Use of my own equipment

I have a planner and mitre saw that I would like to use in the area by the battery operated tools for my pine wood. I have dust collection connections and can hook up the vacuum to lessen the dust.
Would this be ok?

Based on my home shop experience, even if you are bringing in top end tools and connecting to the very top end festool dust extractor, you will be adding a significant amount of dust to the area. Considering that is a shared area with Lasers (they hate dust) and people doing things like resin pours (boo dust) and generally assembling things, I’d say that would be a less than ideal and borderline non-excellent thing to do. But it’s pretty nice outside, you could bring some extension cords and go at it that way.

However we do already have some dusty tools in that area. Assume someone from @Team_Woodshop can provide further context.

This is a really difficult discussion since Woodshop really tries to help everyone have a good time and build neat stuff according to their budget. We have people using everything from discount plywood @$20 a sheet, to wood that cost in excess of $40 per board foot(12"x12"x1"). Some of the material being used is soberingly expensive.

Not every material is allowed in DMS. Carbon fiber has been nixed in most cases. Pallet wood is also banned. Many things the LASER cutters can’t use.

You aren’t talking about, hey the miter saw is down and I need to make a few cuts with my saw. This would open up the work area to even more saw dust. More people would follow. Hopefully the new woodshop will allow more routing inside walls.

Let’s be brutally honest here. Most saws and planers people own only have a token dust port. My Milwaukee saw is borderline, and it as good as it gets, until you purchase a Festool Kapex. These tools are generally made for use outside. There is a huge difference between dust collection and chunk collection. The Festool vacuums are designed along with their brand tools as a system for capturing fine dust. The slab mill creates more chunks and shavings than dust.

Maybe @zacharymarkson is right. DMS might be a bit elitist regarding tools and cheap materials. But if so, we have good reason. We want the equipment to be online and ready when a member shows up.

The area outside of woodshop isn’t exclusive to woodshop. All different types of activities are held in the area. On Thursday night the race team had the valve cover off of their engine so they could powder coat it. I doubt they would be very excited about the idea of your dust getting into the engine. Some people might say who cares if wood dust gets in the engine, until they dug a little deeper into who is on the team(long term and influential DMS volunteers). You might find yourself becoming a DMS pariah in short order after destroying an epoxy pour or two with your dust. This is about respecting other members as much as anything else.

If your equipment’s dust collection is actually effective, maybe you could use your saw and planer over by 3D printers @engpin and the science area. If your dust collection is good enough for them, then it would probably work on this side with the resin and finishing folks.

Is there a reason you can’t use/purchase white wood if you just have to use construction lumber? It isn’t much more expensive than cheap yellow pine. Both of the big box stores will accept returns. In reality, poplar hardwood isn’t that much more expensive than junk construction wood for most projects. With white lumber all these issues just disappear.

It appears the wood committee will be voting to either enhance the sappy wood ban in wood shop or completely rescind it on Monday night.

Trying to save a couple of bucks in materials is leading to a host of other issues.
It is beginning to feel like we are just kicking the can down road with our yellow pine and sappy wood rules. I am beginning to wonder if yellow pine/sappy wood might need to be banned from the whole facility at the BoD level.

Just putting it out there for discussion.

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Or in their powder coating.

Not trying to re-open the discussion that has been beaten to death on other thread(s), but are you going to all that effort because the wood is SYP? If so, then carry on…if it isn’t and you have some other species of pine, do you mind indulging my curiosity as to why not use the tools we have in the woodshop?

As a very high-level party-pooping thought, generating a lot of dust outside in the wind will not make with cars parked in the vicinity terribly happy, including our neighbors. Anything you can do to reduce/abate the impact would be appreciated by those potentially impacted.


edit: I see @SWA has just posted while I was composing…anything he has to say supersedes anything I have to say. That’s just true in general, actually…

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Did you accidentally swallow a whole bottle of humble pills this morning? :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

Seriously, how can this be handled moving forward short of asking the BoD to disallow the material in question?

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I suspect the fundamental issue here is not really the SYP ban, but the desire to use readily available sources (HD and Lowes) and the uncertainty as to whether the specific board is SYP or not. There’s a big difference betweena trip to spcialty lumber yard and the home center in your area.

I have a board that I’m going to use for something in the machine shop that I suspect is #2 white pine. I’m not going to use the woodshop mitre saw out of an abundance of caution. The board has been stored indoors for years and I don’t think it’s sappy, but I don’t know for sure and don’t want to risk “peeing in the pool.”

If only there was a tester for sap content.

And yes, I know about moisture sensors. Not exactly the same thing.

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I noted (just now) a potential compromise on the current SYP thread here:

Other than that, and I am not strongly championing it, I really don’t see a good solution that gets us to the people that want to work on SYP being able to. Maybe in new woodshop configuration we have a dedicate low-end miter saw, band saw and 1 or tow crap blades for the table saw? It’s not a huge stretch actually with a redesign of the miter station (a saw on each end).

Personally, with good of other committee areas in mind per @Ryan’s post, I am OK with wood chip production in wood shop annex and elsewhere (e.g. carving, Japanese joinery, etc.) but would not allow wood dust generated outside the main woodshop and being collected by the Felder…it is just too much of an issue for everyone else. But I guess as long as the slab flattening table is out there, it’s open season and something of a moot point.

My guess is probably not.

While blades are the major victims, anything that touches freshly cut surfaces picks up residue, and it’s challenge to clean when it does. I spent a lot of time scraping and solvent cleaning a mitre saw that I loaned out to someone that used it on really wet sappy wood. He bought me a new blade so I didn’t have to try and clean the burnt sap off it. 0/5 don’t recommend.

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That’s a great idea however, it’s more involved than just changing the blades… they should also wipe down the surfaces with acetone or other solvent…

If they brought in their carbides for the jointer or Planner… changing out those is a time consuming effort. Then a member would have to go for lunch while they waiting for the guy to finish putting the machine back to use…

Don’t forget that when you change jointer/planer blades - they don;t always seat perfectly - you have to run a test board to see if any are off (any “lines” in the test board). If there are you need to figure out which blades are out of whack and correct. This can be simple and quick or it can take a long time to work out. I know, I’ve watched Patrick change blades!

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I explicitly excluded planer and jointer in my comment.

This. :sweat_smile::raising_hand_woman:

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