Dust Collection Decision

Ok—after getting numerous comments yesterday (THANKS LJ! – You guys/gals are fantastic BTW!) I decided that a dedicated super sucker – AKA – dust collector was going to be what we needed. Over the weekend I had missed out on a Jet DC1100, and another one . . . I forget what brand it was. We figured we would end up with some deal on Craigslist and sure enough, there popped one up buried in a “wood tools for sale” ad.

The price was definitely right—about 1/2 of what a new one would be and no taxes/etc.. to deal with so now we’re the proud owner of a Grizzly dust collector.

From the label it was manufactured in October of 2001 and it’s 1 1/2 horsepower.

Getting it home was a chore, as the bags kept blowing around and causing the straps to loosen up. I had the “brilliant” plan of putting the top bag holder loop through my strap and run that strap diagonally across the truck. The problem was the bag kept whipping around and the strap cinch down mechanism was being beat against the truck bed. (Thankfully I drive a ‘real’ truck with little paint, scratches, and all the abuse of the years . . . so a little less paint wasn’t a consequence . . . LOL.) I had to stop twice on the way home to redo the straps to make sure it was still going to be riding with me. The “brilliance” part was that the loop chafed enough to cut it in two. We looked at it and decided it wasn’t a big deal if we’re going to replace the bag anyway. I applied some fabric glue last night and it appears to be holding today. :-)

The handle for the Shopsmith Jointer finally came yesterday also. I popped it on there and viola—all ready to roll. I have a new set of blades and I’d like to put on it and take the old blades and sharpen them. There is a very slight nick in them that most of the time would cause little issue. I still need to get that rust cleared off and then give the bed/fence a good wax job.

The cleanup/oiling process still in limbo here. I have a lot of the egg and ice trays from fridges . . . they’re great for corralling those little screws and things from projects. The machine oiler was great for getting the pulley sheaves just what they needed. A little wax made a huge difference on the tubes and quill.

After dealing with the dust in the Shopsmith, I can’t wait to see how this dust collector will work. The 510 that I bought had a hard life already, but with a little TLC I think it’ll be as good as new.

The next thing with the dust collector will be getting a better bag for tighter filtration and adding a cyclone of some type. Since my main focus will be just on the two Shopsmiths, I’m not anticipating putting any piping to the rest of the shop. I’d rather keep my run just limited to the 10 foot section that I have and bring the DC to the work area. I’m envisioning a platform that is integrated with the current DC body/blower setup and does the chip/dust collection. Hmmm. Lots of possibilities there! I wish they made that Oneida Dust Deputy in a 6 inch or 4 inch size . . at that price! :-)