Invaluable video for me now that I'm setting up shop. Especially the practical tips and purchases. I turned away from the PVC pipe because of the insane price but never thought of the metal ducts at a fraction of the price. Going back to the hardware store now... So many youtubers out there with crazy sponsored equipment and videos recommending all kinds of expensive/impractical solutions.Thanks for staying real!
Thank you. My channel will have some content centered around a lower budget and some content for a higher budget. Everyone is in a different position and I just like to share what I know.
Great video to put out, I'm a professional Furniture maker too in the UK and when started in the industry dust collection was pretty poor and I definitely suffered but in recent years the standards of dust collection around me and in line with my learning have got to similar standards you have your Workshop and it really has made huge difference. So many still take the lungs and personal health for granted, glad to see people talking about it more and more now
Thanks for sharing wonderful dust collection tips ,infact I am taking step by step preventions for my paint booth ,still 50 % away from reaching the desired level but not lost hope that one day I will be able to do a dust free painting job and ur video tips will surely help me now,GREAT
Yeah, I have the Wen one myself, and it does a pretty good job in my garage shop... when I am not slacking and actually use my dust collection. I'm slack on the smaller tools, since I hate hauling the shop vac all over the place. Thinking about the dedicated thing... having one under the miter station and bandsaw, one with the assembly table, and another hooked up to the disc/belt sander and drill press. I think I'm stuck using the beast (have the Harvey G-700 due to space/noise restrictions) for my planer, since it seems a little much for a smaller shop vac, but who knows.
Lots of great tips. I usually go for rainy days to clean out dust collecting systems. It helps to have a covered outdoor loading dock 😏😏. I worked for years in a shop that was adjacent to a residential neighborhood, so we had to be careful on windy days.
Great video! I learned some things. Another affordable option for moving air outside directly adjacent to your work location is to get a blower fan with duct hose (typically 10”x30’ or so) and blow it all outside. Not the best, but fairly affordable and very versatile especially for job site!
Hi Mike and greeting from the One Handed Maker - Australia. Dust is the devil in particle form and this video has a lot of good tips to add to my own workshop. Sometimes I wish I could just open a window/door and clear the dust but all I can do is filter filter filter! Regards James One Handed Maker
I love these tips! Always useful, fun, and interesting content on your channel! I think that the mask is probably the most understated one because using that can help keep you safer for longer while you upgrade your shop slowly. Collecting dust in the air, at the tools, and at the cleanup stage are all super important; if you have your comfy mask on for most of your operations, you will be much better off, especially if your dust collection isn’t robust.
For a cheap but very effective ambient dust filter...I built box/cart with a furnace fan cut through one side and put a single 4" merv 13 on the other side. Running, this will circulate the air in a room better than a box with multiple filters in it. It's also cheaper to buy a single 4" than 4 1" filters (tip = buy multiples online). One those hot days, it's also nice to cool off with it blowing at you.
retired furniture maker here. when i started there was no such worry about dust etc. but over time realisation and laws really cleaned things up. my home shop has basic collection to all tools and luckily with either end of the shop open the prevailing breeze keeps most of the fine dust out. what i really wanted to say, is this has to be one of the better videos on the topic. good common sense. as an aside, in nz the wyn filters are prohibitively expensive. this puts them out of reach for amateur workshops generally. my dust collector is a bag variety, so it lives outside so the dust is carried away and not blown into the shop.
Good tips. For those with basement shops (like me) and no windows for fresh air movement, I rely on a home-built air scrubber I made to fit between my floor joists in the shop ceiling. Box a section in, add a 8" 420 CFM duct booster fan, a length of 8" metal duct and a few 16x25" MERV 13-15 filters (fit perfectly across the joists). It sits directly above the table & miter saw area, sucks up air and directs it to the other side of the shop to create a circular flow pattern. Plenty enough to exchange the entire shop's air in 5 minutes. Total cost was $150... filters being the most expensive parts.
This video comes at a great time. I am about to build a new shop. Many of the ideas presented here will be incorporated. Thank you for sharing. Have a great day and stay safe.🙂🙂
Mike, I never comment on videos and watch a ton. I couldn’t help myself in saying this video was great!!! I learned a lot of really cool tricks and tips that I am honestly shocked I have never herd before. Keep up the good work and thank you for the education.
Great video as usual. Thanks 👍 as a retired physician I realize what my lungs are worth. You did a great job in this video. When designing my new shop I decided to also install an attic fan. This woks quite well.
@@MikeFarrington Great Minds, right. I employ all of your suggestions in one way or another. I worked with Oneida and received great service. I got the biggest cyclone they had with all metal ducts. I’m blessed to be able to get what I want and those that I let in my shop are surprised at what they see. They want to know what “that big white machine cost”? (The cyclone) I say tell me what your lungs are worth. Love your videos. By the way I always suggest those that use remote RF switches to get the best heavy duty one they can and turn the power off to it when you are not in the shop. I’ve heard stories of stray RF signals turning on the dust collection, and running for hours to days. Thanks!
I have a basement shop. I installed a bathroom fan in the ceiling at one end of my long, narrow shop. It is dead silent and maintains a low level of negative pressure that tries to keep shop dust out of the HVAC system and the rest of the house. It seems to be working. It also clears the room of finish odors and similar.
ha ha, I'm chalking this up to great minds thinking alike; just got my Dylos and anemometer too. Awesome tips, and those floor standing filter/in-line fans are GENIUS! Fantastic thumbnail too, btw. :)
BIG PLUS 1 for the simple fan and cross air flow idea. I have not seen it mentioned anywhere before but it works really well and it’s cost effective. Cost effective particle meters are available from bang-good. Rag and bone man got one for his workshop. Precision may not be high but as an indicator they still help give a number to the often invisible and deadly dust factor.
