Dust Extractor Filters

[Duncan A]

I'm looking for a dust extractor to suit my soon-to-arrive Jet 18" bandsaw, plus tablesaw and P/T when I get around to buying them. Ideally, I want a chip collector with fine filter capability.

It's a small workshop and the extractor must be reasonably compact, fairly quiet to keep the neighbours happy, and low powered to avoid nuisance trips.

The Axminster ADE1200 seems to fit the bill - but what do the members think of the felt bags for fine filter use?
Would I be better off buying an extractor that can take a fine filter cartridge?
The Scheppach HA2600 seems to be a very similar unit - but at nearly twice the price. What does it do that the Axy doesn't?

A drop-box of some sort may help the felt bag filters to last longer. Does anyone have experience of a setup along these lines?

Thanks to everyone for a great forum.
Duncan

 

[Carlow52]

Duncan
I started a similar thread recently here:
https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/care ... 43853.html

There is a very useful link in that thread on all about the topic, including some astounding numbers on the required volume of air that needs to be shifted.

My view, having done further research, is as follows: felt bags are just chip collectors and do nothing to stop the small stuff.

You need some sort of fine filter and in addition some way of getting sufficient air changes in the workshop to get rid of what the filters dont catch. The need for filters can be seen in the wide range advertised bysuppliers

Depending on where you live you may not be able to vent unfiltered air to the outside. I dont have that problem so my plan is as follows.
put my felt bag chip collector in a sealed press against the outside wall with a fan extracting the stuff that passes through the felt from the sealed press.

Fit an additional fan to get some fresh air into the workshop.

I accept that this will lead to heat loss but that's my plan for the moment.
HTH

 

[DonStan]

Record Power do one, which you can also buy a fine filter for, might be worth taking a look at -
http://www.recordpower.co.uk/index.php? ... 0COLLECTOR

 

[Carlow52]

Thanks DonStan for the link which highlights some interesting points

" With standard canvas filter suitable as a chip collector. With optional cartridge filter suitable for chips and fine dust. Please Note - Only standard 100mm hose can be used - reducing the diameter or increasing the length will adversely affect the performance."

and from the spec page
Filtration 5 micron (with standard bag) "

The spec does not say what the cartridge filter is good for size wise

 

[ondablade]

Judging by what Bill Pentz has to say seem to be two very basic issues involved:

1. You need to shift a lot of air (approaching 1000cfm) at most machine hoods to create enough of a depression to gather fine dust effectively.

2. Filters fine enough to catch the dangerous very fine dust will blind too quickly to be a practical proposition unless a cyclone or some other means of separation is used to drop out most of the dust before them.

The position is reportedly made more complex by misleading information in the claims of many of those selling dust systems.

 

[Carlow52]

Ian, Thanks for putting in a few sentences what I was "rabbiting on" about.
Colm

 

[Mike.C]

I'm looking for a dust extractor to suit my soon-to-arrive Jet 18" bandsaw, plus tablesaw and P/T when I get around to buying them. Ideally, I want a chip collector with fine filter capability.

It's a small workshop and the extractor must be reasonably compact, fairly quiet to keep the neighbours happy, and low powered to avoid nuisance trips.

The Axminster ADE1200 seems to fit the bill - but what do the members think of the felt bags for fine filter use?
Would I be better off buying an extractor that can take a fine filter cartridge?
The Scheppach HA2600 seems to be a very similar unit - but at nearly twice the price. What does it do that the Axy doesn't?

A drop-box of some sort may help the felt bag filters to last longer. Does anyone have experience of a setup along these lines?

Thanks to everyone for a great forum.
Duncan

Ducan I have the Scheppach HA2600 with a fine filter (If you shop around you will find deals in which the fine filter is included), and I have found it to be an excellent chip collector. As to whether it is a good fine filter is debatable.

