# Dust cyclones



## slemishwoodcrafts (13 Sep 2007)

has anybody ever built a cyclone for dust extraction? I have been researching American websites and am trying to debate between using the Bill Pentz design and the wood magazine design. 

Michael

SLemish Woodcrafts


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## wizer (13 Sep 2007)

Welcome Michael. Search this forum for 'cyclone' and you will have plenty of reading material 

Good Luck


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## DaveL (13 Sep 2007)

Hi Michael,

Welcome to the forum. 

If you take a look here you can see my cyclone going together. It took me 2 years to get to that stage, in the last year I have added a pair of large filters to stop the very fine dust that can get carried though the cyclone. 

You will find posts by Barry Burgess on the cyclones he built, unfortunately Barry is no longer with us, but I am sure he is smiling at our efforts to perfect dust collection using these ingenious bits of kit.


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## Gary M (13 Sep 2007)

Hi Michael, 
welcome to the forum !!!
Cheers, Gary.


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## Newbie_Neil (14 Sep 2007)

Hi Michael

Welcome to the forum.

Cheers,
Neil


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## 9fingers (14 Sep 2007)

Hi michael,

I am the proud owner of the Barry Burgess prototype cyclone based on the Ikea flower pot. I'm on holiday in France at the moment but when I am back !st October I would be more than happy to provide support if you wish to build the Burgess cyclone. PM me
A short movie is here if it helps http://s115.photobucket.com/albums/n313/9fingersphotos/?action=view&current=Mvi_0217.flv

Good Luck

Bob


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## slemishwoodcrafts (15 Sep 2007)

As i will be using a 3 horse motor I have to power the cyclone i was going to build my own blower. any ideas on where I can obtain a 15" backward inclined impeller fan? Any ideas on blower design also?

Michael

Slemish Woodcrafts


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## engineer one (15 Sep 2007)

why do you think you need a blower???

i know barry never used same.

the essence is that the main motor draws the air through the cyclone from the bottom, and it is the combined air flow which draws the material into the cyclone, and then the filters.

paul :wink:


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## 9fingers (15 Sep 2007)

engineer one":1o7nef56 said:


> why do you think you need a blower???
> 
> i know barry never used same.



Paul/Michael,

I think it is simply a matter of terminology. Most builders call it a blower even though it is really sucking air out of the top of the cyclone. The debris comes out of the bottom of the cyclone.

Before purchasing Barry's cyclone. I was planning to buy an impeller and snail casing as spare parts for a commercial 3HP dust extractor. They are normally 14 inch on 3HP machines. I had one on order through Charnwood but it was on almost infinite delivery from Chaiwan and so I cancelled the order having waited 4 months at least. Charnwood were OK about it as they tend to keep a few spares on the shelf so if it had of arrived they would have put it into stock. Axminster would be another supplier to try. Possibly best to say you are repairing a model XYZ machine and the impeller & casing is damaged and you need a new one. Oh yes and the serial number fell off a long while ago!!

Good luck

Bob


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## slemishwoodcrafts (18 Sep 2007)

i contacted axminster and said I was trying to repair an extractor that looked like the ade2200. they are willing to sell me the spares, but i don't know the diameter of the impeller. does anyone have any ideas to that as i don't want to run too small an impeller with my 3 hp motor.

michael


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## 9fingers (19 Sep 2007)

I think you will find it is 14" but hopefully someone who has one might open it up and measure it for you.
Axminster might be able to help as your cover story says 'repairing one that looks like their model'
Beware the lead time for the blower parts as when I talked to axminster 12 months ago, they did not stock such spares.

Good luck

Bob


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## davy_owen_88 (19 Sep 2007)

slemishwoodcrafts":15dg7i1y said:


> i contacted axminster and said I was trying to repair an extractor that looked like the ade2200. they are willing to sell me the spares, but i don't know the diameter of the impeller. does anyone have any ideas to that as i don't want to run too small an impeller with my 3 hp motor.



The impellor on the ADE2200 is only 12" so I would go for the ADE4000 as that is likely to have a 13"/14" impellor.

