WoodCentral Forums

Est. 1998 — 27 years of woodworking knowledge

Cyclone dust separator Question....

Posts

Cyclone dust separator Question....

#1

Cyclone dust separator Question....

Barry Irby

I am assuming most of you have seen the Dust Deputy and similar cyclone separator devices. You put a can with a separator on top of it in line between the dirt and your shop vac and it keeps your shop vac clean and empty. (Mostly) I built a giant one for cleaning up lathe shreds and it worked very well.

My question is, since we know this works very well, why don't we incorporate the concept directly into the shop vac? (There are several home made versions on Youtube that appear to work after three or four minutes of not very rigorous testing.)

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#2

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

CharlieL

I'm not sold on the small cyclone for a 5 gal bucket, especially if you want it on wheels. In my opinion the vac hose enters too high up and makes the whole unit too easy to tip over. I have built 5 gal separators that use a baffle inside and keeps the vac hose down much lower

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#3

Couple reasons, at a guess...

John in NM

First, an effective cyclone incorporated into a shop vac would make it much larger, and for a lot of general shop use it wouldn't have much benefit. Its only us woodworkers that love the cyclone.

Second, think of the lost revenue in bags! :D

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#4

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

Lee Schierer McKean, PA

Take a look at the Duststopper being sold by Home Depot. It works very well.


img

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#5

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

CharlieL

Funny that I haven't heard about the Duststopper until now. It looks like it has a been out in the market for atleast a year.

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#6

That's one I was looking at....

Barry Irby

I stumbled across it yesterday. With such a low profile, it seems it could be built into a shop vac relatively easy. I spent a while on Youtube looking at various configurations and cart people had built to combine them with shop vacs.

OTOH, A drywall bag in a Rigid vac is a marvelous thing. No more giant dust balls on the filter and just toss the bag. Of course, tossing the bag makes my frugal gene twitch.

Actually it seems like just aiming teh in let port on the vac at a tangent to the drum rather than directly at the filter would be a good idea.

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#7

Re: That's one I was looking at....

Lee Schierer McKean, PA

I had a shop vac with an elbow inside the canister, the problem is the filter and motor are in the way for a cyclone to work.

Lee

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#8

I was thinking...

Barry Irby

They could make a canister that would snap on top of the drum of a shop vac and then the motor unit would snap on top of that. The canister could be about 6 or 8 inches tall to get the filter up and out of the way.

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#9

Re: I was thinking...

CharlieL

For the most part I'm happy with what I have put together, plus most of it is constructed of metal, and not plastic.

Re: Cyclone dust separator Question....

#10

Re:Go for it Barry


👍 This page answered my questions

Your vote helps other woodworkers quickly find the answers and techniques that actually work in the shop.