Cheers

Mike

 

[Jonzjob]

Slightly different tack, but still to do with filters. have a Jet AFS100 filtration system for my workshop. I vac out the primary filter every now and then, today being one time. After I had vacced it out I had a thought, rare I know?, and I wondered if I could get more muck out with my compressor and a small nozzle? So I tried and the right side of the filter was after the vac and the left after the compressor.

I must admit that I was quite surprised! That is the cleanest it's been since I got it!

 

[Duncan A]

Thanks everyone for your replies. Looks like I shouldn't jump in too fast here!

I have now read the full Bill Pentz discussion (should have done that first, really) and found it pretty scary. I'm not at all sure, though, that I can go the full hog with 6" ducting, 3hp motors etc. in my 20 sq metre workshop.

Carlow52 - from what you and Bill Pentz say, it looks as if the felt bags do a reasonable job, but not necessarily to a standard that provides real protection, so looks like it'll have to be a filter.

DonStan - I must admit I'd pretty much discounted record on account of their noisy/high power can extractors, but the CX2600 looks interesting - and cheaper than the Scheppach HA2600.

Mike C - thanks for the comments. At least now I know that it appears to do the job well.

Looks like I'll be dithering for a while yet, but the best option looks as if it may be to get one of those mentioned above and combine it with a separation box.

...Or consider a cyclone. No prices on the Oneida website so I tried phoning them for a chat - but they're away until the end of August. This level of service puts me off buying from them.
Has anyone any experience of dealing with them?

Duncan

 

[bighillman]

Hello there. Did you ever resolve your extractor problem/decision? I'm wondering whether to buy the Scheppach ha2600, did you buy that one? If so, how is it?

Thanks.

 

[Duncan A]

Bighillman

"Resolve" is not really the right word as I'm still developing my workshop (nothing happens very fast around here).

So far all I've done is buy an Axy ADE2200 3hp extractor with the fine filter cartridge. Sizewise, this is overkill for my needs but should mean that the expensive filter cartridge doesn't block up for a long time yet. The extractor is not too noisy, but does take up a lot of room, so a cyclone will only be possible after freeing up some space. For now, this meets my needs, together with a Racal Airstream mask - obsolete but it does the job as it was unused when I acquired it and I have sufficient spare filters for now. In time, I hope to get a new Trend, Powercap or 3M mask.
If I want to clear the air in the workshop, I simply run the ADE2200 with an open hose for a few minutes and the filter seems to stop the small stuff escaping.
Far from ideal but it works OK.
FWIW, I was nearly tempted to buy a Camvac at a show recently when the demonstrator connected a couple of metres of hose to the exhaust and dramatically quietened the screaming monster - a very simple fix which immediately removed one of my objections to this type of extractor.

Duncan

 

[beech1948]

I used to have a Sheppach 2600 bag type collector but got very annoyed with the amount of dust left in the shop. The problem being that a bag type collector simply distributes the finer dust. They can collect chips well but not really fines.

I now have two solutions.

1) I added a Thien ( look up Phil Thien and dust collection on google) style drop box to the Sheppach. It worked extremely well as my only other option was to sell it and buy a non bag solution. I have added the "Fine dust collection option" as well but most of the improvement is due to the Thien box.

2) I bought a Record 4000 DC with twin motors. I use this for most of my non-chip makers.

Both of these DC units were very noisy so they have been relegated to a small shed (6'x6') built on the back of the shop and insulated for noise reduction.

These two work well(ish) with one used for the LHS and one for the RHS of the shop.

DC is becoming more complex and I find the deliberate lack of useful information put out by manufacturers to be a major irritation. Manufacturers and resellers have no interest in the performance of the DC they sell only the cash they generate. TRhat means they have no interest in our health as well. There needs to be a few simple data points made against set standards for us to choose between DC devices.

Lets face it a 3/4 HP DC is not going to make much of a difference to either chips or fine dust.
The cost of a few bits of shaped tin, an electric motor and a few bags is not that high so why are prices so high for non-effective devices.

regards
Alan

 

[bighillman]

Well thanks for those replies they've given me much to think about.

