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-----Original Message-----
From: felder-woodworking@...
[mailto:felder-woodworking@...] On Behalf Of mcdavis
Sent: Sunday, May 06, 2012 2:56 PM
To: felder-woodworking@...
Subject: [felder-woodworking] Re: 15 Things I've (Sort of) Learned About
Dust Collection


good post Bill, thanks!


--- In felder-woodworking@..., "Bill Billick" <billick@...>
wrote:

To start with, here's some thoughts about my recent Nordfab
installation -- in no particular order...

1. Yes, Nordfab does cost "at least twice as much" as other ductwork
options. But it's easy to install; easy to make adjustments to
reposition pieces (or to rethink how you originally planned to layout
a run); easy to take apart to clear a clog; and, if you ever move your
shop to another address, most of the pieces of your system would be
readily reusable. Plus if you ever retire your woodworking shop (not
that any of us will ever do that), most of your Nordfab ductwork will
still retain much of its value for resale. For all of these reasons,
I choose Nordfab and if I had to do it again -- well, I would do it again.

2. Nordfab's catalog only shows 30 degree wye branches, but 45 degree
wyes are also readily available without any special order charges.
They aren't mentioned in their catalogs -- you just gotta ask for
them. If you have a relatively small workshop (like I have), using 45
degree wyes may help a lot in laying out your dust collection system.

3. Nordfab's standard length pipes are about 60" in length. They
also offer what they call nipple pipes which are about 12" long. To
create a pipe less than 60" long, you cut off a section of the 60"
pipe, and then slide it into the 12" nipple pipe and secure it with a
quick-clamp. All of this is pretty common knowledge to anyone who has
previously bought Nordfab ductwork. But what I didn't initially know
was that you can also special order nipples that are "less than" 12"
long -- for example, when you only need a 7" long piece of quick-connect

pipe for a particular location.

Actually you can special order lots of different connectors from
Nordfab, and if they're similar to any of Nordfab standard offerings
then there may not be any special charges. I found that to be surprising.

4. Whenever I had to shorten a pipe, I used a bench-mounted 14"
metal-cutting cut-off saw to slice through the Nordfab pipes (although
I didn't cut anything wider than 6" pipes). These are the cheap
cut-off saws that can be found at Home Depot and Lowes. Very easy to do

-- I put a 4"

wide strip of cardboard around the entire pipe, marked it with a magic
marker where it needed to be cut, and then just 2 quick cuts for each

pipe.

Lots of sparks that scared my wife, but it worked like a dream and cut
through the pipes like butter. Definitely wear goggles and a hat --
and if you have a ceiling- mounted air cleaner, that helpful too!
After each cut I smoothed out the cut edges with a small grinding
wheel mounted on the end of a hand power drill.

5. I've discovered that it's not unusual for Nordfab to ship old
inventory first. But in all fairness to Nordfab, most companies
probably have a similar policy. For example, my first 7" quick-clamp
arrived with a fairly short handle that was close to impossible to
close. When I called for advice about how I could leverage the "too
short handle" to close the quick-clamp, Nordfab quickly shipped me a
later model 7" quick-clamp (at no
charge) with a longer handle that was much easier to close. So when
you place your Nordfab order be sure to specify that you only want the
"latest available inventory" for each piece ordered. Hey, it may not
actually happen but it sure doesn't hurt to ask.

6. FYI -- In the last few months, Nordfab has introduced a new
quick-clamp for their system that provides a full 360 degree seal
around the entire pipe connection. Their old quick-connect clamp
(which, of course, includes ALL of the ones that I bought) didn't
quite do a full seal (probably only about 95% to 98% although they still

sealed quite tight with very little leakage).

So if you place a 2009 order, be sure that you specify that you want
only the newer clamps otherwise Nordfab might try to ship you some of
their older style clamps to clear out old inventory.

7. Most of Nordfab's independent dealers charge Nordfab's full list
price, and some may even add on extra charges for processing paperwork,

etc.

