Shop Vac Upgrade

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Pabs

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Upgrading cheap Tit** shop vac. I use this with a respirator for general workshop cleaning as well as for the mitre saw.

Ordered the Cen-Tec Quick Click Separator to mate with a cheap wet & dry from ScrewLoose.
I have upgraded the pretty rubbish sock filter that came with it to a pleated canister design which at least has a dust rating of sorts. I'll still use the respirator when cleaning the workshop.

Parts - blue PE-HD food bin to act as the chip / larger debris container, the cyclonic attachment with a gasket, some 63mm antistatic ducting and some silicone grease
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Cutting a hole in the lid. I don't have a jigsaw so i sharpened a set of dividers and set these to the radius then used them to score the circumference for the gasket. Working from both sides took about 5mins before it was scored through. Came out pretty neat.
20230315_121215.jpeg20230315_121826.jpeg

Then I marked out the holes for the bolts, drilled these out, fitted the gasket with some silicone grease on both sides to help with the seal and fitted the lid to the cyclone
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Then just attached it all up, I also added silicone grease to the gasket on the drum and on the vac itself
20230315_125746.jpeg

(edit! had the in and out the wrong way round blame the noggin not the tool works much better now :rolleyes: )

Initial impressions - good, no loss suction (subjectively, will measure at some point). large bits magically fall into the bucket and fine stuff goes into the vac chamber. when I upgrade the shop vac the whole system can just be plugged in. I may even run some pvc pipe outside to vent depending on how much that would affect suction. I'm currently reading through the Bill Pentz (thanks @baldkev )
 
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couple other pointers after a few more mins use...
- if yours rattles and does a dance on the floor then check the baffle isn't dislodge inside. mine wasn't seated right in shipping maybe but it had fallen off into the chamber. just push it right up all the way until it clicks. a few mins of frustration and then a smile on my face.
- if you drop your silicone grease down inside the chamber don't worry, you CAN get it. Don't despair. you won't end up like a monkey with a jar of sweets. my fist can't fit down there but my proffered hand can. (plus if your mits are bigger than mine then you just de-attach the cyclone :rolleyes:)
 
One further point to the novice...

Allow for some compression in your ducting to allow for the suction taking up the collapsible portion of your pipe if using flexible as I am... Rigid tubing would be better across a single plane...

... On the plus side you get to see any leaks pretty near to source by observing how much it collapses.. if at all... Elementary to the trained eye, perhaps... But I thought I'd share my newfound epiphany with you all anyway. sorry.

But now it's amazing!!! The suction seems better than before.. But I did go and silicone grease the titan vac 'seals'.. There is no gasket, on a titan...
 
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