You could also try charnwood for parts. Their W792 extractor has a 14" impellor - but it is more expensive to buy as a whole than the ADE4000.


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## Noel (19 Sep 2007)

Hi Michael,
pretty sure all Axmnsters' impellors are 12" max. BTW, just ask them for the impellor rather than the cover story story business. They don't generally keep them in stock so there's ususally a 6 week wait from Taiwan. Around £30 I think. Also check the bore so that it suits your intended motor.


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## slemishwoodcrafts (26 Sep 2007)

i was plannin on using a 3HP motor i have. but as it runs at 1425rpm i was going to use pulleys. would this work?


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## engineer one (26 Sep 2007)

you need to consider the speed of whatever you are driving and then see what is going to happen. such a system would allow you to ensure that the motor is definately out of the dustpath.

assuming of course you can get the right pulleys and a decent drive system.

paul :wink:


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## 9fingers (27 Sep 2007)

A pulley/bearing system to transmit 3hp is going to have to be pretty rigid and possibly multiple pulley. ( my 3hp tablesaw has two belts) also the driven pulley should not be too small and the pulley spacing too short as the area of contact of the belt will be too little. - sorry if you know all this but power belt drives are not as simple as they might first seem when the power goes up.
If you have the engineerinjg facilities, then a poly vee belt might be worthy of consideration.
If cost is not a primary consideration (wild assumption!!) then a variable speed electronic drive would run a 1425 motor at up to 3000 rpm with ease and give you the option to tune the running speed to avoid any annoying resonances in your cyclone/piping. 
I have a variable drive on mine as a resonance precaution but the anti vibration mounts do a good job but instead I change speed according to the machine I'm using and how much extraction it needs thus minimising the noise level.

Good Luck

Bob


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## slemishwoodcrafts (27 Sep 2007)

where can I buy one of these variable speed controllers and how much are they likely to cost?

michael


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## 9fingers (27 Sep 2007)

Michael,

I forgot to mention that these only work with 3 phase motors - sorry if I got you all interested. I tend to only use 3 phase motors now even though I only have single phase mains. Inverters give such good control and smooth start/stop/braking etc

I normally buy the inverters on Ebay as and when they come up. Look out for ones specifically for single phase in, three phase out. these will work with dual voltage 240/440 volt motors - most modern ones are like this.

Here is a typical example of what you need although waiting and watching will get one at a better price usually

http://tinyurl.com/2mxbeg

Bob


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## slemishwoodcrafts (29 Sep 2007)

thanks for that link, but i think that they are too expensive for me. I checked the plate on my motor. It says it is single phase but dual voltage 230 - 250v / 460 - 500v. Anything suitbale for this?

Michael


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## 9fingers (29 Sep 2007)

Single phase and dual voltage is quite unusual in my experience.

but as the voltage ranges are exactly double then I can only assume there are two windings which are either connected in parallel for the lower voltage and in series for the higher range. I would expect to see 4 terminal (plus earth) to connect power to and something for the starting/running capcitors

If it were a 3 phase unit , the ratio of the voltage ranges would be approx sq.root 3 :1

eg 230-250 and 400-440 and there would be 6 terminals for star or delta connector of the three windings

Quite what situation one would encounter 460-500 volts is a mystery to me.


I do not believe that the motor you have is suitable for variable speed operation. Sorry to have misled you in my earlier post.

Bob


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## Stu in Tokyo (29 Sep 2007)

Sorry to jump in here late, not trying to be a Grade A silly person, but I did build a Pentz type cyclone in my Dungeon, works bloody great!  

*Dungeon Cyclone Build* <- Lots of pics

There are a total of about 4 pages, sorry if they take a while to load, they are picture heavy


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## 9fingers (29 Sep 2007)

Excellent write up Stu and admirable sheet bashing skills too!

You may wish to know that the link from page 2 to 3 is not clickable or however that is referred to in HTML speak. Easy enough to get to page 3 by editing the URL for page 2 however so I could see the whole story (I'm using nutscrape if the problem is browser related)

Now I must really get off the interweb and into the workshop to do something today!