Excellent video. I have gradually improved my dust collection in my small workshop. I have cyclones and have just upgraded the central shop vac to a Hepa filter one and always had the finest filter cartridge on my larger one for my table saw and larger machines. The particle monitor and anemometer are my latest additions in the last six months. Keep up the great projects and quality advice.
Well, you did a great job showing me how inadequate my dust collection is in my shop. Tip #10 was the best tip. The level of frustration for finding the correct fitting for each tool is so high. I had to resort to 3d printing some of the connections. On a serious note, you had excellent tips and I will be definitely looking into several of these.
Thanks Mike---super-dee-duper info and advice. Setting up my 2 car garage as a shop (truck will be banished to the driveway😉) and you've got me rethinking some of my initial DC ideas.
Perfect timing. I’m in the midst of designing my shop dust collection system. Having recently purchased a Bill Pentz ClearVue cyclone collector (second hand), your tips were super helpful. Great video!
These are great tips. I've also added a dust helmet, the MicroClimate Air2, when doing dust-intensive things. Its filters keep fresh air flowing, and it has an impact-resistant shield. I guess it makes me look a bit like an oddball, but not sneezing constantly is worth it.
Great job on this video! I have one thought to share that will improve the accuracy of your anemometer flow measurements: When using the anemometer and placing it close to (or at) the opening of ductwork to measure volume flow, the cross-section of the anemometer will automatically cause an increase in airflow being measured because you’re restricting the actual area that the air passes through. The result is that you are getting erroneously high airflow measurements. I think a practical way to improve the accuracy is to determine the cross-sectional area of the anemometer and build a section of duct that is larger than the ductwork that you were measuring the flow of by the amount of cross-sectional area of the anemometer. Then attach this test assembly to the duct you are determining the air flow of. The length of this test assembly should be at least a couple of diameters of the pipe itself. While in a rigorous calculation of airflow using engineering airflow calculations this is still inaccurate, it will still be more accurate than what you’ve been doing IMO. I don’t mean to be critical, but I think that this bears consideration. You’ll probably need to build, at most, three test pieces: 4”, 6”, & 8”. I’d look at sheet metal, probably using large HVAC pipe, cutting it down and using pop rivets. I really like your concluding comments - you give fantastic advice! Hope this helps!! Thanks and keep it up!
The anemometer is also useful to see if your filter stack is restricting your collector as they get dirty. Take a few notes of your speeds at the tools when filters are clean. Every month or so, retake a measurement at a known point and compare it to the clean filter value.
The most informative dust collection video I’ve seen. Thank you. I was surprised you prefer PVC over metal duct. My system is all 4 inch PVC, and yeah, it’s so easy to make changes. I went with the Oneida Supercell dust collector - it’s a high pressure and low CFM design. For this machine, 4 inch is recommended and you can also do faster 90 elbows. You can even do “T” intersections. The pressure is extremely high and works well for all my tools. It’s designed for small shops with only one blast gate open at a given time. So I automated the gates with the iVac automatic gates. Very happy! My next dust collection item is figuring out the table saw over arm dust collection.
I'm glad to hear this! I'm thinking of upgrading to a SuperCell. This would definitely be the easiest modification to my current system. I'm also considering something that would be overkill: Dust Gorilla Pro with airlock and transfer blower installed in the space under the garage. The Oneida people have been very helpful. What tools producing a lot of dust do you have connected to the SuperCell?
@@johnhuelsenbeck35 My full system includes: 1. Sawstop tablesaw 2. Dewalt planer 3. Router table 4. Ridgid spindle/belt sander 5. Miter saw w/ dust tent 6. Small 6 inch jointer (not bench top though) 7. 14 inch bandsaw 8. Port for 2.5" hoses to connect small tools (Domino joiner, sanders, pocket hole jig, etc) If you go with the Supercell, I highly recommend automating it with the iVac system. You can only have one blast gate open at a given time, so if it's automated you'll never have to worry. I also considered the Gorilla. My problem was all my duct was already 4 inch PVC, and the Gorilla would have required much more space. The Harvey G-700 also looks like a good machine. One thing I wish I had done: build a lean-to shed outside to house the machine to keep the noise down. The Supercell is a high pitched noise -- kinda like a shop vac. I'm looking into ideas to help reduce the noise a bit. The tablesaw still has dust on top, but I don't think any system will solve this unless I add an over-arm collection line. I will eventually post a video about the Supercell on my channel @Element Woodcrafts.
Solid advice. I definitely like having dedicated shop vacs for machines, and they don't have to be expensive ones if you're on a budget. I have a 30€ vac hooked up to my oscillating belt sander. Yeah it's shit but a 30€ vac is better than no vac. Having a dedicated one means I use it every single time I use this sander.
Thanks for your ideas. Ducting is one area where imperial and metric measurements are close enough not to pose a problem. 4in = 101.6mm, which is near enough to 100 to be easily adaptable.
These are great tips if you can afford the filters, piping etcetera, which I can not, even at a hobby level. So, I do my best by using the same low-profile mask, a hanging air filtration box and cleaning the filter often. I also bought small shop vacs for each tool station and an enclosed sanding box made of acrylic for small pieces of wood and longer or larger pieces I utilize an outdoor bench that is easy to set up. I also bought a specialized vac hose that can be adapted to fit all of my power tools that goes directly to my large wall mounted vacume. That will be replaced first when I can afford it. It's incredibly loud, so I built a small "closet" off the side of my shop to house it in and it is sounfproofed so the neighbors won't be bothered buy the noise. It made a huge difference to the noise level and overall atmosphere of my tiny shop. I will be putting an addition onto the shop once wood prices normalize so when that is completed a new dust collection system will be installed.
