Recently picked up a 1951 vintage Delta Rockwell unisaw and am
going through it before putting it in service.

In my small shop I will be welding in addition to woodworking
and we all know that sawdust and sparks don't play nice together.

I want to fabricate a blade shroud for the unisaw to catch most
of the dust as close to the source as possible.

On my saw, there are two threaded holes that look like prime
candidates for mounting a shroud of this type (they move with
the blade). They are shown in the following picture--they are
center to the picture (one above the other) and the circular
area around them has been faced flat.

http://www.drizzle.com/~dantzler/dropbox/saw3.JPG

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes? Secondary to that, if any one has done this before (I know
folks have since I humbly admit to not coming up with the idea on
my own) would you have any suggestions on implementation?

Some of my thoughts...

I would prefer not to put any more holes in the saw cabinet.
Most likely I'll run some kind of flexible duct (maybe even shop
vac hose) from the bottom of the shroud out the cabinet and to
a good shop vac now (and maybe dust collector later). I could fab
the shroud out of mild steel, but that would make me slightly
nervous because I shudder to think what would happen if the thing
ever came loose. I may take this as a good excuse to start doing
aluminum TIG and make it out of 6061.

Thanks for helping me brainstorm.

Jeff Dantzler
Seattle, WA

In rec.crafts.metalworking Jeff Dantzler wrote:

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes?

I just dug all the crud out of these holes and by chance happened to
have a 5/16" x 18 tpi bolt lying around so I figured that part out.

Would still be interested in any input regarding the blade shroud.

Cheers--Jeff

If you are trying to get the shroud to tilt with the blade can you use the
spliter mount bolt hole? I know all the safty freeks are going to say
something about not using a splitter. If you post on the wood working group
you will get a bunch of messages. The Unisaw is a REAL nice machine, I will
be selling mine in a few weeks, I am about done with my kitchen.
"Jeff Dantzler" wrote in message
...
In rec.crafts.metalworking Jeff Dantzler
wrote:

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes?

I just dug all the crud out of these holes and by chance happened to
have a 5/16" x 18 tpi bolt lying around so I figured that part out.

Would still be interested in any input regarding the blade shroud.

Cheers--Jeff

On Sun, 26 Feb 2006 19:40:14 -0000, Jeff Dantzler
wrote:

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes?

I just dug all the crud out of these holes and by chance happened to
have a 5/16" x 18 tpi bolt lying around so I figured that part out.

Would still be interested in any input regarding the blade shroud.

I personally think you're too concerned about the combustion issue.
If you stand at that saw ripping as fast as you can with no
ventilation in a closet and have someone else welding at the same time
you MIGHT be able to cause a flash fire. I think with minimal
ventilation you would not have a problem.

As far as the shroud goes, the two holes are for a small shroud that
basically keeps pitch off the elevation gears. On the older style
cabinets I've seen, a slanted false bottom is installed in the bottom
of the case that is slanted towards a hole cut for the vac system. I
suppose to reduce the amount of dust that was able to accumulate, you
could do the same thing but higher in the cabinet.

Mike O.

On Sun, 26 Feb 2006 16:49:54 -0000, Jeff Dantzler
wrote:

Recently picked up a 1951 vintage Delta Rockwell unisaw and am
going through it before putting it in service.

In my small shop I will be welding in addition to woodworking
and we all know that sawdust and sparks don't play nice together.

I want to fabricate a blade shroud for the unisaw to catch most
of the dust as close to the source as possible.

On my saw, there are two threaded holes that look like prime
candidates for mounting a shroud of this type (they move with
the blade). They are shown in the following picture--they are
center to the picture (one above the other) and the circular
area around them has been faced flat.

http://www.drizzle.com/~dantzler/dropbox/saw3.JPG

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes? Secondary to that, if any one has done this before (I know
folks have since I humbly admit to not coming up with the idea on
my own) would you have any suggestions on implementation?

They should be 5/16-18 thread. They are used to mount a sawdust
deflector that must have been removed from your unit. The deflecter
is to route the dust down and in the direction of the blade travel so
that it does not come out of the insert opening.



Some of my thoughts...

I would prefer not to put any more holes in the saw cabinet.
Most likely I'll run some kind of flexible duct (maybe even shop
vac hose) from the bottom of the shroud out the cabinet and to
a good shop vac now (and maybe dust collector later). I could fab
the shroud out of mild steel, but that would make me slightly
nervous because I shudder to think what would happen if the thing
ever came loose. I may take this as a good excuse to start doing
aluminum TIG and make it out of 6061.

Thanks for helping me brainstorm.

Jeff Dantzler
Seattle, WA

"Jeff Dantzler" wrote in message
...
Recently picked up a 1951 vintage Delta Rockwell unisaw and am
going through it before putting it in service.

