# Advice needed for small shop dust collection... what is best choice under $1000?



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

Ok, I have been agonizing over what dust collection equipment to buy for too long now, so I am asking for recommendations. I have read as many posts as I could find here, spent hours reading specs, and of course Youtube fun too.

My shop in the basement is in the same room as my furnace, water heater, a refrigerator, the basement stairs, my 12 by 10 ft "music studio", my Zenbot 24×48 CNC router, my Rikon 14 inch Deluxe band saw, my 6×48 Grizzly vertical sander, my drill press, and my 36×72 inch work bench, and two storage racks, and a bunch of basses and their cases, and a 60×30 inch metal school table. The whole room is 18 feet wide by 30 feet deep. The ceiling is 7 feet tall. And everyone in my family is tired of listening to my old Craftsman 16 gallon 2.5 Peak hp shop vac run for hours on the CNC stuff.

So,
I don't have much space…
And I need something quiet…
And I don't have a wall to hang anything on…
And with the furnace ductwork under the 7 foot ceiling, it has to be short!

But I got about $1000 coming in soon.

Any suggestions would be very much appreciated!


----------



## crank49 (Apr 7, 2010)

Unfortunately, small and powerful and quiet are three things that almost never happen together.
You can usually find any two of those properties without the other one.
So, you an have small and powerful, but it will be loud.
Or, you might find powerful and quiet, but it will be large.
Etc.
I would probably go for a 2hp Harbor Freight dust collector combined with a shop air filter.
The filter can run all the time you are in the shop and has a very low power requirement and is low noise.
The collector is designed to fit through a standard door so it is less than 7 ft tall.
If you shop carefully you can get both of these items for less than $500 and that leaves you with $500 to spend on a Fein or Dewalt dust extractor. These three tools will handle about any thing you need.
Use the extractor for sanding, routing, and sawing.
Use the collector for planeing, jointing and big sawing.
Then run the filter all the time.


----------



## rwe2156 (May 7, 2014)

Dittos on what crank ^ said. Excellent suggestions.

I would only add that you need to check the furnace and/or air handler make sure it is well sealed or build a closet around it to keep dust from getting into your central house system.

BTW if you can get hold of a coupon the HF dc is on sale right now. 
Also be aware a 120V motor that size it will need its own circuit (personally I would change motor to 240).


----------



## bearkatwood (Aug 19, 2015)

That reminds me of the saying,

Done well,
Done quick,
Done cheap,
Pick two.

Getting it all just doesn't happen.
You can find many dust collectors for under $1,000. The really expensive part is the piping and blast gates.


----------



## tomsteve (Jan 23, 2015)

maybe think about a sound proofed closet for the dc.


----------



## WoodNSawdust (Mar 7, 2015)

I have the expanded HF dc with the Wynn filter and the super dust deputy plastic cyclone. If you were closer I would offer to sell it to you and use the money to buy a more powerful dc. As Brian said there is a real expense to the piping and blast gates especially if you want anything bigger than 4 inch.


----------



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

Interesting suggestions. I don't see myself installing ducting or blast gates though, I need everything to be as portable as possible, I cannot do two things at once, all my stuff except the drill press (which I forgot to mention) is on wheels, even the CNC setup. And I also forgot to mention I do have a home made 3 filter air scrubber.

Also, I don't have a problem wiring the AC. I just installed a backup generator panel, and my main panel is actually in the shop!

One thing I've always wondered about is why is it there are no horizontal dust collectors? It would be great to be able to have say a system with ~1200CFM and maybe ~10 inch lift that would fit under my CNC machine. The area under it is about 3 ft by 5 ft by 2 1/2 feet and is completely wasted, I just have a shelf under it for hose storage.

But I see most dust collectors use gravity to great advantage, thus we see vertical systems, not horizontal ones.


----------



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

Seems many people mod the HF 2hp. I was going to stay away from it after buyiing the smaller one with the 30 micron bag, 650 cfm wasn't pulling hardly any dust, even with the stock 30 micron bag, and the quality of the unit I got was questionable, I had a bit of bolt tightening and straightening work to do to get it right. But, one thing I really liked was it is really quiet, about 71 dbA by my meter.

How does the HF 2hp compare noise wise? For my budget witht eh HF 2HP on sale right now for $209.99, I can afford some pretty intense modding I suspect! Like a cannister filter on top from Wynn and an internal baffle of somekind.


