As I said earlier, the wife made a run to Lowes' this weekend so I had her pick up some more supplies to start on the next phase of the DC system.  I did some roughing in last night and went back today once the furkids were taken care of and set as much of it in as I could.  Now I need to make a trip over to WoodCrafters once the funds allow so I can pick up a few more goodies.  Until then, I've gone about almost as far as I can go with it.  This leg of the project was to plumb in the ductwork for the scroll saw, compound miter saw, and the second of three floor sweeps. 



(Above)  From where we left off the last time, I have run a main header toward the North wall and branched off with a 4X4X2 sweeping WYE to go to the scroll saw.



(Above) Line hung going to the compound miter and future floor sweep location



From another slightly different angle.

Stay tuned, more to come .............

Now for a few detailed shots of todays progress. 



(above)  Coming down the back of the office wall with the 2", I used two 45 deg elbows I had left over from the kitchen makeover to form the bend.



(above)  I tried to capture the sweep in the WYE but didn't do very good at the camera work as usual.  If you look closely you can see the static cable connections outside the duct.



(above)  The 2" line on left is going to the scrollsaw, 4" just behind going to the right is the TS line, and in the foreground is the header going to the north wall.

Just a couple more photos coming for the night.........

Although I got more than this roughed in, I couldn't get it to stay in place long enough to take a photo, then the batteries in the camera went dead, it started to rain, so I had to close up, get the kids out to potty before the flood gates opened up, etc.  As soon as I get more ground cable and smaller flex pipe and the floor sweep I'll be finishing this stage of the system, so look at about 2 weeks time.



(Above)  Roughing in to go to the scrollsaw.  The downward line will be capped and used if necessary for clean out in case of clogs.




(close up of first photo)



(above)  Added the nipple where the next elbow, blast gate and flext line will connect.

Looking good Dewy.

I hope you aren't getting too many bends and gates that you reduce the static pressure to low to be useful.

Dewey,
You're just building a BETTER MOUSE-TRAP.... any rodent that climbs into the system is going to be going through a 'mulcher' when it hits the squirrel-cage blower when you turn it ON.  You're going to have one 'bloody mess' to clean up after that.  YUCK!!!

nice going Dewey, looks great.

Dewey, thanks for this thread as it has been an education to many of us, both old and new.  I'm watching and learning from all posters.

Posted By swampgator on 07-13-2010 11:41 AM
Dewey, thanks for this thread as it has been an education to many of us, both old and new.  I'm watching and learning from all posters.

As are we all (re: my bold text) Some of the members have brought up some very good points, as did Gerry D when we yacked on Yahoo IM at the beginning of this project.  I try and test the system after every leg to make sure suction is sufficient, and that everything is as good as I can expect w/ limited funds, materials and space.  Woodwizard brought up a good point about this which is why I test it often, and also try to keep the blast gates (in most cases) as close to the header as possible, to shorten the feeders when not in use.  So far it has proved out to be working ok, but his comment also reminds me to rough everything in before attaching w/ screws.  By roughing it in first I can stand back and see it's possible flaws and repair them before running the static ground cable.

Thanks to all, will be updating in a couple weeks probably.  I'm in the midst of major clean up in the shop now.

I have one question...Since you're using PVC, are you also running 'anti-static' grounded wires inside the PVC pipes. (Maybe they're there, but I don't see any.)

Mine is all metal and also tied to mechanical ground on each tool to bleed-off any static build-up that otherwise could cause a spark, zap me, and in a very rare instance, burn the place down.
-- See this Article> Click Here

Your DC project is looking pretty nice and well thought out.

bikebuilder

Good call!

Ground the entire system!

Fine dust and static.

Not Good.............................

IT'S DOING DOUBLES AGAIN!!!!!!!

I see that scooter .....w a i t f or i t..... and all will be well. (usually) lol

And thanks. Better safe than sorry, I think.

Even though a big boom from a home PVCed  DC shop has never occurred, as mentioned in the linked article above, no one would want to be the first, in that respect. And certainly nobody likes to get a "ZAP!" type of surprise when doing that  'precision rip cut' on their table saw because their pinky finger barely touched the rip fence. --- One might loose a thumb with that kind of reaction. --- Ouch!!

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Golly I wish we had more EDIT TIME. after rereading my previous post I thought I should have "Dewey," at the top of it to properly direct my question/post. ....hhhuueerrrmm, oh well...

bikebuilder, if you look at the very first photo at the top of this page, you can see the yellow marrette joining several anti-static cables together. So the short answer is "yes I am".