In waiting for a Tom Hardy Bane reference "no one cared about who I was until I put on the mask" but alas matrix is a classic. Such good timing, I'm working on my own diary collection for a much smaller shop but good to get ideas.
Theres a few more I can offer: you can frequently find 4" PVC pipes with a slight flare at one end (so you can daisy chain them). Make sure the flared end points TOWARDS the tool. That same trick you use with the heat gun will let you bend the pipes. Get a couple 4" end caps and put them on BEFORE bending but AFTER heating. The air pressure inside the pipe remains constant and the pipe can't collapse or pinch this way). Doing this minimizes the number of joints to as few as possible (decreased joints in my system by almost 2/3), AND minimizes the disruption to the air flow, both on the curves and straightaways (this is why you want the FLARED END pointing AWAY from the DC). Finally, find some heat shrink boat tape. It's 4-6" wide, applies like duct tape, but seals and shrinks to form fit with a heat gun. It's easily removable, but is as tight as silicone. It's used by boat manufacturers to shrink wrap boats after completion, so if they're stored in a high salt environment they stay sealed and corrosion free (they combine this with those rolls of shrink wrap plastic, then run the whole shebang under long heating poles. Not relevant, just interesting). It's maybe 15 bucks a roll (eBay) and one roll will do a 1800 sq. ft shop (i speak from experience). Oh, bonus tip: run as many branches from your DC as possible, right at the DC. Like an octopus. This way there's only one dust gate to worry about and you don't have all that standing air in the closed branches' Venturi effects jacking up your active branch. Every time your system forks, even if one branch is closed off at the end (by the tool, I mean), all the "dead air" in the branch still gets tugged into circulation by the air sweeping PAST it. If you cannot branch many times from the DC, then EVERY fork splitting from the main trunk should have its own blast gate. You want the smallest amount of dead air introducing eddy currents as possible (it's as disruptive as flex hose). Finally: it's close to Halloween. Buy a smoke machine. They're like 30 bucks. Stick your tools hose into it and you'll find EVERY leak in your system in minutes without causing any harm to it. If you can find the red smoke, use that. Barring that, get some uv-reactive chalk (~$4.99) and powder it. Suck it up with your system and take a black light to your joints. Same principle.
You merely adopted the dark, I was born in it… um wait…. What you know you can’t explain, but you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life. Never mind viewer your dust collection system is woefully inadequate, here are two dozen pro tips. TY Mike for sharing another great video.
Tip 16, except we have dust collectors set up for each tool. We just got the Oneida Gorilla Pro 5hp dust collector with 7" hoses for our CNC. But it's a full sized cabinet shop, like 12.5k sq ft. Anyhow, very well done video my friend.
Very good information regarding dust control and how not to breathe in wood dust - which is a known carcinogen. Top tip, Mike: if you want to minimize dust inhalation, shave your beard. OSHA recommends being clean-shaven prior to donning any type of dust mask, including a full-face or half-mask respirator. The really fine dust has a good chance of getting in between your beard hairs and the mask. I know, maybe you won’t look quite as macho, but you may increase your chance of not dying from lung cancer at a relatively young age.
Another ambient air filtration option for small shops are box fans. I run 2 of them and are made by Lasko. They came with changeable 20x20x1 inch filters and are purpose made for air filtration. They work extremely well in my 2 car garage and the filters are cheap.
While the ambient air cleaner idea you have is a great one , the one draw back is that in a shop you’re size you are not pulling anywhere near enough cfm to give required air changeovers needed to adequately filter the air.
I would push back on this. I made two of these, and based on my particle meter the air quality is pretty darn good in my shop, and improves fairly quickly when I turn them both on. The rest of my dust collection game is pretty good, so there isn't a ton of stress on these filters.
@@MikeFarrington well if it is that’s a pleasant surprise . I have two 1350 cfm air cleaners with a suggested air changeover rate of 10-12 air exchanges an hour and 1850 sq/ft shop. I couldn’t imagine going to units that small and achieving 10 exchanges per hour.
@@northernhumidor5615 10-12 exchanges is an arbitrary number picked by a marketing department. Your shop may need more, it may need less. The only way to know for sure is to get a partial meter. The 1350 number is also a number developed by a marketing department. My guess is the real world number is lots lower, especially when the filter is slightly loaded. I'm not saying these filters are better or worse, but they have been tested in my shop. So I know how useful they are.
I'm having shop envy right now. Mine is an 8x12 shed I turned into a shop. I built carts for my bigger machines, table saw, band saw, planer and joiner so I could roll them outside so I have room to work.
When it comes to metric vs imperial ducting you can pretty much go by 4" = 10cm or 100mm witch is a fairly common one. The other common dimensions are 50mm, 75mm, 125mm 150mm and 200mm which is 2", 3", 5" ,6" and 8". So basically 1" is almost 25 mm or more precisely 25,4mm so it's pretty close. Then you can use the heating pvc ducting trick you mentioned earlier to get it to fit precisley since it's pretty close compared to the metric ducting dimensions. The one off is normal vacume hoses that in metric are generally 40 mm for shop vacs and maybe 32mm for normal household vacuum cleaners.
Totally agree unless you are a good chunk off in size. I have plumbed my shop using 4, 6, and 8" ducts. So when I get the random 120mm port, I need a way to size it up to 6" Thats where the donuts come in.
Cool shot of the storm. I was at Red Rocks for Nine Inch Nails when that storm blew in. Didn't touch us but made for a hell of a light show on top of of what NIN was already doing.
I think the only way to have made that storm better would be to have been at a NIN concert. Thats a once in a lifetime event. Did they cover Cars? I love their version of that song.