----------



## agallant (Jul 1, 2010)

I don't remember my HF being all that loud in my 16X18 shop


----------



## a1Jim (Aug 9, 2008)

I would suggest having your DC outside ,DC and open flames on water heaters and furnaces could be an explosive combination. Build a small little shed house. outside and run the ducting inside,this will also eliminate the need of having to have to modify the filtration. HF units work great and you can use HF's 20% off coupon to lower the price even more.


----------



## Notw (Aug 7, 2013)

Even though I have done a lot of "mods" to my harbor freight dust collector and it works well for me, I think if I had a $1k budget I might have to look real hard at the new jet cyclone dust collectors. They start at $1049 which is a bit high but i think it would be worth it. I am thinking about swapping my Thein collector out for a cyclone, if you are interested in my setup check out my blog.


----------



## Holbs (Nov 4, 2012)

Yep…single canister dust collection enclosed with sound absorption material (you know..the triangular stuff you see in sound rooms to break up the high frequencies) built around knock down walls. That will "help" with motor whining. A single 6" HVAC main feed to get over to the general area of your machines (since you already have HVAC there already). Possibly more sound absorption material along the ceiling here and there. Can pick up the HF one or see what's around on craigslist (I picked up my 3HP dual bag grizzly for $250). Should not cost more than $500. Or as Jim says… DC outside (which I just might do this coming summer).


----------



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

Notw, I read your blog. I am curious, why didn't you place the impeller/motor assembly right on top of your separator? Was it for access or was it for some other reason?

And thanks all for the suggestions, but ducting outside or building a shed is prohibited locally, and I live next to one policeman, and back up to another, and don't wish to push my luck… I get feedback already from the bass playing I do!


----------



## nerdbot (Sep 3, 2014)

Perhaps it's just my particular 2HP HF DC but mine is about as loud as my 12 gallon 5.5HP shop vac. I was a little disappointed since I heard real dust collectors are much quieter than shop vacs. I even broke out a cheapo decibel meter and just a few quick tests showed them to be roughly the same.

The other day while at a woodworking demo, I noticed a Jet DC was pretty quiet - I was sitting pretty close to it and I could still hear the instructor. Granted - it may have been a smaller DC and the room was much bigger than my garage, but it still made me wonder.


----------



## nerdbot (Sep 3, 2014)

Just checked out Jet's website - looks like it was a 1HP DC, so that may have been the difference.


----------



## MT_Stringer (Jul 21, 2009)

I have the HF DC in my one car garage. The filter is one from Wynn Environmental. I also have a 30 gallon drum upstream of the fan with a Thein separator inside it.


----------



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

I have to say, the HF sytems I've seen in LJ have one thing in common… nothing! There are so many different designs!... This is a great site folks, I could just click through the posts all day and get nothing done!

That being said, there is some good news for me recently. I am negotiating to swap my current room in the basement for my original 500 sq. ft. workshop room that I used to have the shop in when I had every tool imaginable, including a dual bag 1 micron DC. But this is a way down the road… :-(


----------



## 8iowa (Feb 7, 2008)

In my 1/2 of a garage shop in Gainesville I have a little less than 200 sq. ft. to work in. This Shopsmith dust collector occupies less than 4 sq. ft. I've "tucked" it back in the corner by the garage door. With a 16 foot 2 1/2 inch hose it easily reaches any tool in my shop. It's very quiet. No one in the house can hear it running.

The cost is only about half of your $1000 budget and this includes the accessories. Used units go for around $250 on eBay. My unit dates back to the mid 80's and still works perfectly. I believe that it draws about 5 amps. It has ample capacity (cubic ft. per Min.) to handle my planer, joiner, or saw.

It's also made in the USA.

http://i255.photobucket.com/albums/hh130/8iowa/001.jpg[/IMG][/URL[/URL]]


----------



## MT_Stringer (Jul 21, 2009)

The thing about the HF collector is it is reasonably priced. I paid $149 when it was on sale and they accepted the 20% discount coupon.


----------



## TTF (Sep 13, 2009)

I have the same modified HF setup on my 20×30 shop. It works well, but it's pretty loud. I have it in a closet, which cuts the noise way down.


----------



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

Just stumbled upon the Oneida cyclone "shop vac" "Industrial Dust Cobra 17 Gal HEPA Dust Extractor". It's a bit over my budget, but, it is listed at 73dba, has a .3 micron filter and has an extremely small foot print (20×20 in.), and works off 110 volts. The CFM is low, 245, but the static pressure is 23in.

Probably kicks but ovewr my old 2.5hp Craftsman shop vac, which currently works really well with my CNC machine, except the noise level is ~87dba!

I can't find any reviews here on it though. Which is curious in itself!


