Are cheap cyclones any good?

[Robbo60]

I have been tempted by the cheap cyclones on eBay for <£15 to use inline with my trusty Henry.

the question is are they any good?

also what would you recommend for a good value bin to mount the cyclone on?

thanks

Hopefully I will tell you next week. Had one arrived yesterday £16. Got hoover from Lidl £30 last week. Blast gates coming next week £10 each (£40). Flexi hose next week £15 for 5m. OSB for dust box £10. Clips for lid £6. 40mm push fit pipe and bits from Screwfix?? circa £20. I want to build housing outside but will be a job getting through reinforced concrete wall (Pre fab garage)

 

[HamsterJam]

I've just set one up. As a trial I used a translucent plastic tub that my fat balls came in (the sort for birds), bit of ply to stiffen the lid. Works a treat, so will get something bigger soon. Trade off though, smaller = more frequent emptying = easier to empty so might stick with it for a while. I put half a brick in it, it was too light to stay put when you move the sucky end

I use a multi-cyclone recovered from a Dyson vacuum cleaner also mounted on a fat ball tub. I 3D printed adaptors for the pipes and hooked it up to my WAP shop vac. The Dyson has a HEPA filter so even the fine stuff is caught although it does restrict air flow a little.
Wondering what to do next. Thinking maybe parallel 2 or more cyclones to get better throughput?

 

[Gavlar]

I went the Thein baffle route, as an alternative. It's attached to the base part from a deceased shop vac and is very effective for anything other than the finest particles. Plenty of videos on YT of the design and process.

 

[Sachakins]

Thats

This would look nice connected to my Henry

Ultra High Efficiency Cyclone separator - Dust extractor | eBay

Now that's high art sculpture.

 

[Sachakins]

I went the Thein baffle route, as an alternative. It's attached to the base part from a deceased shop vac and is very effective for anything other than the finest particles. Plenty of videos on YT of the design and process.

I found that the thein baffle gets less effective as the bin fills up. Any more than half full and I got loads off dust through to my vacuum filter.

 

[Gavlar]

True, it's not a cure-all, and mine is only used for tools that don't make lots of waste so takes a while to fill up to that point.

 

[smugdruggler]

I bought two off eBay and to get the airflow I needed using a LPHV vac I put them in parallel. I used a plastic kitchen waste bin with internal bracing as the receiver and very little detritus reached the Vac. Very little cost and very effective.

The only down side is that due to the smaller cyclones they sometimes clog when using the planer/thicknesser.

 

[Chris Hawkins]

Already answered, but yes they work very well. Mine connected to an old Dyson - after a year of use the very small Dyson bin is less than 5% full!

 

[baldkev]

I got a blue feed grain bin with lid off ebay for about 13 quid.... i.put a 100mm pipe offcut in the top ( not centred ) and another in the side near the top, but at an angle pointing down.

I run an axminster extractor with filter and as long as the blue bin doesnt fill up, the fine dust is all the goes through to the extractor. I use it for a table saw, planer thicknesser, bandsaw and workshop floor vac. Its a bit hillbilly, but was quick and works....

 

[Inspector]

Maminary?

I think he was going for laminar as in smooth airflow.

Pete

 

[John Brown]

I think he was going for laminar as in smooth airflow.

Pete

Ah! OK.

 

[Doug B]

Neat.
May I ask where you got the drum from?

I got them off a chap I worked for they were air freight barrels for batteries

 

[TheTiddles]

You can make a variation that drops the chips directly into a contractors trash bag (3mil here) a la Dust Deputy Bagger. I made my own version on a cart with a different cyclone brand. Lets you collect 60 or more litres in the bag.



Pete

Now that is some cute engineering, uses a free feature to perform an additional function, I like that lots.

I guess the first time you don’t empty the bag till it’s almost full you learn not todo that again

Aidan

 

[Rorschach]

I bought two off eBay and to get the airflow I needed using a LPHV vac I put them in parallel. I used a plastic kitchen waste bin with internal bracing as the receiver and very little detritus reached the Vac. Very little cost and very effective.

The only down side is that due to the smaller cyclones they sometimes clog when using the planer/thicknesser.

Can you show your parallel setup?

 

[DBT85]

Getting a cheap 100mm one is difficult

I think axminster have the cheapest, but its a basic design and £150.

To deal with 100mm inlets the units need to be a fair bit larger so they now can;t be shipped cheaply from china like the small 50mm ones.

Also at 100mm they are probably going to restrict a well tuned 2hp extractor.

Someone needs to dyson a couple together. Can't think of a reason it won't work. Though that might be better suited to 3hp with a properly sized impeller, not the ones that come on most of the units that often don;t seem to have been resized for the larger motor they are fitted with.

 

[Robbo3]

The small ones are excellent for collecting dust but tend to clog when used for larger shavings.
Used for cleaning ash from the wood burner

They tend to be unstable so a Thien baffle can be the answer

 

[smugdruggler]

Can you show your parallel setup?

I would be happy to however as the setup is at my 'shop in France I can't get there to take pictures.

 

[Retired]

Hi,

I've started to make a cyclone extractor but at the moment it's much too cold to play in the workshop. I bought a new commercial Henry vac and one of the black cyclones through eBay at over £20 also a 5m Henry hose; I had a plasterers bucket to hand so will use this as the receptacle.

Kind regards, Colin.

 

[HamsterJam]

Thats

Now that's high art sculpture.

Made me laugh that underneath this £9.5k device, eBay suggests a sixteen quid cyclone in the “More like this” section.

 

[matkinitice]

I've posted an update thanks to this thread.

I ended up getting the 3-in-1 from Amazon. The Dust Commander, the barrel and the 5m of hose. I would highly recommend the relief valve in the thread I link to - without this you're gonna have a collapsed barrel.

All works great - one of those things I wish I purchased a lot sooner.