@@MikeFarrington they didn't. Played plenty of 90s Era. Some from the 2000s. Some I didn't know. Good show. I heard the Saturday show was better. But whatever. We got the mother nature light show to boot. Btw, keep up the great work with the videos. They're very informative and your commentary hits me in the 90s sweet spot.
@8:00 Dammit. Now I have to vacuum the shop! :) Also, the "Bane/Bain thumbnail was perfect" Every time I put on my Trend Stealth mask, I go into a little batman/bain voice! LOL
Tip number one should be: Move your dust collector outside, negates the need for expensive filters and cleaning them, reduces noise. Cons: Negative pressure and loss of conditioned air. Good tips, thanks!
When sweeping a floor you can sprinkle or spray water on the floor as you sweep. It clumps all the dust on the floor into small clumps and lessens the amount of dust that ends up in the air when sweeping
Great video Mike ! Tons of useful info. 5 inch flex-hose fits on Felder 120mm ports without too much finagling, but those adapters are genius. I like your anemometer idea for hose diameter vs. air speed, esp. at altitude. Yeah, Bill Pentz' writings were a real wake-up call. After seeing you and J. Bates both use an air quality mon, it's on my list now, LOL. Love those skyline time-lapse shots. Front Range ? thanks again man . . .
120mm is very uncommon 125mm is probably the one they use. Though it might be somewhat under 125mm if it's designed to be used by a 125mm flexhose around it. Which is basically 2mm smaler then a 5" so that would work with a hose clamp that you tighten a little more. The hose he used was already 4" which is about 100mm so the port on hios machine were most likley 75mm which would be about 3".
Thank you. The air quality meter has really been a big help. It has given me a much better understanding of where dust is being created, if you can afford it, I think its worth it. 5" flex is easy enough, problem is on the other end, I have used 4" and 6" duct, so I would need to track down other fittings, so I just end up making the donuts. Yes, Front Range.
Great video with a lot of very helpful information. I am interested in building my own air filtration unit and wondered if you could share about the noise level produced by the fans on your cylinder dust filters. Considering that type as well as the furnace squirrel cage style.
I have no idea how to describe the noise level. I work with ear buds in, so I don't hear them at all. I will say this, the inline fans are designed to be used in homes, so they are typically pretty quiet.
Mike, thank you for sharing your experience! I appreciate you adding all the links to each tip. Does the Shop Apprentice build custom floor accessories?
This is the best general introduction to dust collection that I've seen.
What a gorgeous video shot it was, as the wind from the fan blew through you luxurious hair. Just like a model.
Ha! You are welcome.
Invaluable video for me now that I'm setting up shop. Especially the practical tips and purchases. I turned away from the PVC pipe because of the insane price but never thought of the metal ducts at a fraction of the price. Going back to the hardware store now...
So many youtubers out there with crazy sponsored equipment and videos recommending all kinds of expensive/impractical solutions.Thanks for staying real!
Thank you. My channel will have some content centered around a lower budget and some content for a higher budget. Everyone is in a different position and I just like to share what I know.
I love Bill Pentz. If you can read Bill's stuff and not think you're going to die immediately then you're a better man than me.
Bill needs to point out a bit clearer that he's got an unusual sensitivity to dust. Lots of good info, but a bit too..... _concerned_ about dust.
Great video to put out, I'm a professional Furniture maker too in the UK and when started in the industry dust collection was pretty poor and I definitely suffered but in recent years the standards of dust collection around me and in line with my learning have got to similar standards you have your Workshop and it really has made huge difference. So many still take the lungs and personal health for granted, glad to see people talking about it more and more now
Thank you.
This is the very best overview of woodshop dust collection concepts and ‘how to’ info I have seen. Excellent job Mike!
Wow, thanks!
Great tips Mike, and very timely as well.
Glad you liked it!
Thanks for sharing wonderful dust collection tips ,infact I am taking step by step preventions for my paint booth ,still 50 % away from reaching the desired level but not lost hope that one day I will be able to do a dust free painting job and ur video tips will surely help me now,GREAT
Thank you. Keep at it.
Mike best woodworker in the world fact !!! You deserve your own tv show like a remastered new Yankee show that would be class !!!
Thank you very much. I wish.
I've been looking for a good ambient filter system and these inline fan/Wynn filter combos look like just the ticket. Well done, Mike!
They work really well.
Yeah, I have the Wen one myself, and it does a pretty good job in my garage shop... when I am not slacking and actually use my dust collection. I'm slack on the smaller tools, since I hate hauling the shop vac all over the place. Thinking about the dedicated thing... having one under the miter station and bandsaw, one with the assembly table, and another hooked up to the disc/belt sander and drill press. I think I'm stuck using the beast (have the Harvey G-700 due to space/noise restrictions) for my planer, since it seems a little much for a smaller shop vac, but who knows.
Wow, Wow, and Wow this is very helpful. Thank you!! I have to say your woodworking is fantastic as well.
Glad it was helpful!
Lots of great tips. I usually go for rainy days to clean out dust collecting systems. It helps to have a covered outdoor loading dock 😏😏. I worked for years in a shop that was adjacent to a residential neighborhood, so we had to be careful on windy days.
Well done, Mike. One of the best tips videos I've seen.
Thank you.
Great video! I learned some things.
Another affordable option for moving air outside directly adjacent to your work location is to get a blower fan with duct hose (typically 10”x30’ or so) and blow it all outside. Not the best, but fairly affordable and very versatile especially for job site!
That is a really good idea. When I lived in San Diego, I did that nearly year round.
Mike, excellent tips & information as always! Much appreciate your humor & knowledge my brother.
Thank you very much.
Hi Mike and greeting from the One Handed Maker - Australia.
Dust is the devil in particle form and this video has a lot of good tips to add to my own workshop.
