especially the second one in aerosol's post. It means you can use a regular vac with normal hoses to the top part of the unit and only the lower part of the unit has to be sized up. So esentially no adapters and it can use any vac once it can suck good enough. I might look into making a dedicated one of those for the planer and then a mobile one for the rest of the shop.

There are two shop vac's that i see in argos that look like i can afford them the earlex wd1000 (710/2279) and wd1100 (711/1349) they are 69 and 83 euro. £45 in the north for the cheaper one and as i am going up to donegal via enniskillen in a couple of weeks and the enniskillen argos have one in stock i might pick up the cheaper one.

I realise fully that to really take care of the problem I have to invest in a proper chip and dust extraction with an air polisher etc.. But at the moment I just want to have the ability to cut down on the dust generated by the planer, the table saw and the sanding. I don't do a lot of work with MDF but if I ever start to then it will have to change as the small amount of things that I have built with that convince me that it is just not a nice product once it is ground to a powder. Thank god for flat boards that we can buy but it has it's price.

Thanks for all your input guys, at least I presume that you are all guys are there any ladies that follow the woodcraft forum?

aerosol

Hi Ennisa,just had a closer look at that website,seems it wasn't on last year,must of been 2 yrs ago I was planning on going!!

Can't see anywhere that says trade only,if it is I'm sure this is easily overcome anyway;) Pm me for ideas!!

Fingalian

Evening All,
I've been to both of those and I'm not 'Trade', but they are geared more towards the trade than us backyard woodworkers. Some of the smaller stands are interesting and you get some good deals but I wouldn't be going out of my way to attend either. By all accounts Ally Pally is the one to go to and if memory serves me I think Joe Ballantine has been to that one?
Cheers,
F

aerosol

Thanks for that Fingalian.which is the ally pally?

Fingalian

Its the big woodworking show in Alexandra Palace in London, I think it is on in Feb? the UK woodworking magazines usually have write ups/info on it. Keep meaning to go some year.
F

doozerie

People may already be aware of this but for the likes of a planer you ideally need a HVLP (High Volume Low Pressure) extractor which is capable of shifting the likes of large shavings. For finer dust, like that produced by a router, a High Pressure Low Volume (such as a regular household vacuum cleaner) is better. Some devices try to be both, but generally speaking they are two different beasts and few extractors will do both jobs very well. Having said that, I have used a Record Power DX4000 (a beefier version of the RSDE2 with 2 motors) for both, and the results have been reasonable.

When dealing with fine dust though, you've got to consider how effective your extractor is at filtering the dust. A regular household vacuum cleaner will almost certainly take in most of the dust but just spit back out the finest particles (which are the most dangerous to your health) because the dust bag effectively is too porous to trap them. Being so fine, you won't see the dust hanging in the air, but you will notice it once it has settled on surrounding surfaces (and in your lungs!). So, if you are uncertain whether your extractor is really filtering fine dust effectively you should still wear a dust mask whenever generating dust. Any decent extractor will state the level of filtration that it provides - one reasonable recommendation seems to be to filter down to at least 0.5 microns although finer filters exist. Decent extractors are not cheap though.

One of many sites that provide a lot of useful info is Bill Pentz's Dust Collection Research site and it even describes how to build your own cyclone which might be of interest to some.

aerosol

Thanks Doozerie,that looks like a good site,have to have a good read(in stages!)

ennisa

Doozerie,
excellent, thanks for that I will have a good look.

dubtom

I got a fox extractor (display model) from Mcquillans in blanch a while back for around the €200 mark. It has a double extraction tube and a fairly large motor. paid extra for a couple of shut off doors,I think a tenner each, and it came with a good bit of piping. The guys up there will often knock a few bob off for a demo or last in the line. I also have a single extractor,some german yoke, and over time the plastic fins that sit on the motor have broken off,it would barley suck a ciggy at this stage. I suppose the ultimate would be a wall hung unit with piping and connectors all around the work area, the floor standing models though handy take up a lot of precious room.