----------



## CharleyL (Mar 10, 2009)

I went a different way. I also have a small shop (14 X 26'), but it's in a separate out building and I have way too many tools for the space, so not much chance of wedging in a big dust collector and piping anywhere, so I have been using a Shop Vac for years. It worked somewhat, but it was noisy, clumsy, too big, and frequently in the way.

Then a few years ago they major remodeled the house next door to me, taking almost everything out of the shell of the house and putting in new. One day during this remodeling I saw the central vacuum unit being carried out to the dumpster by the owner, and I yelled to him and asked for it. He brought it over and gave it to me. Then he went back, climbed down into the dumpster and brought out the 25' hose and all of the attachments. Over the next few days the vacuum piping and inlets were also delivered to my shop.

I cleaned it up, put a cord and plug on it and plugged it in. The suction was tremendous, when compared to my Shop Vac, but the filter in it was just a floppy disk of filter fabric permanently attached to the inside of the vacuum above the bottom collection can. In using the vacuum for sanding, this fabric filter would plug fairly quickly, so this wasn't my best idea to use this vacuum in my wood shop in it's original form. A short time later a friend was closing his commercial shop and he offered me an Oneida Dust Deputy. It's a small plastic cyclone that is intended for use with a Shop Vac to separate out the sawdust and chips before they reach the Shop Vac. It fastens to a lidded pail and the dust and chips end up in it instead of in the Shop Vac. I immediately saw a future for the central vacuum unit that I had and mounted it in the attic of my wood shop. I used the piping and inlets that I had been given, but ended up needing to buy some additional fittings and pipe. I installed one inlet in center of the the side wall of my shop, one inlet in the attic of my shop, and one inlet in the outside wall of my shop near where I park my cars, so I can also use it to clean my cars and truck. The Dust Deputy sits next to the central vacuum unit in the attic of my shop on a re-claimed metal 30 gallon grease drum and separates out 99+% of everything that is vacuumed up. Any super fine dust that gets past the Dust Deputy and the filter in the central vacuum gets piped out doors through the wall, so I never have to worry about breathing it. At this point I had spent about $126 for this whole vacuum system, including the Dust Deputy and I had a complete working vacuum system.

This is in no way a true wood shop dust collector, but most of my projects and tools don't really need the high volume dust collection capability of a true dust collector. I'm usually doing sanding, drilling, routing, or scroll sawing to make the sawdust or I'm cleaning the floor. I have hooks on my 8' shop ceiling in key places so I can easily route the vacuum hose to several different tool locations, or I can take it down and add attachments for cleaning the shop floor or to use it outside to clean the cars and truck. I've made it a very flexible system.

The two major dust/chip producers in my shop are my Unisaw and my DeWalt 735 planer. I don't even try to use my vacuum system to collect the saw dust and chips from them, but I did vacuum all of the saw dust out of the bottom of my Unisaw with the system right after I had finished installing it. I got about 5 gallons of saw dust out of the Unisaw and all of it ended up getting separated out by the Dust Deputy. None of it was in the central vacuum unit. The cabinet under the Unisaw catches most of the sawdust from it and I've decided to continue shoveling it out about 2X per year. The DeWalt planer gets taken outside when I use it (there's no room in the shop to use it). It's on a Delta Miter Saw/Planer folding stand, so it's easy to store it on end in the corner of the shop or take out and lift it into using position in the driveway when it's needed. I have the DeWalt hose/drum cover option for the 735 to collect the chips, but the dust from it goes through this cover fabric and into the out doors air and none of it gets into my shop. Any dust that gets into the air in my shop is filtered out by a high quality filter that I put in my window style heat pump that is installed high and through the North facing wall of my shop. It not only heats and cools the shop, but acts like a ceiling mounted type air filter for me. I clean or replace this filter about every month.

So in a small way I have a complete small shop dust management system that seems to be working very well for me. With the unit upstairs in the shop attic I sometimes need to turn off the tool that I'm using, or unplug the vacuum hose from the wall inlet, so that I can listen to tell if it's even running,. As of now I have about 20% of the drum filled with saw dust and debris, and I've been working 4-8 hours per day 4-5 days per week all Summer in my shop, mostly using my two scroll saws. There is absolutely nothing visible in the collection can on the bottom of the central vacuum unit.

Charley


----------



## huyz (Jan 16, 2016)

> I would suggest having your DC outside ,DC and open flames on water heaters and furnaces could be an explosive combination. Build a small little shed house. outside and run the ducting inside,this will also eliminate the need of having to have to modify the filtration. HF units work great and you can use HF s 20% off coupon to lower the price even more.
> 
> - a1Jim


Is explosion a pretty big concern with this setup inside? If I move mine outside, will an extra 10-20ft of tubing reduce efficiency of the system by a lot?


