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How does Moses make his coffee?
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How does Moses make his coffee?
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Bowl Leader
The biggest thing to consider in dust collection is CFM (cubic feet per minute). The more air you can move and filter the more dust you will collect. Even a 6.5hp shop vac will only draw 160-180 CFM. Meanwhile the smallest portable dust collectors will run 550+ CFM, with 1100 CFM being pretty normal for a small shop.
The difference in dust control is astounding. In the case of sanding you could create a downdraft table and a dust collector will virtually eliminate any airborne dust. The vac doesn’t intake enough air to make something like this work. It is also much, much quieter than a shop vac.
Upgrading to a dust collector is one of those things that I kick myself for not doing sooner.
This is great information, thank you.
I have definitely not been pleased with the overall quality of the shop vac dust collection and figured there had to be something better out there.
I wouldn’t necessarily buy a separate shop vac. Unless you have multiple circuits in your shop, you may hit a point where you are pulling too much current and trip your breaker.
I started using an inline dust separator and it has helped a ton to keep the filter on the shop vac clean, and keeping suction up. But in all honesty all of my tools still spit dust everywhere. I can tell a difference when the collection is running, but it is still far from foolproof.
AlixPartner’s dust collection setup in the previous thread is pretty nice, and I love how small the footprint is. That’s as optimal as you can get with a shop vac in my honest opinion.
That's good to know, thank you. I did add an additional circuit when I was outfitting the garage, specifically so I had enough places to plug in my tools without worrying about tripping a break or having to move tables around. I figured sawdust was just part of the process, but wanted to make sure I wasn't overlooking anything.