Dewey, looks good. Like to see those long sweeps. TIP... use good blast gates, the cheap plastic ones clog  and will not close up completly. the metal ones that can be taken apart and cleaned are much better.

Posted By hclark2 on 07-25-2010 12:18 PM
Dewey, looks good. Like to see those long sweeps. TIP... use good blast gates, the cheap plastic ones clog  and will not close up completly. the metal ones that can be taken apart and cleaned are much better.

If I could afford the metal ones I would, but since every aspect of my shop is run on a shoe string budget, I have to make do with what is affordable at the time, but trust me when I say the cheap plastic ones are easy to take apart, had 3 fall apart on their own, now they are screwed together in all 4 corners.  lol!

Posted By gmaint on 07-26-2010 10:33 AM
Dewey;

  Of course we all 'trust' you. However, since you posted the "alleged" Craig pictures nothing has been posted from Craig. WT? either your schnauzers and dust sweep made him disappear, or we are going to have to start a "CSI HCOA"

Gregg, I talked to Craig on Saturday, he'll be getting his computer back out of the shop on Friday or Saturday, and will be flooding us with photos and DL storoes then.  He's still alive honest, but his veggie garden, ummmmmm, well he'll explain.

Posted By Dewey on 07-24-2010 11:49 AM
bikebuilder, if you look at the very first photo at the top of this page, you can see the yellow marrette joining several anti-static cables together. So the short answer is "yes I am".

Ahhh...Good! Sorry, I didn't catch that 'cause it looks more like a  lamp extension cord end than a wire connector in the picture. Probably just 'cause it's a little bit out of focus and so what looks like plug-prong holes are actually the shadows of the wire-nut.

Also, here's a hint on keeping plastic blast gates clear and fully closeable:
To keep them clear, cut the corners off , at 45 degrees or so, so that there's about a 1/4" long opening on both corners at the bottom of the gate slot . When ever that blast-gate is opened, it clears itself.

I've experienced the clogging issue myself, and doing that is easy to do using either a Dremel Tool or a Coping saw. It has worked like a charm since I did that and I haven't had any gate closing issues in the 5+ years since I installed my system and did that mod on all of my plastic blast gates.

I can't and won't take credit for that idea as I'm pretty sure I found it mentioned somewhere else, maybe on this forum or maybe on another site, blog or forum. If I could remember where I originally found that tip, I'd post a link to it here, but I don't. Sorry.

I've never had one actually fall apart on me...(yet)...as you've mentioned...
..I've actually tried to break one apart on purpose (I won't go into why here) and I only managed to distort it to a point that made it completely unusable.

Bikebuilder wrote

Also, here's a hint on keeping plastic blast gates clear and fully closeable:
To keep them clear, cut the corners off , at 45 degrees or so, so that there's about a 1/4" long opening on both corners at the bottom of the gate slot . When ever that blast-gate is opened, it clears itself.

You know what? I have read something similar, but it was to grind off the full end of the gate, I like your solution much better. As soon as I get the next batch of supplies to work on it again I'm going to give that a try. Thanks for the suggestion. Now, any tips on improving my camera skills b/c they suck big time (no pun intended since we are talking dust collection)

Dewey,

I've heard of that too, but imo, it opens much more of a gap than is needed adequately to clear the channel.
Oh yeah...!!! Something a tad bit important...Remember to open the gate before cutting the corner off. Otherwise you'll nip the corner of the gate itself and it will probably not seal right when closed.

On your photography skills, it's not your fault that things are out of focus, but it's more to do with what the camera decided to auto-focus on. - Your plumbing.

Your pics are much better than what a Polaroid or a 'fixed-focus' cam would produce. I'll say no more on that here as 'Photography for the Web' would be better discussed in the 'Miscellaneous' forum rather than here. After all, I don't want this discussion getting cluttered up with off topic 'photo snapping chatter', as I'm sure you, nor anyone else does either.

For any members considering an inexpensive dust collection system, this discussion should be a good resource. (not to compete but I spent more money on my dust collector cyclone than I spent on my entire plumbing system, including the blast gates. Could it be better? Ohhh...Yes! That's why I'm still thinking of ways to refine a few collector ports, connections & configurations. 'Wind and Suction' are tricky things to figure out without an 'Air-Flow Sciences Engineering' doctorate hanging on your wall. lol

Bikebuilder wrote:

That's why I'm still thinking of ways to refine a few collector ports, connections & configurations. 'Wind and Suction' are tricky things to figure out without an 'Air-Flow Sciences Engineering' doctorate in your pocket. lol

Well people say I'm full of hot air at times so maybe I have half the battle won before starting.