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My newest most-favorite-ist tool
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Author:  Tim McKnight [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:27 pm ]
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Since I have been cleaning the bajeebers out of the shop for the last week (due to Mary's newfound wood allergy problem) I thought I would share some pics of one of my two new tools. It is a mini-cyclone seperator made by Clear-Vue Cyclones. This little puppy is nothing short of amazing!!! Keep in mind that the pictures you are about to see are AFTER the 5 gallon bucket was emptied FIVE times! That is 25 gallons of micro fine dust, not just your average sawdust and wood chips. I have pulled all of my tools out from the walls, amd vacuumed the walls, tools, ceilings, lights, floor, cabinets, you name it. I would HIGHLY recommend that if you are serious about making your shop vac work like it has never worked before you need to check this tool out!









99.995% of what ever you suck up goes into the 5 gallon bucket. I have not cleaned this pleated filter yet and it still looks like new. My old shop vac would have had the filter plugged solid after picking up a half gallon of dust.

The "other" new tool is the 5HP 1800 CFM big brother to this little mini. I am still running new duct work and should have it operational in about a week. Just for fun I fired it up last night (with 5 open ducts) and it about pulled my arm in ;) I am reeeeeely stoked about these new tools.
Author:  nathan c [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:36 pm ]
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Excellent, Tim. I've been looking for a solution for my RIGID vac. This seems a better solution than the garbage can lid separators.
Author:  Hesh [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:41 pm ]
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Very cool Tim my freind but did you have to show those pictures of that.......dirt........  Now I am going to have nightmares tonight.....

Congrats bro!!!
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:52 pm ]
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I have been the trash-can seperator route and there is no comparrison. I have a steel cyclone that is made for 4" duct and it works pretty good but it still did not perform like I had expected it to. This little mini is ... amazing. I don't want to wear out the word but it really is. Clear-Vue has a video demo on their site with the Rigid shop vac and you can see it in action.

Hesh, sorry about that. Just dream about little white clouds, little white carpets, little white lambs and little men in white suits carrying an extra white jacket .... for YOU!!!
Author:  Lillian F-W [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:54 pm ]
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Details man, detail. Purchased where? How much? What comes with it? Details.
Author:  SteveCourtright [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 2:55 pm ]
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Looks promising. Of course, the proof is in the pudding. Do let us know how Mary's allergies fare!
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:02 pm ]
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Do a Google search for Clear-Vue Cyclones. The mini runs $125-ish. You have to design your own base and mounting but there are lots of ideas on their site. I used a 3/4" x 13" piece of birch plywood, routed a 3/8" wide circular groove on the underside about 3/8" deep. Laid in a strip of close cell foam (1/4" x 3/8") in the groove to seal on the mouth of the bucket. Add two eye screws and two bungees to hold the cyclone to the bucket and you are in business. It comes sized for 2-1/2" vac hose. I am still not happy with my cart so I need to re-deign that.
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:05 pm ]
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Here is the website address - Clear-Vue Cyclones
Author:  Lillian F-W [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:05 pm ]
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Thanks Tim.
Author:  KenH [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:12 pm ]
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GREAT info Tim!  I dont have any allergies to wood, but for other health reasons I want to do something about the amount of dust int he air in my shop. Looks like this will be just the right ticket for those needs.


I might also add that this is the  LINK to the clear vue web site


I was at Home Depot last week and discovered that you can buy the vacuum hose and all of the necessary attachments and adapters for hooking your sanders and small tools to your vacuum system. While it isnt necessarily cheap, it is not as expensive to hook all of these up as I thought it would be.


 
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:12 pm ]
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I spoke with Ed Morgano (owner of Clearview) and he said many folks plumb their shops with 2" PVC and hook up the mini to a rigid system. I can see how this little guy could handle some smaller hobby tools with ease. So if you are cramped for space this could be a viable alternative. You could also easily mount this little unit on a larger trash can so you would have more capacity if needed.
Author:  Dave Anderson [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:24 pm ]
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That looks like the answer for my shop!
Thank You Tim, I'm definitely going to check that out!
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 3:30 pm ]
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Ken,
I don't have any allergies to wood either but as I was researching a more effective dust collector system I read some info on Bill Pentz web site that made me realize how dangerous and harmful wood dust can be to your health. I thought my shop was fairly clean since I had a "dust collector" [system] UNTIL I started looking around my shop a bit more closely. Look at the fine dust on the light shades, lips of the cupboards, on your work benchs, etc... and then you begin to realize what you are breathing is the same micro fine dust that is all over everything. It is even worse if you are working in a basement or home shop because now the fine dust is being spread all over your home if you have forced air heating and cooling.

The main culprit of my system was the FILTER. My last system was a Grizzly with a huge bag filter. These bag filters are simply not good enough to stop the fine dust from penetrating the bag. Once the bag is full of fine dust the vac system is much less efficient. Ideally it would be best to vent the blower out doors but then you create negative pressure in your shop which leads to even more problems. As the blower exhausts air out doors you must bring air back inside. If you are doing this in the winter you are exhausting your heat. If you are trying to maintain the humidity level in your shop them you are brining in moist or dry air which upsets the humidity balance in the shop. So the leat complictaed method is exhausting the blower inside the shop to maintain the RH and temperature balance. To do this effectively you need a very high quality filter to stop the fine dust particles.