Sometimes I wish I could just open a window/door and clear the dust but all I can do is filter filter filter!
Regards James
One Handed Maker
Thanks for sharing
Excellent tips, thanks Mike. Defiantly will use some of them in my basement shop.
great tips! I just used my leaf blower yesterday. A clean shop is so much more inviting for getting stuff done!
Absolutely!!
I love these tips! Always useful, fun, and interesting content on your channel!
I think that the mask is probably the most understated one because using that can help keep you safer for longer while you upgrade your shop slowly. Collecting dust in the air, at the tools, and at the cleanup stage are all super important; if you have your comfy mask on for most of your operations, you will be much better off, especially if your dust collection isn’t robust.
Thank you. Totally agree, dust masks for the win.
Thanks for the closing tip. Very helpful
Thanks for sharing. Your channel is one of the most informative ones out there.
Thanks Rob.
For a cheap but very effective ambient dust filter...I built box/cart with a furnace fan cut through one side and put a single 4" merv 13 on the other side. Running, this will circulate the air in a room better than a box with multiple filters in it. It's also cheaper to buy a single 4" than 4 1" filters (tip = buy multiples online). One those hot days, it's also nice to cool off with it blowing at you.
Yay! Dust collection. My favorite. Thanks buddy.
Mike, confused by 2 emails from TH-cam about this comment. “You’ve been randomly selected….
retired furniture maker here. when i started there was no such worry about dust etc. but over time realisation and laws really cleaned things up. my home shop has basic collection to all tools and luckily with either end of the shop open the prevailing breeze keeps most of the fine dust out. what i really wanted to say, is this has to be one of the better videos on the topic. good common sense. as an aside, in nz the wyn filters are prohibitively expensive. this puts them out of reach for amateur workshops generally. my dust collector is a bag variety, so it lives outside so the dust is carried away and not blown into the shop.
Good tips. For those with basement shops (like me) and no windows for fresh air movement, I rely on a home-built air scrubber I made to fit between my floor joists in the shop ceiling. Box a section in, add a 8" 420 CFM duct booster fan, a length of 8" metal duct and a few 16x25" MERV 13-15 filters (fit perfectly across the joists). It sits directly above the table & miter saw area, sucks up air and directs it to the other side of the shop to create a circular flow pattern. Plenty enough to exchange the entire shop's air in 5 minutes. Total cost was $150... filters being the most expensive parts.
Thats a good idea.
This video comes at a great time. I am about to build a new shop. Many of the ideas presented here will be incorporated. Thank you for sharing. Have a great day and stay safe.🙂🙂
Glad it was helpful!
Mike, I never comment on videos and watch a ton. I couldn’t help myself in saying this video was great!!! I learned a lot of really cool tricks and tips that I am honestly shocked I have never herd before. Keep up the good work and thank you for the education.
Ambient air cleaner - I used furnace filters and a box fan. Using a particle counter it works great. In 2020 a lot of these designs were popular.
That is a good option for sure. I figured there were enough videos covering that subject, so I wanted to present a different option.
Definitely becoming my favourite channel 🤘🤘🏻
Wow, thanks!
Another great and informative video. Thanks, Mike.
Thank you.
Great video as usual. Thanks 👍 as a retired physician I realize what my lungs are worth. You did a great job in this video. When designing my new shop I decided to also install an attic fan. This woks quite well.
I like that idea. I have one installed in my shop. I probably should have mentioned it in this video.
@@MikeFarrington Great Minds, right. I employ all of your suggestions in one way or another. I worked with Oneida and received great service. I got the biggest cyclone they had with all metal ducts. I’m blessed to be able to get what I want and those that I let in my shop are surprised at what they see. They want to know what “that big white machine cost”? (The cyclone) I say tell me what your lungs are worth. Love your videos. By the way I always suggest those that use remote RF switches to get the best heavy duty one they can and turn the power off to it when you are not in the shop. I’ve heard stories of stray RF signals turning on the dust collection, and running for hours to days. Thanks!
@@MJ-nb1qn They last forever and work well. Maybe expensive, but to me totally worth it.
I have a basement shop. I installed a bathroom fan in the ceiling at one end of my long, narrow shop. It is dead silent and maintains a low level of negative pressure that tries to keep shop dust out of the HVAC system and the rest of the house. It seems to be working. It also clears the room of finish odors and similar.
ha ha, I'm chalking this up to great minds thinking alike; just got my Dylos and anemometer too. Awesome tips, and those floor standing filter/in-line fans are GENIUS! Fantastic thumbnail too, btw. :)
You'll find uses for both tools. I know that I have.
BIG PLUS 1 for the simple fan and cross air flow idea. I have not seen it mentioned anywhere before but it works really well and it’s cost effective.
Cost effective particle meters are available from bang-good. Rag and bone man got one for his workshop. Precision may not be high but as an indicator they still help give a number to the often invisible and deadly dust factor.
Low hanging fruit for sure. Cheap and very effective.
Excellent video. I have gradually improved my dust collection in my small workshop. I have cyclones and have just upgraded the central shop vac to a Hepa filter one and always had the finest filter cartridge on my larger one for my table saw and larger machines. The particle monitor and anemometer are my latest additions in the last six months. Keep up the great projects and quality advice.
Thank you. Sounds like you are getting a good system setup.
I use my leaf blower to clean up the dust in my garage shop also. Works great!
Its both effective and fun.
But it doesn't clean it up. It just disturbs it and moves it around...
Well, you did a great job showing me how inadequate my dust collection is in my shop. Tip #10 was the best tip. The level of frustration for finding the correct fitting for each tool is so high. I had to resort to 3d printing some of the connections. On a serious note, you had excellent tips and I will be definitely looking into several of these.