Felder recommended contacting Doug Lippy with Industrial Corp. in
Maryland, and Doug is one of those Nordfab dealers that charges full list

price.

Maybe at one time Doug gave Foggers a discount, but he apparently
doesn't do it anymore. In this tight economy you would think he
would. So instead I went with:

Kevin Bolland
Bolland Machine
2718 Darlington Rd.
Beaver Falls, PA 15010
Phone: 724-846-1290
Fax: 724-846-5253
kevin@...

Kevin had been previously recommended by several Foggers (that's how I
found him). He offers a 10% discount to FOG members (if you ask for
it), and I've found him to be both helpful & easy to work with. When
I explained to him what I was trying to do, he patiently listened &
then offered suggestions & solutions that saved me both money & future
grief. And, in fact, several of my tips in this post originated from
Kevin. In addition to the 10% discount, there also weren't any
additional hidden charges for consultations, handling the paperwork,
shipping markups, etc. Kevin's a good guy to do business with.

8. All orders are packed and shipped directly from Nordfab's facility
in North Carolina. So it really doesn't matter where a dealer is located:
you'll still pay the same shipping charges to your shop regardless of
which dealer you use. All of the truck and UPS shipments that I
received from Nordfab (without exception) were well packed and arrived

without damage.

FYI -- I took advantage of a FREE SHIPPING offer that Nordfab had this
past December. That saved me a lot of money. I don't know if that
was a one-time free shipping offer -- or whether Nordfab will be doing
it again if the U.S. economy continues to tank. Does anyone know if
Nordfab ever offered this before?

9. Even though all of Nordfab's pipes and pieces will readily clamp
together without any tools needed, always wear leather-faced gloves
when doing your installation -- there are lots of tiny, unseen sharp
metal edges everywhere that will definitely cut up your hands (even if
you're being quite careful). I'm talking from experience here. I
found a nice pair of leather-faced gray mechanics gloves at Lowes for
about $15.00 that fit like a second skin and worked great to eliminate

further cut hands.

10. There are lots of different ways to hang Nordfab ductwork from
your ceiling. I choose to use #2 Gripple hangers ( see
www.gripple.com ) which are rated to hang about 100 lbs. per Gripple.
For those unfamiliar with Gripples, they use a thin wire rope to hang
the ductwork from your ceiling, and they're designed to be easily
re-adjusted/re-tensioned. That makes them quick & easy to install
and, if needed, to later easily re-adjust. The Gripples that I bought
came already attached to a small "L" bracket, and I just screwed them
into my basement ceiling joists. It was a very clean, nice-looking
installation. Gripples are available in several different varieties
and sizes, depending upon: how much weight they need to support, how

you'll attach them, and how long a support wire you'll need.

I used 5-foot long # HF-SEYE90G-NO2-5FT @ $5.35 each and I bought them
in late December '08 from:

Alan Manufacturing Inc.
3927 East Lincoln Way
Wooster, OH 44691
(800) 435-2526
Fax (877) 333-2526

Alan Manufacturing has Gripple info available at:
www.alanmfg.com/Catalog/Alan 2009 Catalog.pdf Their Web site doesn't
take orders, so you'll need to call them at their 800 number to place your

order.

Be aware though that Alan Manufacturing isn't really set up for Web
mail orders and it may take them a few weeks to ship your order, but
otherwise they are reliable, honest, and they charge reasonable
prices. Their Gripples are normally sold in packages of 10 -- so I
ordered 2 packs. Alan Manufacturing was the only U.S. source who I
found that sells and stocks most of the various varieties of Gripples
available -- although you might be also able to find them elsewhere as
well. When I searched the Web, Gripples seemed to be more readily

available in Europe than in the U.S.