In my small shop I will be welding in addition to woodworking
and we all know that sawdust and sparks don't play nice together.

I want to fabricate a blade shroud for the unisaw to catch most
of the dust as close to the source as possible.

On my saw, there are two threaded holes that look like prime
candidates for mounting a shroud of this type (they move with
the blade). They are shown in the following picture--they are
center to the picture (one above the other) and the circular
area around them has been faced flat.

http://www.drizzle.com/~dantzler/dropbox/saw3.JPG

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes? Secondary to that, if any one has done this before (I know
folks have since I humbly admit to not coming up with the idea on
my own) would you have any suggestions on implementation?

Some of my thoughts...

I would prefer not to put any more holes in the saw cabinet.
Most likely I'll run some kind of flexible duct (maybe even shop
vac hose) from the bottom of the shroud out the cabinet and to
a good shop vac now (and maybe dust collector later). I could fab
the shroud out of mild steel, but that would make me slightly
nervous because I shudder to think what would happen if the thing
ever came loose. I may take this as a good excuse to start doing
aluminum TIG and make it out of 6061.

Thanks for helping me brainstorm.

Jeff Dantzler
Seattle, WA

I have an imperfect dust collection system on mine an old unisaw .I made an
improvised dust shoot for the interior terminating at an elongated hole in
the side of the base . the dust collection system [2HP grizzleguts] is
plugged in there .

the front ventilated cover has been replaced by an unvented one and caulked,
the base is also caulked to the floor the table is sealed underneath with
either duct tape or expanded foam ["stuff"].and lastly I have drilled as
many holes as I can get in the insert .

It does gets a lot of the dust generated by the blade but not all , probably
as much as any other solution ......

"Jeff Dantzler" wrote in message
...
Recently picked up a 1951 vintage Delta Rockwell unisaw and am
going through it before putting it in service.

In my small shop I will be welding in addition to woodworking
and we all know that sawdust and sparks don't play nice together.

I want to fabricate a blade shroud for the unisaw to catch most
of the dust as close to the source as possible.

On my saw, there are two threaded holes that look like prime
candidates for mounting a shroud of this type (they move with
the blade). They are shown in the following picture--they are
center to the picture (one above the other) and the circular
area around them has been faced flat.

http://www.drizzle.com/~dantzler/dropbox/saw3.JPG

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes? Secondary to that, if any one has done this before (I know
folks have since I humbly admit to not coming up with the idea on
my own) would you have any suggestions on implementation?

Some of my thoughts...

I would prefer not to put any more holes in the saw cabinet.
Most likely I'll run some kind of flexible duct (maybe even shop
vac hose) from the bottom of the shroud out the cabinet and to
a good shop vac now (and maybe dust collector later). I could fab
the shroud out of mild steel, but that would make me slightly
nervous because I shudder to think what would happen if the thing
ever came loose. I may take this as a good excuse to start doing
aluminum TIG and make it out of 6061.

Thanks for helping me brainstorm.

Jeff Dantzler
Seattle, WA

I have an imperfect dust collection system on mine an old unisaw .I made an
improvised dust shoot for the interior terminating at an elongated hole in
the side of the base . the dust collection system [2HP grizzleguts] is
plugged in there .

the front ventilated cover has been replaced by an unvented one and caulked,
the base is also caulked to the floor the table is sealed underneath with
either duct tape or expanded foam ["stuff"].and lastly I have drilled as
many holes as I can get in the insert .

It does gets a lot of the dust generated by the blade but not all , probably
as much as any other solution ......

Thanks to all who replied.

This will be an interesting project, but I think I can come
up with a good solution.

Jeff

On Sun, 26 Feb 2006 16:49:54 -0000, Jeff Dantzler
wrote:

[...snip...]

My main question is can any one tell me the thread spec for these
holes? Secondary to that, if any one has done this before (I know
folks have since I humbly admit to not coming up with the idea on
my own) would you have any suggestions on implementation?

[...snip...]

I just picked up a copy of Sandor Nagyszalanczy's book "Woodshop Dust
Control". There on page 177 it had a picture similar to what you are
talking about, specifically for contractor table saws. He does
describe in a couple of paragraphs just what he did, but there is only
1 photo from the top and you can't see how it is mounted. Anyway, it
might be worth a gander at your local library.

Jim Weisgram wrote:

I just picked up a copy of Sandor Nagyszalanczy's book "Woodshop Dust
Control". There on page 177 it had a picture similar to what you are
talking about, specifically for contractor table saws. He does
describe in a couple of paragraphs just what he did, but there is only
1 photo from the top and you can't see how it is mounted. Anyway, it
might be worth a gander at your local library.

Thanks Jim!

Jeff