I guess its time to take back my shop from the dust. I have acquired some bigger tools through the years and dragging around my HF dust collector is not cutting it anymore. I am in the market for a collector. I know that I want something in the 2-3 hp range with a cyclone. I am looking at the JDS 2hp, the Laguna 3hp and several of the Grizzlys. My question is how accurate do you believe the manufactures ratings are. For example the JDS says it runs at 1700 cfm and the Laguna is around 2200. None of the grizzlies are anywhere close to those kind of ratings. I am planning on buying a collector that will allow for me to run bigger tools yet in the future.
What are your thoughts and am I missing a manufacturer with a good machine around the 1200-1600 range.
In my opinion there is not a nickels worth of difference between all the collectors claiming 2hp and with a single filter bag on top with a plastic bag on the bottom. In that category, HF rules the value niche.
I personally find most everything Laguna sells is over priced and from what I hear their customer service sucks, so that's a no-brainer for me.
That leaves me with deciding between Grizzly, Clearview, Omega and Penn State for cyclone collectors. I think Grizzly has a good reputation and a competitive price in this category so my chouce would be between Grizzly and what ever the best deal I could get from one of these others.
CFM ratings don't mean squat without corresponding pressure ratings. Best is a fan curve graph. You can see at a glance what CFM you get at any given pressure. That is a tool you can work with to design a good system.
I won't argue with Crank's points. My personal choice would be a CV, but a lot of folks don't like the DIY stuff that goes with it. Next to that would be the Griz, and the G0441 falls right into your criteria. Be sure you have the ceiling height for it. Be aware that getting the top performance from such a unit also requires a ducting system that will support it, that usually means 6" lines and the duct work cost can be considerable.
I picked up a gently used grizzly 2hp pretty cheap on Craigslist. Put a baffle under it, and vented the blower straight out the wall (granted, not everyone can do that). I've yet to see any visible dust outside. My biggest cost was 6" pvc and accessories. I am very pleased with the set up.
The ratings are WAY OVERRATED. If you are in the $1500 range there is now better choice than the clearvue.
I challenge any other manufacturer ti do this.
I think for the price and the quality, the Penn State tempest cyclones are the best on the market right now. I have a 5hp clearvue and it's great, but if I wanted to save some $$ and still get an excellent cyclone, I'd go with the 3hp tempest.
Thanks for the input I am still shopping, I have it narrowed down between three Grizzly, tempest and clearvue. I would love to run the grngate system with it so that may limit me to 3 hp machine. Problem with grizzly is they say a min. 40 amp circuit…not sure how I feel abou that.
Beiser, I run my 5 HP cyclone on a 30 amp circuit and it isn't even close to exceeding that. It's hard to imagine why Griz would call for a 40 amp on anything that size or smaller.
Maybe I weird, but I don't see what all the fuss is about with the automatic BG. I would rather have a large DC that does it right, than some fancy BG and a smaller unit, and have more money invested in the later. With a starting price at $500, that buys a lot of other tools that can do something I can't. I can open a blast gate. Sorry this post was not meant to sound angry, it's just my thoughts.
We are in the DC evolution process ourselves. We have a Delta 5 hp Cyclone Leeson motor. It runs a 14" impeller which I have considered swapping out for a 16" impeller.
But to your question, I think I would stay with 5 hp and not go less. Just for my needs but I would want as much power running the impeller that I can reasonably have. Some machines will call for a minimum spec on DC.
So considering you options, while I have been impressed with the CV product offering, I think for the money I likely would go with the 5 hp Tempest as I am certain it will meet and exceed you needs / expectations.
Oh, and we run our 5 hp DC on a 30 amp breaker. I think the motor is only 20 amps which would be about right on a 5 hp motor.
The Penn State Tempest S 2.5 Hp Cyclone will give you 1000 CFM at any one open 6" gate within 35' of well designed 6" duct at only 13 amps on 220. Only requiring a 20 amp circuit. For a one man shop one gate at a time is all you need.
Thanks for all the imput, my first thought with the blast gates is simply ease of use, I have a tendency to always be "moving" and I know my weakness will be loosing the remote or just quickly thinking one cut won't hurt anything. My shop is only 14×24 so I will have short runs of pipe. I am with you guys on the breaker just saw that on Grizzlies specs
There is another measurement in flow device that is important, that is pressure, or in a negative pressure "vacuum".
That, in the case of a dust collectors range would be measured in inches of water with a manometer.
The claims of specific CFM, but with no pressure measurement, and through a given size tube doesn't mean a whole lot.
An example could be a 4 barrel automotive carburetor that has a rated flow of 400 CFM at a pressure of perhaps 12" of water.
But, a tiny carb for a Honda 90 bike will flow 400 CFM at 90 inches of water. I did that once for fun on a flow bench. The little carb got hot from the friction of the air moving through it.
I am dealing with dust collection now. My main problems are with a larger planer and shaper. There having perhaps 1200 CFM of flow, is doing a poor job of dust collecting, as the pressure or depression is not high enough, allowing dust to escape.
I have noticed that some manufacturers have started listing a certain CFM and a what vacuum that was achieve. The problem lies in lack of industry accepted standardized testing. There are so many variables that a standardized test could help remove from the equation to let the customer be able to compare apples to apples instead of kiwi to watermelon.
Back in the 1990s during the "buy an attitude" Harley craze, I jumped into cylinder head flowing. I got through it, made money, and dont have any tattoos.
I did a lot of research in flow dynamics. I remember reading about dust collection in factories. Some of that was to help reduce the power cost of doing it.
One of the problems is sharp bends in the pipes, the less sharp bends the better. Bends cause the flow to become turbulent, and reduce the effectiveness-flow.
In one study it was suggested adding a shark fin shaped piece extending about to the center of the pipe to help the flow become laminar again just after the bend. I have seen that done on the intake ports on aftermarket cylinder heads.
A friend does commercial cook lines for schools. On those, they use hoods that also provide make up air. That is the direction I think would be better for me, I want to vent outside rather then filter the air coming out of the dust collector. And not causing a negative air pressure in my shop.
Thanks for all the advice, I decided to order the clear vue
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