Dust Collection Frankenstein
/Thanksgiving weekend, my shop vac “dust collection” system went kaput. I’ve been wanting to upgrade to something more powerful, more of a dust collector than dust spreader, and my shop vac setup failing was the catalyst I needed.
Now, what I found out along the way, but didn’t realize before I went to Harbor Freight and picked myself up a new 1HP dust collector, was that my little shop vac thing wasn’t actually dead…I didn’t recall putting one of those shop vac dust collector bags in the 5 gallon container last winter, and suffice to say, that thing was FULL. I thought that all of the sawdust was getting dropped into my Home Depot bucket cyclone. I was mistaken. No matter, I went ahead and took the shop vac down from where it was mounted and moved it into the other garage bay to be used for more shop vac appropriate cleanup.
Lessons were learned, and I got to surfing YouTube to decide how I wanted to rig this thing up. I knew that I wanted a cyclone separator and some sort of air filter. I found several videos and took ideas from several different ones.
My setup is as follows:
1HP Harbor Freight Portable Dust collector
Galvanized trash can with Thien Baffle attached to the lid
PVC for ducting
26”H x 13.5”diameter nanofilter
20’ clear 4” dust collection hose
24” floor sweep
2 blast gates
Thumb screw bridged hose clamps
Various 4” dust collection fittings
Gamma seal bucket lid
Home Depot 5 gallon bucket
I told my dad what I was doing and he said he had a bunch of 4” PVC left over from his old dust collection system, so I took that off his hands because I’m his favorite (only) daughter.
I ran the PVC up high along one wall of the garage, with two downspouts for collection. One for my table saw and other tools, the other for a dedicated floor sweep. Each of these have blast gates that can be opened or closed depending on what’s in use.
The PVC then runs down into the galvanized trash can that I outfitted with a Thien baffle to separate the dust, similar to what is shown in this vintage Stumpy Nubs video. I cut out two holes in the lid and inserted a 90 degree elbow that will be where the dust enters, swirls around, drops to the bottom of the can, and then the air goes out through another PVC coupling at the center top of the lid. I used silicone to caulk all the fittings to make it airtight, and added foam weather stripping around the top of the lid where it will attach to the can to hopefully get a decent seal.
The PVC then runs up through the center of the trash can lid and connects to the dust collection motor intake with some corrugated 4” pipe because it came with the stuff I stole from my dad and I don’t waste shit. From the motor, the outlet goes through a piece of the 4” flexible hose to a contraption I built for the filter.
The filter is open on both ends, so I used a 14”x16” piece of plywood and cut a hole in the center. I used sheet metal screws to screw the filter to the plywood and attached a flanged 4” hose fitting to the top for the hose connection, and sealed it with silicone. I added a back with a french cleat, and two sides to give it some more stability.
I cut out the center of the gamma seal lid and screwed that to the bottom of the filter. The mating portion of the gamma seal lid just snaps onto the 5 gallon bucket and screws into the bottom of the filter to capture any dust that makes it through the cyclone and into the filter.
The motor for the dust collector had 4 holes for casters (this is supposed to be portable), so I used bolts to bolt it onto another piece of plywood. On the back of the motor panel, I attached french cleats so I could easily mount it to the wall.
Once everything was hooked up, I plugged it in and gave it a test run and OMG what a difference! Holy suction, Batman! I sucked up all the dust I had around the shop and the HD bucket was empty, so it’s working as expected. So what if it’s a little bit of a Frankenstein? If it keeps my shop clean, that’s all I care about! Now I can finally get back to making stuff!
