Popular Woodworking 2000-11 № 118, страница 33

Rescue your shop and your lungs

from mounds of unhealthy dust.

et's be honest, it's hard to get excited about dust collection. But once you get a dust collection system, you'll honestly wonder what the heck you were doing before you had it.

Dust collectors and air cleaners vastly improve your work environment, and we're not just talking about making your shop tidy. Fine sawdust is a health hazard. Even the least irritable dust can clog your nasal passages. Some woods — especially exotics and spalted woods — can pose serious health risks. So now that you know you need dust collection, you need to figure how much is enough.

There are two kinds of collectors that

are important to home woodworkers. The first is the single-stage dust collector, the least expensive system outside of a shop vacuum. In a single-stage dust collector an induction motor turns an impeller (basically a fan) that sucks in big chips. The chips go into a cloth bag, which you'll have to empty periodically. There are more expensive two-stage collectors that suck the chips into a barrel and the fine dust into a bag. And there are very expensive cyclone collectors that also separate fine dust from the big chips. We recommend most woodworkers buy a single-stage collector and add a cyclone lid for $35.

The other key element to a home dust