Bob


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## slemishwoodcrafts (4 Oct 2007)

i have built my first cyclone. it was a mini for my record rsde1. plumbed into my 2.5" system it works a treat. it can be seen in the post entitles cyclone in the project plans forum


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## John McM (23 Oct 2007)

Are there no UK distributers of complete cyclones?


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## BradNaylor (23 Oct 2007)

Fascinating stuff, Stu.

I've got a big 8 filter/4 bag conventional DC unit which I am thinking of moving to a purpose biult shed outside of the workshop in order to cut down on fine dust and noise, and to free up space.

This cyclone talk is making me think again.

Is a cyclone intrinsically more efficient in moving air, or is the advantage simply that not so much fine dust is expelled into the atmosphere?

If the latter, then my move outside would seem to solve the problem anyway, but I am intersted in any potential improvement in performance. I could use a lot of my DC system as parts for a cyclone.

Would it work putting a cyclone in the loft?


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## 9fingers (23 Oct 2007)

It is the blower not the cyclone that moves the air. The cyclone potentially removes more dust from the exhaust air.

Moving DC into anothe room or the ousdie is all very well but if you heat your workshop then all that warmed air is going to be sucked out very quickly and heating cost rise.
Put a cyclone inside the workshop ans relatively clean exhaust air is kept inside the workshop supplemented by the heat from the motor.

Bob


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## Stu in Tokyo (23 Oct 2007)

Hi Dan, you can certainly build a good cyclone that will have great separation, but you need a serious blower, a good motor with a BIG impeller to move the volume of air needed, but once you do that, I think the cyclone is the way to go, the dust clean up is dead easy too.

Sorry I have to run now, but please ask more questions if you need be.

9 fingers is right about the removing heated/cooled air from your shop, that can get expensive.

Cheers!


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## John McM (24 Oct 2007)

Anyone know anything about these?

http://www.oneida-air.com/products/syst ... export.htm

Cheers


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## druster (26 Oct 2007)

looking for a new extract myself and am interested in the cyclones, there is a uk distributer of the oneida systems, seem v pricey to me though, I was looking into making one, i came across these filters http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/FINE-DUST-EXTRACT ... dZViewItem
which look like they could be adapted to use!


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## John McM (26 Oct 2007)

druster":nvcyir68 said:


> looking for a new extract myself and am interested in the cyclones, there is a uk distributer of the oneida systems, seem v pricey to me though,!



Who/where is the UK distributer and how much? Maybe they sell parts seperatley?


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## CNC Paul (26 Oct 2007)

Hi All,

Oneida-air are advertising in uk woodworking magazines, I tried to call them and got the answerphone...No return call and the website link is dead.


Maybe they are just testing the water by the interest they get ?



CNC Paul


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## druster (29 Oct 2007)

I sent an email to their us site asking for distributors info and I received a pack in the post with contacts price list etc the web address is www.oneida-air.co.uk
telephone number is 01473 827518
address is oneida air systems ltd, 31 wilson rd, hadleigh , suffolk, ip7 5ru
the 2hp super dust gorrila is 1253.73 not including shipping, portable version is 1481.68 and the dust deputy shop vacuum attachment is 149.95
they are only starting to ship this autumn.
all of the ducting parts seem fairly reasonable though, the only variable i don't know is shipping costs.


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## CNC Paul (29 Oct 2007)

Hi Druster

This is from their US site.

2Hp Super Dust Gorilla System - XGK020105 
Base System Price: $966.60 + shipping that = £483.20....Welcome to rip off Britian @ £1253.7.


CNC Paul


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## druster (29 Oct 2007)

i wonder what the shipping and taxes would be if you ordered it from their us site?
probably still be a better price!


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## John McM (29 Oct 2007)

I've just had an email from the UK distributor. The UK price is £1067+vat for the Super Dust Gorilla. It's in stock. The price takes into account the extra cost of shipping, taxes etc and apparently has a larger motor. It's still a bit steep for my purse but it may be a sign that cyclones will become widely available in the UK. Here's hoping.


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