Basement shop - dealing with the furnace

Dust is a huge issue. Dust can explode—- it happens, thankfully not often. That said, you can never be too safe.

You can get a small dust collector for not too much money. I’d really look into doing this. Probably could get a small dust collector for less than it would take to wall in the furnace.

Be good about watching your filter and keeping them clean.

Anything you can do to decrease dust by the furnace and in the house as a whole is a good thing.

Good luck and welcome to the slippery slope of woodworking!

-- Betsy - GO BUCKS!

sry,

My shop is also in the basement and shares the space with an oil fired, hot air furnace. My dust collection consists of and ambient air filtration/circulation and a basement window blower to pull air out of the shop.

The biggest problem I face is to remember not to run the window unit in the winter. If the furnace kicks on, the widow unit pulls exhaust fumes into to basement instead of going up the chimney.

Before anyone chastises me, it has only happened once- my wife came home and reset the thermostat. I was wearing my dust mask and didn’t notice the smell. I put 2 smoke detectors near the furnace to alert me if it were to happen again.

Even with all your efforts, I suspect your wife will notice an increase in the amount of dusting she will be having you do.

Lew

Sry,
First off what I would do is seal off the furnace room (only if you have access to a outside wall) with a door that you can put a seal on like weather stripping. Then go to a supplier for furnaces and buy a Barometric Damper they will need the make, model, BTU rating of your furnace. This information will tell them what size damper you need. The damper goes in the outside wall to bring in outside air when the furnace starts up. The furnace needs whats called “combustion air” to prduce the flame. Next while your at the funace spplier check on 4” or 5” pleated filters, they provide you with frame sizes required to install the filter into the return air. If you don’t feel comfartable doing this your self you should be able to find a compamy to do this for about $300 – $400.
This would take care of both your problems safely, and keep the wife healthy. You still need to have a dust collection system. $300 – $400 may sound like a lot but thats only a couple of trips to the Dr’s office with allergy problems.
I used to do HVAC/R for a living.

-- Ed Collinge- Edmonds, WA.

My furnace is in my shop and I haven’t had an issue with it. My wife has a lot of allergies and asthma as well and it doesn’t seem to affect her more. No more dust thoughout the house either. Perhaps I have a fantastic furnace; not sure, I’m not really up on that sort of thing. Or perhaps I’ll have problems in the future; we have only spent one winter here. I’ll stay tuned to this topic though. Maybe I should take some preventative measures.