Pat Barber wrote:

....
My motor cover is quite large and it is covered in slots
for motor ventilation. The throat plate has two big holes
in it and the plate doesn't(can't) fit very tightly on my
saw.

I'd not cover the motor ventilation slots as I think someone else
suggested for (to me) obvious reasons. I also don't disagree w/ the
viewpoint that if there's a residual dust/chips in the bottom it really
makes any difference.

....

I'm curious about how others have faired with table saw dust
collection.

About the same w/ the PM 66...it picks up what it picks up and that
isn't on the shop floor or in the air. That's good enough for me. I
don't have overhead collection which would be good from the collection
standpoint but more of a pita wrt having stuff "in the way"...

I'm still perplexed about what size pipe I'm using and what I
could do about it.

The new collector has two methods:

A inlet with four 4" holes.

A single inlet with a 8" inlet.

I checked around and 8" pipe is both rare and very
expensive. I found a source of 8" flex but again,
very expensive.

Even if I bite the bullet and get the 8" pipe, that
leaves the problem of how to transition to each machine.

Most of my machines are really geared toward 4" outlets
and that creates more peroblems.

I "believe" the BIG pipe is the better method but because
of my new layout, rigid pipe is a real problem.
....

The ideal would be to have an 8" trunk line and transitions to the
individual machines. I'd strive to as close an approximation to that as
I could achieve. I'd also strive for as little corrugate flex piping as
possible for efficiency reasons.