If the woodshop dust collector stops sucking effectively (if you open floor sweep blast gate and stuff FALLS out of it), it’s possibly a clogged up filter. This is a different issue than what is caused by a full collection barrel.
Here’s an image of the dust collector (sorry for potato quality, clipped from security cameras):
The circled in red portion is the filter. Air sucks in (ideally) from the outside thru the metal mesh there (gray metalic portion). If this cylindrical chamber is full, the dust collector will not SUCK (or will depending on your viewpoint). The motor runs, it makes noise, but there’s nothing being done other than wearing out the motors, wasting electricity and making noise.
On Thursday, when I came up to the space, the dust collector was running, but everyone was complaining about it being broken. When I took off the black bottom of the filter (attached via J-bolts), I found the filter COMPLETELY full of packed sawdust. Here’s an image taken from under the filter up into it (and it was this consistency into the entire length):
After putting on a respirator (HIGHLY recommended), I put a trash can under it. I pulled out the sawdust first by hand. I also used the compressed air to blow it from the outside (outside of mesh) once it was past pulling by hand. I filled two of the big trash bins like so:
It’s my understanding we have a pressure indicator that will show this situation much more effectively, but this hasn’t been installed yet. @dallasmagna has also recommended possibly putting an agitator on the device (like a huge cell phone vibrator motor). In the meantime, please take the 15 minutes or so to fix this on your own as opposed to continuing without dust collection. It doesn’t take much for instance for the jointer to fill up internally making opening it up and clearing it mandatory.
No one member knows every tool and support system at DMS. I didn’t know about the filter on the vac before this post and I’m one of the members that gets in trouble for wanting to know how too much stuff works. Thanks @Kentamanos for cleaning the filter and posting what it looks like. The next time I dump the can I’ll make sure to check it as well.
Do we talk about the Vac system in the wood shop 101 class? Seems like a useful topic for the beginners. Side note, I need to take the wood shop 101 since the updates to the curriculum.
If I didn’t think it was PARTIALLY an education problem, I wouldn’t have posted this. If I thought it was ENTIRELY an education problem, I’d need drug testing.
I DO think there are quite a few people willing to do what I did (and I’ve seen Alex do before, which is why I knew to check it) if they knew that was a potential failure case.
Very true. And if you see me in the woodshop and ask woodworking advice on anything but the CNC router, you might just get back a blank stare. This goes double if you start asking about exotic joints
I think until the gauge is installed (which I’m getting motivated to track down and install), the best indicator to see if it’s worth removing the bottom is the floor sweep performance. It’s the closest blast gate to the system, and if it’s not performing well, “something is wrong”.
I went through the class in the last 60 days. We covered how to turn it on and gate usage. Also some special attention to the joiner which has some issues with proper vacuum and tends to get clogged which it was at the time so a good example of what “not working properly” manifests as. Two of us took it apart after class and un-clogged it btw.
We did not cover the dust collection barrel or associated items at all in class. The class went long as it was so I’m not sure adding to it would be desirable but then again this doesn’t look like it would need more than a mention on basic troubleshooting and a note the procedure is documented in Talk, or perhaps it should move to the Wiki?
Yeah,
I’ve heard that the new wood shop 101 is a vast improvement and much longer than before. It is also a valuable class to inform on maintenance because the new members would be the ones hearing how to clean and maintain the tools. New members tend to be the group of people that want to jump in on things and be a part of the space more so than us old fart members that can be more picky on where we interact. I also want to limit the burden we are putting on the instructor as a wood shop 101 class isn’t one of those classes that people love to teach. Enjoyment is a large part of attracting teacher to teach.
At the moment, Tom and I are the only ones teaching it. We don’t get into shop maintenance, because of the time restraints - the class tended to need about an hour more than we can give it.
Oh - and that’s an exhaust filter, not an intake filter. It tends to fill up when the filter paper clogs with dust, and the dust and shavings begin to fall off the sides. Running the CNC on MDF will blow it up nearly every time. It’s mainly a dust thing, the centrifugal chamber catches the chips, but the dust is too light to just fall out of the airstream, and makes it to the filter, which promptly clogs. Sometimes a big load of heavy chips (as in setting the joiner to take too big a bite) will decrease the airflow in the duct enough to load it up as well. Too many vents open - same thing.
If someone can find the water gauge, I’ll install it. It’s needed.
Since a few weeks ago when we had a thread about the saw stop table saw filling up I’ve made an effort now and then to open it, check how dirty it was, and vacuum it. I’ll try doing the same with the filter when I have the chance.
Stupid questions of the day:
I assume you can unplug this thing before digging into it? I’m sure I can figure this when I next look at it.
Then comes this one:
what do you do with the chips?
I assume close the bag and pitch in the dumpster but then I have some follow up:
Does one need to use bags, or can it just go straight in the dumpster?
Where does one get more bags?
We do need to do something about maintenance on this equipment. This not taking proper care of the equipment WILL bite us in the ass. Perhaps we need to make the 101 a 2 part class if we don’t want to have them run longer. This lack of maintenance will at the minimal cause premature failures with the equipment at a minimum, worst case is a fire. We need to have a system that we can set up with pre-determined (adjustable) timer perhaps with an RFID scan to scan when we clean & perform maintenance. Tie that into at minimal red & green lamp, red when maintenance/ cleaning needs to happen. I feel that this is a priority to get this or some sort of system similar in place.
I agree, but don’t think it needs to be that complicated. Right now, we tend to maintain “as it fails”. It would be more sensible to establish a schedule of needed maintenance tasks, and do preventative maintenance rather than reactive. The problem with following the failures is, that a failure often causes some level of damage to the machine, versus maintaining to try and avoid failure, which prevents these things from being damaged.
Volunteer operated organizations are, by there nature, very poor at such preventative maintenance. However, this particular task and the area it occurs in is an ideal testing ground to see if such a program could be established and followed (and how many volunteers participate).
Today about 2 PM ditto @Kentamanos OP above. Blue barrel was completely full BUT LIGHT WAS NOT BLINKING. Filter was packed completely full of sawdust. Emptied both. If you turn on the blower please check the suction. If the suction is too weak to move any sawdust please check that the barrel needs to be emptied.
That means the drum is full of chips and dust. Unclamp the drum and slide it out, being careful to not break the sensor mounted in the lid, and roll it out to the dumpster.
