wilbur
I have a 1940's era bandsaw that has zero amenities in the way of dust collection. I had one of those 4" plastic dust collector flanges, and was looking at the bandsaw, trying to figure out how to rig up the flange. I have zero experience with fabricating things from sheet metal. I was holding the flange thinking, "If there was only some way that I could make a dust collection device with this for my bandsaw. But whatever would I make it from?"

I was thinking this while staring directly at a pile of scrap pine sitting on the floor of my shop. Seriously.

A full ten minutes later: *** headslap ***

This is what I made.

I basically made this by screwing on the right side, putting it under the table of my bandsaw to see what I needed to notch out, then doing the same with the left side, then adding some cross pieces for strength.

On the right side I used a Forstner to drill some recesses, and sloppily epoxied in some rare earth magnets, which hold it in place.

And this is it in action.

This dust collecting shroud completely encloses the lower guides of my bandsaw, and collects the vast majority of the dust that used to pile up underneath the bandsaw. I can't put a number on it, but I wouldn't be surprised if this setup collects over 99% of the dust generated.

Although this setup is really custom fit for my bandsaw, the design principles should be easy to apply to any machine. It's basically a box to enclose where the dust is going and rare earth magnets mounted in an area where they can stick to the bandsaw.

After making this, I'm just a little surprised that more machinery accessories aren't made out of wood. We are woodworkers, aren't we?