Cyclones - a couple of questions:

[Scrums]

Finally got round to assembling the cyclone I got from Cyclone Central months ago and it's got me to wonder about a couple of points .....

The power for the cyclone is a wall mounted Fercell extractor with 6" inlets and outlets. I've quickly tested the cyclone and it seems to work well - now I've left it for the adhesives to cure.

1. The fercell is working by having the 'exhaust' air blown into a cloth filter bag - why not blow it straight outside? presumably a more powerful suction then as no restrictions on the outlet. (I realise the major drawback is exchanging workshop air with outside air) I have an ideal place to vent it - private and doesn't matter if there's dust/shavings.

2. Current plan is to use a plastic bin as a dropbox, but I've a lot of large extractor bags - why not build a container for holding one and put the cyclone over that ? (.... does a cyclone put a lot of pressure into it's dropbox ?)

If anyone's got any views/advice before I try it out and possibly waste my time, pray tell ....

Chris.

 

[wcndave]

1. The idea would be to catch particles in the bag I would think. If you have a place to vent outside, that is safe and proper to do so, and don't care about losing the warm air, then do it, however i doubt it will make much difference to the suction power.

2. why not put the bags in the plastic bin? best of all worlds... the pressure it exerts is based on the power of the vac, rather than the cyclone. if you have a blockage for example at your tool, then the vac will create a vacuum in the drop box. I saw a video on youtube from the guy who demos the cyclone central about how to make a safety release valve. would be easy for a plastic bin.

 

[Scrums]

Thanks for your reply,

Getting that bag out of the way saves space as much as anything and knowing how much dust blocking up the pores of the fibre of the bag lessens suction - I reckon it's got to improve it + the micro dust goes outside !

I thought about putting the bag in the bin - the bin has a slightly tapered neck, anything much over 2/3rds of a black bin sack and it ain't gonna come out easily + the 'proper' extractor bags I have are huge !