A dust collection query.

[hockey1]

Hello everybody,
I'm a new guy here to this site. Let m start off by saying that this is a great site. It is finally nice to go to a forum site and not feel as though people have giant egos.

Now on to the question at hand.

I have been thinking on this dust collection (more like managing) problem that I have and a resolution to this problem. This has all happened to us and maybe this can resolve the problem. I'm looking for others input to this. Like many others I pefer to hook up my shop vac when I'm using my power sanders and just when I get to the meat and potatos of the work the filter clogs up with the fine dust.

What I am proposing is the use of a bucket utilizing sealed lid with water in the bottom of it where the hose from the tool goes down into the water meanwhile the vacuum hose goes into the top of the bucket finishing the circle of suction. Pretty much making this just like a huge water bong. If a bong can filter out particles in smoke, I think to myself "I can use this concept" and use it in my workshop.

Has anyone ever tried this? If so, does it work? I would rather not waste my time or money on a project like this especially if anyone else has tried and failed. Also just to clear things up I do not use nor condone the use of bongs for any puroposes. Then again if it works in dust collection I might change my mind.

[TracyP]

Welcome Jesse, I don't think that sawdust and water would mix very well. I would think it would be prone to clog and clump. Having said that, I would like to invite you to go to the Who We Are Forum and give us a formal introduction. I may be wrong about the dc Idea you have and I am sure others will chime in to give you ideas. Again welcome aboard.

[ScottM]

Jesse, welcome to the saw dust pile. Please go out to Who we are and tell us a bit more about yourself.

[toolferone]

First off hello there!

I saw something like that on a dryer vent to catch the lint. There are several mini cyclone units out there that are 99% efficient. I don't know if that will do what you want. There are also several aftermarket washable filters for the shop vacs. Cleanstream is a popular one.

[JimmyC]

Jesse,

Welcome to the site.

What you are describibg is the same exact set up used for snading spacle on drywall jobs. I have the set up and it works exactly as you describe, a pole sander with a mesh screen has a hose hooked to the back of it, as the spackle is sanded the dust goes through the hose and is deposited in a five gallon bucket that is half filled with water, then a hose comes out of the bucket and goes into a shop-vac. Some fugitive dust gets through the water bucket but the majority ends up in the water.

Hope this helps,
Jimmy

[Jon]

Hello Jesse I think you should try it and tell us how it works. you might be on to something.

[DaveO]

Welcome Jesse, I am glad that you could join us. You pose a very interesting question here. I have had some experience with bongs in the past , and understand the mechanism behind them. I believe that the particulate matter with saw/sanding dust would be much to large to be captured in a water bath. In addition the suction force needed to move the air through the water probably would be too great for a shop vac set-up. What I might recommend is a separator http://www.woodcraft.com/articles.aspx?articleid=408. There are several designs that use a 5 gallon bucket for use with a shop vac.
But that said, I haven't seen it tried, so I have no grounds to say that it won't work. It doesn't sound like the set-up would be to expensive to undertake...it might be worth a try. You might become the next Bill Pentz

Dave

[Gofor]

Originally Posted by DaveO

...I have had some experience with bongs in the past , and understand the mechanism behind them. ...

Dave

Now why would that not be surprising from someone who has a tie-dyed wall hanging in his shop!! You are kinda young, tho, for a 60's kind of guy. "He's an (not so) old hippie, ..." Bellamy Bros.!!

Go

[Bas]

Hi Jesse, and welcome!

I think it's a fascinating idea. I think I came across something similar on a different site, so it's not totally wacko (or, at least, you're not the only one ) but of course I can't find the link.

I think Dave and Tracy have summed up the main issue - clumping/ clogging. Filters are great at catching big particles of dust/ chips, and the big stuff doesn't clog the filter. But you don't want that stuff to get into the water. On the other hand, small dust clogs filters, but water would easily trap it.

What you'd want is a two-stage system. The first stage (think a 10 gallon bucket) would capture the big particles, and have a coarse filter to let the air and smaller particles through. By coarse we're talking perhaps 50-100 micron. The second stage would be the water filter that traps all the fine stuff.

I'm pretty sure it will work, but it wouldn't be very compact - always an issue in the workshop. But, emptying the bucket would be simple, and changing the "filter" would be ridiculously simple if you have a sink in your shop.

I say give it a try!

[Alan in Little Washington]

Over the years various household vacuum manufacturers have sold a "watervac". They met with varying success; an indicator of such might be if any are sold today (I don't think so.) Of course, the water tank would cause a vac to be heavy, and messy to empty and clean. The other problem is that a lot of fine dust will be in suspension, so a fair amount contained in air bubbles will make it past the water.

That being said, I think the cleanest and by far the most effective would be a ClearVue mini cyclone which is specifically designed for shopvacs and mounts on a drywall bucket.

[Travis Porter]

I have a water vac for the house. It is a rainbow brand. We fell for one of the sales gimmicks and paid an exorbitant amount of money for it. It does vacuum very well and it doesn't lose suction, but the pan gets totally filthy and is a royal pain to clean out. You have to dump and rinse, dump and rinse, over and over again to get all the gook out. In the house, hair is really bad in it. We still have it (paid waaaayyy too much money for it to ever recover) and use it occassionally.

[McRabbet]

I must agree with Alan -- For several years, I used drywall filter bags and a HEPA filter in my 16 gallon ShopVac to capture ROS and mitesaw dust. It worked fine to capture all of the dust, but I had to replace lots of filter bags and they were not cheap. I bought a CV06 Mini Cylcone and mounted it on top of an empty 5 gallon drywall compound bucket. I've eliminate the drywall bags and it will probably take years for me to collect the small percentage of fines that get through the cyclone into my ShopVac canister -- it is still empty after 9 months of use. If you are still skeptical, check out this video (the first one). This little guy is worth the price!

[Dusty Sawyer]

Just don't get any wild ideas and drink the wood-water.

[hockey1]

Everybody,

Thanks for the input. That cyclone seems to be the ticket, they now have one that attaches directly to a rigid shop vac. But, I do believe I am going to try with my endeavours. Some people have stated about the particles and the volume of air being a problem. I'm thinking maybe if I can fabricate something to suspend a couple layers of screen in the water and thus break up the the large bubbles of air into smaller particles. This would, at least for me would be used strictly for sanding so cleaning I don't believe should be too much of a problem

Call me hard headed but, this might be something I must prove myself wrong. I will keep this updated

[Bas]

Originally Posted by hockey1

Call me hard headed but, this might be something I must prove myself wrong. I will keep this updated

That's how progress is made!