"carl mciver" wrote in message
nk.net...
"Paul" wrote in message
.. .
SNIP
|
| Has anyone tried making a home built wet dust collector? Should
eliminate
| setting the bags on fire. What I'm thinking is attaching the duct from
the
| dust collector to (through) the lid of a 30 gal. (metal) drum. Have
another
| duct from the sander also attached to the drum lid, but extending down
| inside to about 6" from the bottom of the drum (might need a grate or
screen
| a few inches above it to breakup the incoming air). Fill the drum about
2/3
| full of water. Would a 2hp dust collector be strong enough to pull
enough
| air through the water to be useful?
| Paul

Never had a Rainbow vacuum have you? Unless you emptied the tank of
muck out after every use, it would grow some **** even bacteriologists
have
never seen before. I can't even begin to describe the smell.
If you fill up a device with water, you've reduced the volume of the
container by that much, and unless you have a shower effect or something
going on, the sawdust will sit on top of the water, defeating the purpose
completely. Then cleaning it out will suck beyond all belief. I think
for
the effort you could stack a couple 55 gal drums or trash cans to each
other
and get the increased volume that way. Install the inlet about halfway up
and such that the air swirls in the can and it'll settle out well enough.
Might also be worth having a smaller can with a prefilter for the stuff
that
the first separator missed.


Carl,
As a matter of fact I do have a Rainbow vacuum, but I think there is a huge
difference between how fast things grow in 2 gallons of water in a vacuum
(sucking up who know what off your floors) and 20 gallons of water in dust
collector for a belt sander. We have a large commercially built wet dust
collector (RotoClone) at work that holds about 50 - 60 gallons water that is
hooked up to our blasting cabinet and three belt sanders. In the last three
years it has only been emptied once to clean out the metal sludge inside and
it doesn't smell at all.
I think you are missing the point about the water, it is the filter so
reducing the volume of the drum isn't an issue. The air from the sander
enters below the surface of the water and has to pass through it. The hot
sparks get cooled, greatly reducing the risk of setting the filter bags on
fire, and most of the dust gets captured by the water and sinks to the
bottom instead of going into the cloth filter bags. Cleaning will be a chore
as ferrous dust will form into a solid cake at the bottom, but it will take
years of home shop use before cleaning is really needed. If it is too much
of a hassle to clean, keep the lid, bring the drum to the landfill/recycling
center/scrap yard and get a new drum.
As for the sawdust sitting on top, the OP said he sands mostly metal so
that shouldn't be an issue. He also said he didn't have room for a 55 gal
drum.
If the OP sands a lot of light metals (like aluminum) a wet dust collector
is definitely the way to go since dry dust collectors are not recommended
because of the danger of explosions.
Paul