The main benefit the to cyclone is that it separates the majority of trash and fine particles into a collection barrel and greatly reduces the amount of fine dust which could be headed for the filter. This fine dust is death to your high dollar fiter. A restricted filter will then greatly reduce the efficiency of the dust collector as a whole.

I said all that to say this - The Mini-cyclone is amazing in that out of 25 GALLONS of super fine dust that I have sucked up thus far less than a 1/10 of a teaspoon has reached the Shop Vac filter. This thing is extremely well designed and super efficient. I don't understand the design of it but the proof is in the pudding.
Author:  Todd Rose [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 7:47 pm ]
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I always use a bag inside my shop vac - standard shop vac bags available at hardware stores, etc. It catches all the dust, so the shop vac's filter element never clogs up. When the bag's full, it goes into the trash, and a new bag goes in. So, I don't see a need for the cyclone, which appears to make the vac so much more cumbersome. Is there something I'm missing?

Author:  Todd Rose [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 8:01 pm ]
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To elaborate a bit - the bags I use are designed to capture fine dust. I have no reason to think they aren't doing so effectively, and I don't notice any significant drop in sucking power from the shop vac as the bag fills up.

I mainly use the shop vac for cleaning up the shop. I also have one belt sander I hook it up to as a dust collector, and I'll occasionally hook it up to a ROS, though I usually don't bother, because my ROS's do a pretty good job of collecting their own dust in their little bags, and I do my sanding on a down-draft table I built, which is connected to my main dust collector. All other machines are hooked up to my main dust collector. Then I also have a ceiling mounted air cleaner.

Anyway, my point is that the bag system in the shop vac works just fine for me, so I might suggest that others try this before adding the cyclone, which, as I said, just seems like it makes the shop vac into an unwieldy unit.
Author:  Hesh [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 11:25 pm ]
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Todd buddy it is the size of the particle that is being captured, consistently, that is the real value of the systems employing a cyclone of HEPA filter.

I used bags too in shop vacs and they are really just a strainer and the smallest particles are still released into the air for you and others to breath.  In addition to the bags I also used the $36 HEPA filter cartridges in my shop vacs and although these worked they clogged up in less use then it took to build a single guitar.

So what I think is being missed here is that Tim is trying to capture the finest particles which BTW are the most potentially dangerous.
Author:  Don Williams [ Mon Dec 17, 2007 11:39 pm ]
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Oneida also makes a similar unit that I'm planning to get one of these days.
It's called the Dust Deputy.
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 12:36 am ]
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Don,
I narrowed my choices down to two [large] units:
1) Oneida
2) Clear-Vue

I won't bother to say why I purchased the Clear-Vue over the Oneida in an open forum. However, after the research I did the Clear-Vue was the winner IMHO. Another thing that bothers me is that Oneida runs some negative advertising campaigns against Clear-Vue which I don't appreciate as a consumer.
Author:  Brock Poling [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 1:00 am ]
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Read the controversy section on Bill Pentz's site.

Very interesting.

Author:  Dave-SKG [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 1:18 am ]
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[QUOTE=Tim McKnight]Here is the website address - Clear-Vue Cyclones[/QUOTE]


Thanks Tim, You always come up with great stuff. I jst ordered one the mini CV06...can't wait to get and get that dust out of my shop!


MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Author:  WaddyThomson [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 3:33 am ]
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I have the Dust Deputy, and I have not had to touch my vacuum filter now for months.  I use it to catch all of my sanding dust, and my dust from my band saw.
Author:  Chas Freeborn [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 3:42 am ]
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I've got the Dust Deputy (as well as an Oneida Gorilla cyclone) and they're
both great.
For the sanders I use a Fein Turbo 2 with the Hepa bag and filter.
-C
Author:  Howard Klepper [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:07 am ]
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IIRC, there was a recent review of cyclones (American Woodworker, I think)in which Oneida and Grizzly came out on top. That was for complete collection systems, which may not have included the add-on cyclones like Clear-vue. According to that review there have been some recent improvements in the blades in the Oneida and Griz that make them precipitate out finer dust than they had previously. I'm thinking the 3hp Griz for the new shop I build next year--located in a separate room.
Author:  Don Williams [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:40 am ]
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I know several people who own Oneida's, and although you may not like them comparing their product to other products (product differentiation is common), they have some features that make them pretty well top shelf. Everyone who has one loves theirs, and trust me, they are fantastic, and well made. To each his own I guess, but I wouldn't buy a clear-vue myself because it's made of plastic, and also because the stuff appears to be cheaply made in my eyes. Don't take that personally, it's not a knock on anyone who prefers them. It's just the way I feel about them. It may not have any factual value at all.
Frankly, I'm glad Oneida pointed out things like the guage of the steel they use versus the steel others use, and the type of welds, and also the material and design of the impeller. Those are very strong selling points. They make a very good argument for why their prodcut is the best, which is why when I upgrade my old Grizzly unit, I'll get an Oneida. No second thoughts.
Author:  Tim McKnight [ Tue Dec 18, 2007 6:45 am ]
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Howard,
I believe, if you read Bill Pentz's information, many of those design changes that you reference came from Bill's work. There are many good systems on the market and each of us will be drawn to this one or that one for different reasons. The Clear-Vue just seemed to be the best fit for me, plus in some small way, it was a way that I could support Bill and the strides that he has made in this field.
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