 

[Duncan A]

Alan makes a good point about standards.
When I bought the ADE2200, Axminster were also selling the Jet DC1100, a virtually identical machine but rated at 1600m3/hr rather than the ADE's 2200m3/hr. Probably just Jet being a little more conservative with their figures, but there was no way of knowing. Similarly, the apparently very similar Jet fine filter cartridge was rated at 1 micron whereas the Axy was rated at 0.5 micron. No matter what the micron rating, it is irrelevant without specifying what proportion of that size of particles are captured and what proportion pass through - some will always pass through.
Finally, I don't remember the details, but I found that some of the power ratings on the Axy website were wrong according to the plates on the actual machines and some ratings quoted input power whilst some quoted output power, making it very difficult to compare machines.
I've not looked into it, but I suspect that if you are running commercial workshops, you will need to get the information missing from these domestic suppliers, but you would inevitably end up paying more.

Duncan

 

[RogerS]

Duncan...the Axi 2200 is a good choice ...as a chip collector from machines like a planer/thicknesser and spindle moulder. However, if you feed it with stuff from your table saw or anything else that generates fine-ish dust then you will start to see a drop off in suck as the filter gets clogged (it is doing it's job though!). How long before this happens will depend on how much use you give it. I fitted a fine drum filter from RB Industrial and managed to beat out of it about 1/2 bucket of very fine dust after I had been use it for quite some time. A cyclone in front of it will drop out most of the dust but for me the amount of chippings I can create in a day make emptying the relatively small drum size that most folks fit to a cyclone (oil drum type) a pain in the backside.

So I have compromised for now and bought a secondhand twin motor Camvac off eBay and use this for the machines that generate dust. The 2200 is just used for the planer/thicknesser and spindle moulder. But even then you'd be surprised at how much fine dust still gets generated by these two machines. In my ideal world, a magic-cyclone would drop out just the fine dust and let the chips go through to the main part of the 2200. That way, my local stables would be even happier to take my bags of chippings.

At the end of the day it comes down to the type of work you do and the amount of waste you create. I'm like quite a few on here...I don't create enough to justify a proper serious trade-rated dust/chipping system etc but generate more that the average DIY'er/hobbyist.

Three useful mods you can make:

1) remove the plastic fingers on the inlet ports as they will get blocked with chippings if you're not careful. Just make sure you don't suck up that screwdriver!

2) modify the NVR so that it is permanently on and use a remote on/off control from Maplin. Just make sure you unplug it from the mains before you do any work on it

3) The bottom bag will leak fine dust where the clip fastens. Use about 6" of gaffa tape to tape the bag to the drum at this point to stop it.

 

[Duncan A]

Hmmm, I may have to get a drop box or cyclone sooner rather than later; or perhaps take a closer look at the Jet DC1100A which incorporates a cyclonic section and may provide inspiration towards a compact solution. One of my concerns over a separate cyclone is that I believe they may be noisy, and a built-in one may not be as bad. Probably not as efficient, but if it drops out say, 2/3 of the dust, that would be a pretty good improvement in filter life.

Yet another project for "one day"!

Regarding your mods:
1. I've removed the plastic fingers from one 100mm port so I can swap the hose round to choose whether to have them in use or not. At present I'm not using the 150mm port.
2. A good idea, I may do just that.
3. I'm afraid I just let it leak, but it is annoying.

Duncan

 

[bighillman]

I've decided to order the Scheppach ha2600. I'll let you know how it was.

Interesting to hear you give your chippings to the local stables, good idea. Any other uses for it? Ideally I'd love to be able to make briquettes out of it for the log burner.

 

[RogerS]

....
3. I'm afraid I just let it leak, but it is annoying.

Duncan

But it then defeats the whole point of having a fine filter! You're spewing dust into your air.

 

[Duncan A]

Roger
Very little leakage and when I next change the bag, I'll put some sort of rubber or foam around the DX to effect a better seal.
Duncan