11. I modified the Nordfab gates per a previous FOG posting (sorry
that I can't give credit to where its due since I forgot who posted
it) -- "Disassemble a standard metal blast gate into its' 3
components. On one side of the cast housing, drill 3 holes, 17/64
diameter through (one side
of) the housing. Locate these holes near the area where the
thumb-screw threads are. Reassemble the blast gate. Drop 1/4" rare
earth magnets from Lee Valley Tools into the holes. These magnets
will stick to the gate portion of the assembly and provide the same

function as the thumbscrew".

That worked great -- many thanks for the tip! While the gates were
disassembled I smoothed out some of the rough edges on the sliding
part to make it slide a little better. I also substituted (on each
gate) a steel round-nose spring-plunger set-screw with a 1/4"-20
thread ( www.McMaster.com
#3126A142 ) for the gate's thumbscrew adjuster.

12. I installed all of my gates to be as close to my main line as
feasible -- as recommended by Bill Pentz. From what I understand,
that helps to prevent large quantities of debris from slamming into
your cyclone and then make its way into your filter(s) instead of your

collection drum.

And it may also help your system to run better too. My Oneida cyclone
is only a 2 HP 230 volts single phase unit -- so anything that I could
do to help it function a little better became important to me.

13. I attached a short extension handle to each gate to make them
easier to reach & use. These handles were fabricated from a 1/4" x 1"
wide aluminum bar. I just cut the 5 foot long bars to the appropriate
length needed, and then bolted it to the end of the gate. My longest
extension handle was only about 12 inches long. If you need longer
extension handles you might want to go with a thinner aluminum bar
(i.e., 1/8" or 3/16" thick). To finish off the end of each extension
handle, I slipped on a nice-looking red plastic handle grip that I bought

from www.McMaster.com #9692K24.

McMaster-Carr has these handle grips available in several designer
colors (I.e., red, black, or white). Initially the handle grips were
pretty hard to slip over the end of the aluminum bar, but adding a few
drops of blue Loctite #242 thread locker into the end of the grip (as
a temporary
lubricant) helped a lot. The extra weight of these aluminum extension
handles was offset by both the magnets and spring-plunger set-screws
previously described. The extension handles added a very nice
finishing touch to the gates.

14. Following another FOG recommendation, I bought an aluminum 5"
duct coupler (www.McMaster.com # 5518K14) and attached it with HVAC
metal ductwork tape to a Felder 120mm plastic quick-connector. After
assembly, it now fits both a 5" hose and the Felder 120mm port
perfectly -- a very sweet combination that looks & works great.

15. I'm now building a dust level monitor for my Oneida 35 gallon
dust collector drum. Per Art Pentz's recommendation from a while
back, I purchased a Series DBLM "Mini-Bin" Dry Bulk Level Monitor that
I'll be mounting on the dust collector drum. The monitor uses a small
120 volt motor that rotates a small blade with paddles at 1 rpm. When
the drum is close to full, the paddle blade is stopped, a micro-switch
then turns off the power to the motor, and a second micro-switch turns
on another device to alert you that the bin is full. In my
application, I'll be using that second micro-switch to set off an LED
strobe light mounted on the lid of the dust collector drum. I
purchased the motorized bulk level monitor (part #
DBLM3040) for $125 directly from www.dwyer-inst.com. The LED flashing
strobe light (part # LEDFL-RV350-ACA) cost $67 and was purchased from
www.safetylightsandsignals.com While the LED strobe light provides
plenty of attention-getting light for its purpose, it only consumes
about 1/10th of one amp at 120 volts so it shouldn't burn out the
micro-switch which is only rated for 3 amps. Yes, I could've instead
wired in a relay to control a higher amperage alerting device but I
wanted to keep it all as simple as possible and, for safety concerns,
I also didn't want to create any potential sparks near my dust
collector. That said, the whole circuit is pretty basic and intuitive
to wire (the bulk level monitor comes packaged with a color-coded
wiring diagram). I'm also going to hook it up so that it only receives

power when the Oneida cyclone is actually running.

Hopefully at least a few of you folks will find some of the above info
helpful.

Best,

Bill

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