Thank you. If I had a 3d printer, I'm sure I would use it to make fittings.
Thanks Mike---super-dee-duper info and advice. Setting up my 2 car garage as a shop (truck will be banished to the driveway😉) and you've got me rethinking some of my initial DC ideas.
Glad to help
Very informative video! Appreciate the information and time spent producing the valuable informatio9n.
Glad it was helpful!
Best intro yet
Thank you. Probably a little over the top, but I had fun making it.
Two videos in quick succession?! You spoil us.
I'm working on posting more. We'll see if it keeps up.
Awesome B Role Mike!
Thanks Mike. Great instructional video. I learned a lot.
Thank you.
Perfect timing. I’m in the midst of designing my shop dust collection system. Having recently purchased a Bill Pentz ClearVue cyclone collector (second hand), your tips were super helpful. Great video!
Glad it was helpful!
@@MikeFarrington Thx… and some jerk is replying in your video comments… sending out spam messages.
@@m.e.h. Sorry, I keep reporting them, then blocking them. They keep coming back. Not much I can do...
The Matrix reference was perfect. I laughed out loud by myself!
Ha! Glad you liked it.
This is a great & useful video on a topic that has been covered so many other times by so many others. That’s hard to do. Thanks man.
Some good tips and from accumulated experience. Even a few chuckles in there, thanks for the effort (vids, not laughs).
Glad you enjoyed it
These are great tips. I've also added a dust helmet, the MicroClimate Air2, when doing dust-intensive things. Its filters keep fresh air flowing, and it has an impact-resistant shield. I guess it makes me look a bit like an oddball, but not sneezing constantly is worth it.
Good stuff!
Nice to see your views of the distant Colorado Rockies, Mike.
Thanks 👍
That was a pretty crazy lightning show we had. I’m just a bit south of you and it was amazing
Very informative & entertaining presentation - as usual.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Great tips I think you covered it all
Great job on this video! I have one thought to share that will improve the accuracy of your anemometer flow measurements:
When using the anemometer and placing it close to (or at) the opening of ductwork to measure volume flow, the cross-section of the anemometer will automatically cause an increase in airflow being measured because you’re restricting the actual area that the air passes through. The result is that you are getting erroneously high airflow measurements.
I think a practical way to improve the accuracy is to determine the cross-sectional area of the anemometer and build a section of duct that is larger than the ductwork that you were measuring the flow of by the amount of cross-sectional area of the anemometer. Then attach this test assembly to the duct you are determining the air flow of. The length of this test assembly should be at least a couple of diameters of the pipe itself. While in a rigorous calculation of airflow using engineering airflow calculations this is still inaccurate, it will still be more accurate than what you’ve been doing IMO. I don’t mean to be critical, but I think that this bears consideration.
You’ll probably need to build, at most, three test pieces: 4”, 6”, & 8”. I’d look at sheet metal, probably using large HVAC pipe, cutting it down and using pop rivets.
I really like your concluding comments - you give fantastic advice!
Hope this helps!!
Thanks and keep it up!
Thank you. Good info.
The anemometer is also useful to see if your filter stack is restricting your collector as they get dirty. Take a few notes of your speeds at the tools when filters are clean. Every month or so, retake a measurement at a known point and compare it to the clean filter value.
Great point.
I'm loving the Ambient air filter tip. My box filter has alot of blow by.
Thank you. These work well for sure.
The most informative dust collection video I’ve seen. Thank you.
I was surprised you prefer PVC over metal duct. My system is all 4 inch PVC, and yeah, it’s so easy to make changes. I went with the Oneida Supercell dust collector - it’s a high pressure and low CFM design. For this machine, 4 inch is recommended and you can also do faster 90 elbows. You can even do “T” intersections. The pressure is extremely high and works well for all my tools. It’s designed for small shops with only one blast gate open at a given time. So I automated the gates with the iVac automatic gates.
Very happy!
My next dust collection item is figuring out the table saw over arm dust collection.
I'm glad to hear this! I'm thinking of upgrading to a SuperCell. This would definitely be the easiest modification to my current system. I'm also considering something that would be overkill: Dust Gorilla Pro with airlock and transfer blower installed in the space under the garage. The Oneida people have been very helpful. What tools producing a lot of dust do you have connected to the SuperCell?
@@johnhuelsenbeck35
My full system includes:
1. Sawstop tablesaw
2. Dewalt planer
3. Router table
4. Ridgid spindle/belt sander
5. Miter saw w/ dust tent
6. Small 6 inch jointer (not bench top though)
7. 14 inch bandsaw
8. Port for 2.5" hoses to connect small tools (Domino joiner, sanders, pocket hole jig, etc)
If you go with the Supercell, I highly recommend automating it with the iVac system. You can only have one blast gate open at a given time, so if it's automated you'll never have to worry.
I also considered the Gorilla. My problem was all my duct was already 4 inch PVC, and the Gorilla would have required much more space.
The Harvey G-700 also looks like a good machine.
One thing I wish I had done: build a lean-to shed outside to house the machine to keep the noise down.
The Supercell is a high pitched noise -- kinda like a shop vac. I'm looking into ideas to help reduce the noise a bit.
The tablesaw still has dust on top, but I don't think any system will solve this unless I add an over-arm collection line.
I will eventually post a video about the Supercell on my channel @Element Woodcrafts.
Solid advice. I definitely like having dedicated shop vacs for machines, and they don't have to be expensive ones if you're on a budget. I have a 30€ vac hooked up to my oscillating belt sander. Yeah it's shit but a 30€ vac is better than no vac. Having a dedicated one means I use it every single time I use this sander.
Great video Mike! Thanks for all that you do for the community!
A lot of good tips Keep up the good work and keep the videos coming good sir.