----------



## a1Jim (Aug 9, 2008)

Huyz
Yes explosions are a possibility and yes longer runs create more static pressure making your DC less efficient than shorter runs,whether it is a real problem is determined by what kind and size of ducting you use and what you're using the DC for. For me the additional safety factor and noise reduction plus saving the floor space is worth the effort.


----------



## BobAnderton (Oct 5, 2010)

So, I looked into the Harbor Freight 2HP dust collector pretty seriously a while back. I was going to combine it with the super dust deputy from Oneida and a Wynn filter. I realized that even though I would have gotten the dust collector cheap by the time I added the filter, the cyclone, the hose, remote, etc I would have spent about $700. The thing is, that Harbor Freight dust collector is only spinning a 10" impeller. It spins at 3450 RPM, which is the induction motor speed, and all models will, but every other 1.5-2 HP dust collector will be spinning a 13-14" impeller. That *really* matters because the the airflow is a function of the fan tip speed and that goes up as the square of the impeller diameter. I have no idea why they paired a (supposedly) 2HP motor to a 10" impeller but it performs the worst of any of the 1.5-2HP collectors in this Wood Magazine article.









By the time you have some piping and flex hose, tooling ports, and a cyclone separator you're looking at 6-7 inches of static pressure, and the CFM of the HF blower is really falling off fast in that range, getting down to about 200 CFM. All the other models are pulling twice that CFM when faced with that static pressure.

For the same $700 investment you could get something like this Grizzly 1.5 (real) HP unit with a 14" impeller and integrated cyclone and remote switch and have something with a lot better resale value down the road. It'll pull a lot more CFM than the Harbor Freight solution.


----------



## Yonak (Mar 27, 2014)

With $1000 to spend, you should be able to get a small dust collector and an air filter to help minimize the dust on everything else in the area, if you look for used.


----------



## kelvancra (May 4, 2010)

IF you go Harbor Freight or other system with poor filtration, plan on spending money for after market bags that filter better.

For example, I have a three horse, four bag system (switched to plastic Home Depot bags for the bottoms) and replaced the ones it came with with one micron bags (better yet, go for .5). There is a reason people call these "dust pumps." This can be best seen by walking over to my little Delta and tapping the upper bag. If you do, dust doesn't just fall, you can see it billow. Not so with the three horse.

Money well spent.

Next, if you are not going to build your own, look at the Super Dust Deputy. I've emptied my thirty gallon drum under it four times. Meanwhile, the collector only has a cup of dust in it.

[Meanwhile, consider the Bob Anderton approach, above. Note the bag, which is not designed to hold dust, because the cyclone grabs it, instead.]


----------



## builtinbkyn (Oct 29, 2015)

Bob I don't think $700 is even remotely close to being needed to improve the HF collector. I have yet to install the Wynn filter or even make a Thein for it and it's doing just fine for me. In a small shop with one machine running at a time with a single dedicated connection and no blast gates or pipe bends, it doesn't miss much and I can't imagine anything being much better.

Today I ran the t.s., jointer, miter saw and planer. It didn't leave anything behind that another, more expensive unit wouldn't. This is what it collected today. Bag was nearly empty at the start. Nothing to speak of, in terms of uncollected dust or chips were left around the shop.










The runs are short to each machine and it's only a single connection via hose directly to the collector. I don't think a small shop needs anything more. If the OP were to run hard pipe to each machine, I could see the need for something more powerful, but that doesn't sound like the plan.


----------



## OSU55 (Dec 14, 2012)

As for airflow with the HF 2hp DC, I measured mine with a vane anemometer. Wynn filter, Thien cyclone, 10 ft long 4" dia flex hose, 465 CFM available at the hose inlet where it connects to a machine.


----------



## BobAnderton (Oct 5, 2010)

Thanks for the real world measurement OSU55. Looking at the fan curve I posted it's above 400 cfm in the 5-6 inches of static pressure range. Maybe that's closer to what your setup is creating. I was estimating 6-7 inches based on spreadsheets on Bill Pentz's site, but I didn't have any real measurements of my own. Also, thanks Bill, for your actual experience with the unit. I think most of the HF mods are turning them into 2 stage units so that most of the dust doesn't make it to the filter, causing the flow rate to drop as the filter gets dirty. Those mods add $ and static pressure generally but preserve the filter.


----------



## builtinbkyn (Oct 29, 2015)

NP Bob. I realize my post is anecdotal, but I really can't imagine where I would benefit more from a higher priced unit - at least not at this time with how I'm running the system using a single, direct connection to the operating machine.

