Bandsaw Dust Extraction

[Harbo]

I have recently acquired an old Startrite 352 bandsaw which performs excellantly except that dust collection/extraction is none existant!
Has anybody successfully managed to rig anything up for these machines other than shoving a hose on the floor underneath it?
In David C's article in Popular Woodworking he rigged something up for his Robinson Cadet - it shows in a photo but no details?

Rod

 

[beech1948]

harbo,

I have a 352. To improve dust collection I have done the following.

1) Added a brush to lower tyre to remove dust
2) Added a 63mm plus pointed hose which can be set just above cut being made
3) I enclosed the base floor and the Right Hand Side when I put it on wheels and stuck a 4" hose in there. I will probably move this from mthere to the lower rear on the LHS as you face the saw.

My next effort is to remove the under table - lower blade guard and to replace with a perspex guard with a 4" hose connection.

The real problem is to know where to cut holes in the steel cabinet. You could try to cut a 4" hole at the lower rear and fit a DC hose.

Current dust gathering is at maybe 70%+ so its not too bad. These saws do produce much dust though.

regards
Alan

 

[Harbo]

Alan - thanks for the response, I will try some of that - it already has brushes top and bottom but they could be worn?
At the moment the dust seems to come from every orifice top and bottom!

David C seems to have fitted some plastic rigid hose direcetly under the table but I cannot make out if the blade runs through it or it is to one side?

Rod

 

[beech1948]

harbo,
When I replace my lower guides dust collection I am intending to find/buy a 4" dust chute which is attached to a flat plate to screw to the front of my new perspex guide surround.

I have not seen them in the UK so I may be getting one from the US.

regards

Alan

 

[OPJ]

I'm assuming you don't already have a 100mm port lower down the back of the saw? My saw does and from that I added a short length of 50mm hose using a Y-connector, so that I could prevent mountains of dust from gathering around the lower blade guides. That's what I find is most important (with bearing guides. anyway), to keep them running clean and free.

I has made a definite improvement while compromising the effeiciency of the lower 100mm port slightly. But I'm happy with it and I'd like to think it will make an appearance in a future issue of British Woodworking...! :wink:

 

[dickm]

My beloved 352 has a 4" port in the rear LHS of the base, and I guess it catches about 50% of the dust. Brushes are in place and apparently in good condition, but it still spews out a lot of dust from the top guide area. Have been wondering about fitting something somewhere near the bottom guides, but haven't been able to come up with a suitable design.
If someone can publish one, I reckon that would make it a near perfect saw for what I need.

 

[Shrubby]

Harbo
type WIS24 into google, the second page covers bandsaws.
I've done this with the pipe entry on the front of a bandsaw door.The blade runs through a slot in the pipe and the airflow from the blade hurls the dust down the pipe if you get the placement right. You need some pipe,a matching dia. holesaw and some epoxy - good luck

 

[ivan]

Shrubby's got the answer. My new saw has this as standard, my old fixed up well with sq. drainpipe, sloped down with blade slot, so air could strip sawdust from blade; partly cut around lower guides, kept these clean too.

 

[Harbo]

I will give this a try - the other problem is fixing it to allow rotation of the table?

I was looking at a new Startrite 401 today - apart from a hose connection outlet in the bottom box it seems to have all the same problems as the old ones - dust everywhere!

Rod

 

[ivan]

Try to see if the extraction can leave the machine (out and 45 deg down) at right angles to the blade. On my old saw, a 16" Taiwan version of the cast iron Delta 14, this was quite easy. Then the table can tilt down till it's // with the extractor pipe. I found it helpful to use the sq rainwater down pipe as easy to fix. Make up a dummy from cardboard so you can keep cutting and fitting by trial and error, and then bandsaw the plastic. I added some 2mm ali sheet here and there with pop rivets to make sure I got all the dust. The blade ran in a 2-3mm wide slot in the pipe.

The new (sheet steel) saw extracts from the bottom case at the back just under the guides, and as supplied the under table area/guides (which are outside the lower casing) collects a lot of sawdust. I split a section of 50 x 100 kitchen extraction pipe and trimmed it to clip on over the guide, which is now in a considerable downdraught from the extractor, and stays clean.

If you have an outlet at the bottom of the lower case and it has an airtight door, see if my clip - on trick might work for you - depends on a reasonably large hole where blade enters lower casing.

 

[Harbo]

As an interim solution to my Startrite I used a piece of round to square 63mm down pipe connector. Just cut a slot in the square section to allow blade to pass through, placed underneath the table and held in place with the lower sliding blade guard.
The effect was amazing with very little dust appearing elsewhere!

Rod

 

[Digit]

I've adopted the same solution with my old Evenwood bandsaw. At first I thought the extractor hose would get in the way but that has not proved to be the case and at least it no longer fills my slippers with saw dust!

Roy.

 

[beech1948]

Harbo,
That was a just in time post. Many thanks.

I was just about to spoend £45 on perspex to cut and mould to fit below my 352 table. Bought a square to round converter and fitted that today. Big improvement already and it fits quite neatly. The small diameter pipe does not seem to be too restictive and I have managed to attach to a 4" DC pipe.

I still have a slight problem with dust above the table. Especially when cuttting through more than 6" depth and at 11" its a bit too much as the dust can interfer with the alignment of the part being cut.

My next step is to get one of the Axminster semi rigid pipes and try to fix this as close to the bottom of the wood being cut as possible.

regards
Alan

 

[9fingers]

Alan,

I think this means that the extraction is not getting the dust off the blade effectively before it is carried round to the top. Do you have brushes to wipe the blades?

Bob

 

[beech1948]

9fingers,

Yup I have brushes on top and bottom wheels.

Its not really a fault with dust collection which is now much better. The problem is that when cutting through a board that is say 11" thick the amount of saw dust is quite large. A board which is say 4" thick will cover the throat through which bthe blade travels in the top thus the suction available will drop leaving some dust top settle on the top or edge under the piece being cut.

The better solution will be to increase the level of suction...but thats expensive. So putting a dust extraction hose close the bottom of the wood will help a little.

On thinner and smaller boards there is almost no problem now.

regards
Alan

 

[DMD]

Had one of these for 20 years now and just use a 100mm hose stuffed between the table underside and the lower door with blade guard removed so it becomes oval shaped and the blade runs inside the hose. I find it is all down to suction so i have a strong extractor which is able to suck dust through the hole in the table as well

 

[Helvetica]

Hope you don't mind me re-opening an old thread instead of starting a new one, but is there any chance someone could post a photo of their 352 dust modification? I can't see where it would exit the machine. Thanks a mill

 

[custard]

I've not used that many bandsaws (one Startrite and a couple of Records) but I'd just assumed that, like compound mitre saws, poor dust extraction was just a fact of life.

But recently I got a Hammer N4400 bandsaw, and the quality of dust extraction is astonishingly high. The puzzling thing is that there appears nothing special about the dust extraction provision, a couple of brushes and a single extraction port, so nothing different to my previous bandsaws. The only things I can think iare that it's brand new so perhaps the brushes are stiffer, and the dust extractor itself is quite a bit beefier than my previous ones. But if I ever got another bandsaw which had a dust problem I'd just keep tinkering until it was fixed, because what I've learnt from this is that a bandsaw doesn't have to be a dust monster!

 

[Steve Maskery]

Custard
I'd lay a pound to a penny that the improvement is a result of your more powerful extractor unit.
S