Thank you.
Great and very clearly explained tips!
Glad it was helpful!
I love your shop what a great set up...
Thank you.
Thanks for your ideas.
Ducting is one area where imperial and metric measurements are close enough not to pose a problem. 4in = 101.6mm, which is near enough to 100 to be easily adaptable.
Agreed.
From Neo to Bain in one video ❤️
awesome as always
Thank you! Cheers!
Great video and great advice
Thank you.
Great episode! Also love the t-shirt. Cobra Kai!!
Ha! Thank you.
20 tips in 1 video. Holy Mackerel
Action packed.
@@MikeFarrington but for real these are solid advice. Going to implement some of these in my small shop. Thanks for the great vids
These are great tips if you can afford the filters, piping etcetera, which I can not, even at a hobby level. So, I do my best by using the same low-profile mask, a hanging air filtration box and cleaning the filter often. I also bought small shop vacs for each tool station and an enclosed sanding box made of acrylic for small pieces of wood and longer or larger pieces I utilize an outdoor bench that is easy to set up. I also bought a specialized vac hose that can be adapted to fit all of my power tools that goes directly to my large wall mounted vacume. That will be replaced first when I can afford it. It's incredibly loud, so I built a small "closet" off the side of my shop to house it in and it is sounfproofed so the neighbors won't be bothered buy the noise. It made a huge difference to the noise level and overall atmosphere of my tiny shop. I will be putting an addition onto the shop once wood prices normalize so when that is completed a new dust collection system will be installed.
Thank you for sharing. I felt like this video had a little something for all sizes of shops.
Another excellent video, and timely for me personally!
Educative and entertaining! Love your content
I appreciate that!
In waiting for a Tom Hardy Bane reference "no one cared about who I was until I put on the mask" but alas matrix is a classic. Such good timing, I'm working on my own diary collection for a much smaller shop but good to get ideas.
Thank you.
Theres a few more I can offer: you can frequently find 4" PVC pipes with a slight flare at one end (so you can daisy chain them). Make sure the flared end points TOWARDS the tool.
That same trick you use with the heat gun will let you bend the pipes. Get a couple 4" end caps and put them on BEFORE bending but AFTER heating. The air pressure inside the pipe remains constant and the pipe can't collapse or pinch this way). Doing this minimizes the number of joints to as few as possible (decreased joints in my system by almost 2/3), AND minimizes the disruption to the air flow, both on the curves and straightaways (this is why you want the FLARED END pointing AWAY from the DC).
Finally, find some heat shrink boat tape. It's 4-6" wide, applies like duct tape, but seals and shrinks to form fit with a heat gun. It's easily removable, but is as tight as silicone. It's used by boat manufacturers to shrink wrap boats after completion, so if they're stored in a high salt environment they stay sealed and corrosion free (they combine this with those rolls of shrink wrap plastic, then run the whole shebang under long heating poles. Not relevant, just interesting). It's maybe 15 bucks a roll (eBay) and one roll will do a 1800 sq. ft shop (i speak from experience).
Oh, bonus tip: run as many branches from your DC as possible, right at the DC. Like an octopus. This way there's only one dust gate to worry about and you don't have all that standing air in the closed branches' Venturi effects jacking up your active branch. Every time your system forks, even if one branch is closed off at the end (by the tool, I mean), all the "dead air" in the branch still gets tugged into circulation by the air sweeping PAST it. If you cannot branch many times from the DC, then EVERY fork splitting from the main trunk should have its own blast gate. You want the smallest amount of dead air introducing eddy currents as possible (it's as disruptive as flex hose).
Finally: it's close to Halloween. Buy a smoke machine. They're like 30 bucks. Stick your tools hose into it and you'll find EVERY leak in your system in minutes without causing any harm to it. If you can find the red smoke, use that. Barring that, get some uv-reactive chalk (~$4.99) and powder it. Suck it up with your system and take a black light to your joints. Same principle.
Thank you very much. Those are some really good tips. Awesome.
You merely adopted the dark, I was born in it… um wait…. What you know you can’t explain, but you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life. Never mind viewer your dust collection system is woefully inadequate, here are two dozen pro tips. TY Mike for sharing another great video.
Ha! Thank you.
Look at that wind swept hair! You clearly use the same barber I do! 😜
Great tips.. Thank you for sharing..
Tip 16, except we have dust collectors set up for each tool. We just got the Oneida Gorilla Pro 5hp dust collector with 7" hoses for our CNC. But it's a full sized cabinet shop, like 12.5k sq ft. Anyhow, very well done video my friend.
Thank you.
Very good information regarding dust control and how not to breathe in wood dust - which is a known carcinogen. Top tip, Mike: if you want to minimize dust inhalation, shave your beard. OSHA recommends being clean-shaven prior to donning any type of dust mask, including a full-face or half-mask respirator. The really fine dust has a good chance of getting in between your beard hairs and the mask.
I know, maybe you won’t look quite as macho, but you may increase your chance of not dying from lung cancer at a relatively young age.
Thank you. I believe that is too fine of a point. When I cover the inlet on this mask and breath in, a fairly good seal is created.
Another ambient air filtration option for small shops are box fans. I run 2 of them and are made by Lasko. They came with changeable 20x20x1 inch filters and are purpose made for air filtration. They work extremely well in my 2 car garage and the filters are cheap.
Good tip for sure. I wanted to present a different approach in my video. There are plenty of great videos on the box fan and filter setup.
Love it. Great video as always Mike
While the ambient air cleaner idea you have is a great one , the one draw back is that in a shop you’re size you are not pulling anywhere near enough cfm to give required air changeovers needed to adequately filter the air.
