Axminster MTM Air Filter Review

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AndyG

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After a weekend of routing and spending the following few days feeling my lungs had suffered a severe clogging, I decided it was time to invest in a shop air filter to complement my face mask.

After some thought I went for the Axminster MTM. I was tempted by the slightly more expensive AFS-500, thinking the different speed settings might be useful. But, I received the good advice that anything needing a remote control might not be a great idea considering their tendency to hide themselves.

Anyway, I thought I'd post a few pictures of the MTM, seeing as there's not much to go on at the Axminster website. Hopefully if anyone else is considering a similar purchase these might help their decision.

This is the filter inlet, showing the coarser pre-filter.
preFilter.jpg


A pair of clips hold the filter and front grill on. When removed you get access to the inner fine filter.
insides.jpg


This is the inner filter. I assume the shape increases the filter surface area, reducing impedance to air flow and increasing dust collection capacity.
fineFilter.jpg


Here's the fan unit at the back.
fanUnit.jpg


Finally, the filter outlet. The red arrow points to a free nut that came with the filter. It's a nice extra, but it would have been nicer still if it didn't arrive rattling around inside the filter casing.
outlet.jpg


So, what's it like? Well, it does seem to pump a fair amount of air through it. It easily sucks a sheet of paper to the inlet. I wouldn't say it was Very Quiet like the website claims, but it's not ridiculously loud and doesn't get annoying when left on for a while.

It comes with a good length mains cable with a on/off switch halfway down. There's no remote, and no switch-off timer, but the latter could probably be solved with a cheap timer switch (although you'll need one that didn't switch on again 24 hours later).

The build quality is on the whole O.K. Although, one of the welds that holds the sheet metal seam running the length of the filter has parted, But that's nothing a rivet and a bit of duct tape can't fix.

I haven't had much of a chance to really test how effective the dust control is yet. But you can definitely feel the air circulating in the shop [1]. The next time I create some serious dust, I'll add to this post how well it performs.

All in all, I'd say a winner. It's not too loud, it's got a good air flow rate and it's solid but light.

Andy

[1] - This is in a 2.5 x 6 x 2.8m shop (WxLxH)

Update

After some time I've had a chance to get more of an opinion about this air filter.
I'm still very happy with it, but I've a few more niggles. I wish I'd bought a filter with an adjustable speed control. In general use it could have been on a slower setting, and then sped up for dustier times. This is a noise related thing as this filter does drone a bit. You tend to forget about it, but occasionally it does get annoying. Since the initial review I've moved into a smaller workshop, so the noise is more noticable, but in a larger shop the noise will probably be less noticable.
Noise aside, as an air filter it works very well.
Here's a picture of it finally mounted.

wallMounted.jpg
 
Thanks Andy

nice review

Looking forward to reading how effective is turns out to be
 
Andy - glad the advice helped the decision... I lose quite enough things in the 'shop as it is, without adding essentials like on/off switches!!

I've got one of these: as to effectiveness, the pre-filter goes a matching shade for whatever wood dust I'm generating pretty quickly. It's actually quite scary, when one thinks of the amount of stuff that has gone into the lungs before getting one of these or an equivalent system.

As an afternote to the review, mine's now some 2 years old, and sits hung from the rafters of the garage: no problems, just a piece of kit that sits out of the way and 'does what it says on the tin'.

If you have any worries about fine dust, get one of these or an equivalent...

(edit: whilst not 'very quiet', mine's certainly not loud at all: the noise seems at about the level of a loud disc drive in a computer, as a rough guide - I notice it when turning on, but 'lose' it within a couple of minutes: it's not a factor that would affect my buying decision on this equipment.)
 
Andy,

Thanks for the review. :D
I have been thinking about an air filter. I looked at what Tony made and thought twice about finding filters, but you pictures have solved the problem.

I have an equipment cooling fan from a 19" rack. :)
The Axminster site gives the size of the MTM as 300mm*300mm*750mm, my fan will fit on a 300*300 box end. 8) Axminster sell spare filters, £20.92 for the main filter and £8.96 for the pre filter. :)

All I need is a simple frame a few bits of sheet stuff (ply, hardboard or MDF) 4' of foam draft seal and Bobs your uncle (well my uncle is called Frank but you get the drift :wink: )

So for an out lay of £30 with a hand full of workshop scraps and only a small tuit an air filter can be mine. \:D/
 
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