The bag filter will get changed out to a Wynn filter I have, that's still in the box. I think I'll also build a Thien separator. Hopefully it's not wasted time in that it will actually reduce the efficiency I'm already experiencing.

The fine particulates that are the real health issue are ever present in a shop environment IMO. Only a quality respirator can deal with those. Again, that's just my feeling on the subject. I have no real data to support it. I think a lot of those particles spin off cutting blades and get dispersed into the room before any collector can deal with them effectively. There may be less of them, but I feel no machine will be 100%, so there's always a health risk.

As for the volume of sound coming from the HF DC, well it doesn't seem to be any louder than the collectors that were used in the community shop I had access to. I don't recall what they were, but they could be heard equally as well as all of the machines that were running simultaneously.



> Thanks for the real world measurement OSU55. Looking at the fan curve I posted it s above 400 cfm in the 5-6 inches of static pressure range. Maybe that s closer to what your setup is creating. I was estimating 6-7 inches based on spreadsheets on Bill Pentz s site, but I didn t have any real measurements of my own. Also, thanks Bill, for your actual experience with the unit. I think most of the HF mods are turning them into 2 stage units so that most of the dust doesn t make it to the filter, causing the flow rate to drop as the filter gets dirty. Those mods add $ and static pressure generally but preserve the filter.
> 
> - BobAnderton


----------



## roman (Sep 28, 2007)

a broom


----------



## OSU55 (Dec 14, 2012)

+1 Bill. Very few have industrial tools with effective dust collection engineered in for their home shops. Sure, the machines have a DC port, but to your point, particles escape at the cut. While the "shop filters" help, there is still dangerous dust floating around while a tool issued and for a period afterwards.


> The fine particulates that are the real health issue are ever present in a shop environment IMO. Only a quality respirator can deal with those. Again, that s just my feeling on the subject. I have no real data to support it. I think a lot of those particles spin off cutting blades and get dispersed into the room before any collector can deal with them effectively. There may be less of them, but I feel no machine will be 100%, so there s always a health risk.
> - builtinbkyn


----------



## eflanders (May 2, 2013)

If it were me, I would seriously look into using a Fein or Festool dust extractor coupled with a dust separator/ cyclone and another air scrubber unit mounted under your cnc. Why? The Fein is quiet, portable and highly efficient. Get one that has the HEPA filter. I would build another dust/air scrubber and place it under the cnc as mentioned. The other scrubber should be mounted in an opposite corner, at the ceiling to create a circular air flow. Use a gradual filter system on your scrubber that finalizes with a HEPA filter.

The machines you use the most produce a lot of fine dust and this combination I think would best serve all of your needs. Please note that most belt sanders are very hard to collect dust from with any type of collector. You will also want to use HEPA filters to your furnace. Some of these ideas were suggested to me by fellow LJs and on the Thein separator website for my basement shop.

Perdonally I use both a DC system, the Fein turbo 2 extractor and 2 seperate air scrubbers. My biggest improvements made to my arrangement was when I rearranged my air scrubbers as mentioned above and the addition of a Wynn filter to my DC. My shop is much larger than yours. But I had substantial issues with fine dust travelling to the upstairs parts before I made these two changes. Now the dust that builds in the upstairs, is not mostly from the basement shop! I also should mention that I rarely close the basement door to the upstairs. This is because I also run a supplementary heater (pellet stove) in the basement to maintain temperatures there. The natural heat rise here also lowers my house heating needs substantially.


----------



## agfrag (Oct 18, 2015)

I apologize for not checking in for a while, and I noticed a bunch of comments these past couple days, so here's a brief update.

I ordered the Laguna Mobile Cyclone 1.5hp dust collector from Rockler back in November. It was back ordered, and it arrived last week. I had to wait till yesterday to put it together. I like the new design, the canister filter assembly now bolts directly to the cyclone housing, no hose to worry about. I haven't given it a shot yet, but it is a lot quiter running than my Sears shop vac, but with a bass-ier sound, if that makes sense. I turned it on and went upstairs and asked everyone if they could hear it and they said hear what? So that's good. I hope to be doing some mdf cnc routing soon, and that should be a good test. I'll post an update as soon as I do some work with it.


----------



## kelvancra (May 4, 2010)

In addition to dropping out most the dust and all the chips, cyclones have the advantage of allowing you to vacuum things without running them through the impellers. I managed to justify a new set of sunglasses, before I put the Super Dust Deputy in front of my three horse. If I did the same thing now, you might be able to identify them.


----------