I would push back on this. I made two of these, and based on my particle meter the air quality is pretty darn good in my shop, and improves fairly quickly when I turn them both on. The rest of my dust collection game is pretty good, so there isn't a ton of stress on these filters.
@@MikeFarrington well if it is that’s a pleasant surprise . I have two 1350 cfm air cleaners with a suggested air changeover rate of 10-12 air exchanges an hour and 1850 sq/ft shop. I couldn’t imagine going to units that small and achieving 10 exchanges per hour.
@@northernhumidor5615 10-12 exchanges is an arbitrary number picked by a marketing department. Your shop may need more, it may need less. The only way to know for sure is to get a partial meter. The 1350 number is also a number developed by a marketing department. My guess is the real world number is lots lower, especially when the filter is slightly loaded. I'm not saying these filters are better or worse, but they have been tested in my shop. So I know how useful they are.
I'm having shop envy right now. Mine is an 8x12 shed I turned into a shop. I built carts for my bigger machines, table saw, band saw, planer and joiner so I could roll them outside so I have room to work.
Thank you.
Another excellent video, well done!
Alot of great tips and a loot to keep in mind although I don't really mind the old style face mask and I really like the quick latch
Thank you. Good point.
Excellent advice and tips! Thank you for the video
FWIW, Mathias Wandel just pointed out that you're better off moving the fan a bit away from the window because of fluid dynamics.
Good tip.
When it comes to metric vs imperial ducting you can pretty much go by 4" = 10cm or 100mm witch is a fairly common one. The other common dimensions are 50mm, 75mm, 125mm 150mm and 200mm which is 2", 3", 5" ,6" and 8". So basically 1" is almost 25 mm or more precisely 25,4mm so it's pretty close. Then you can use the heating pvc ducting trick you mentioned earlier to get it to fit precisley since it's pretty close compared to the metric ducting dimensions. The one off is normal vacume hoses that in metric are generally 40 mm for shop vacs and maybe 32mm for normal household vacuum cleaners.
Totally agree unless you are a good chunk off in size. I have plumbed my shop using 4, 6, and 8" ducts. So when I get the random 120mm port, I need a way to size it up to 6" Thats where the donuts come in.
The new face mask, I got one 5 months ago what an improvement over the cartridges, I totally agree…….
Thank you.
Nice one Mike!
Glad you enjoyed it
My god, you've launched a full scale war against dust in your shop!
Dust is the enemy.
Agreed, perspective is key when it comes to the risks of anything. Follow the white rabbit down that dust collection hole.
Thanks Jason.
Cool shot of the storm. I was at Red Rocks for Nine Inch Nails when that storm blew in. Didn't touch us but made for a hell of a light show on top of of what NIN was already doing.
I think the only way to have made that storm better would be to have been at a NIN concert. Thats a once in a lifetime event. Did they cover Cars? I love their version of that song.
@@MikeFarrington they didn't. Played plenty of 90s Era. Some from the 2000s. Some I didn't know. Good show. I heard the Saturday show was better. But whatever. We got the mother nature light show to boot. Btw, keep up the great work with the videos. They're very informative and your commentary hits me in the 90s sweet spot.
@@SweetSillyFun Nothing better than 90s NIN.
@8:00 Dammit. Now I have to vacuum the shop! :) Also, the "Bane/Bain thumbnail was perfect" Every time I put on my Trend Stealth mask, I go into a little batman/bain voice! LOL
Thank you. I do Bane overtime as well.
Great video!
Thanks!
Tip number one should be: Move your dust collector outside, negates the need for expensive filters and cleaning them, reduces noise. Cons: Negative pressure and loss of conditioned air. Good tips, thanks!
Excellent tip!
Ooh this is a fantastic idea!
Thanks
When sweeping a floor you can sprinkle or spray water on the floor as you sweep. It clumps all the dust on the floor into small clumps and lessens the amount of dust that ends up in the air when sweeping
Great video Mike ! Tons of useful info. 5 inch flex-hose fits on Felder 120mm ports without too much finagling, but those adapters are genius. I like your anemometer idea for hose diameter vs. air speed, esp. at altitude. Yeah, Bill Pentz' writings were a real wake-up call. After seeing you and J. Bates both use an air quality mon, it's on my list now, LOL. Love those skyline time-lapse shots. Front Range ? thanks again man . . .
120mm is very uncommon 125mm is probably the one they use. Though it might be somewhat under 125mm if it's designed to be used by a 125mm flexhose around it. Which is basically 2mm smaler then a 5" so that would work with a hose clamp that you tighten a little more. The hose he used was already 4" which is about 100mm so the port on hios machine were most likley 75mm which would be about 3".
Thank you. The air quality meter has really been a big help. It has given me a much better understanding of where dust is being created, if you can afford it, I think its worth it. 5" flex is easy enough, problem is on the other end, I have used 4" and 6" duct, so I would need to track down other fittings, so I just end up making the donuts. Yes, Front Range.
Got some pretty damn nice lightning in your area............
Yeah, we get those a few times per year.
"I watched the Matrix recently and couldn't help myself" is a great t-shirt idea.
Haha! I agree.
Great video with a lot of very helpful information. I am interested in building my own air filtration unit and wondered if you could share about the noise level produced by the fans on your cylinder dust filters. Considering that type as well as the furnace squirrel cage style.
I have no idea how to describe the noise level. I work with ear buds in, so I don't hear them at all. I will say this, the inline fans are designed to be used in homes, so they are typically pretty quiet.
Your last tip about 2 45 ells on the pvc, use a long turn 90 or a conduit 90 and they are really long sweeps.
Thats a great tip, however, those are like 200 bucks.
Mike, thank you for sharing your experience! I appreciate you adding all the links to each tip. Does the Shop Apprentice build custom floor accessories?
Thank you. He sure does. Ha!