Exhausting minute amounts of dust and noise issues.

[Erik Loza]

I am no authority on dust collection but have spend a lot of time in a shop with a 3.5hp Oneida commercal cyclone and then many a trade show, shouting over a 5hp Oneida all day long, and distinctly feel that the bulk of the noise seems to come from the resonance within the actual steel cyclone chamber and also the ducting on the supply side. At the trade shows, the exhaust vents out right beside us and that is not nearly as overwhelming a sound as the cyclone, itself. Just my unscientific observation.

Erik Loza
Minimax USA

[Chris Parks]

Eric, I had the exact same impression so my approach was to enclose the cyclone and see whats left after that. I found with an open exhaust that there was very little reduction in noise and others have found the same. The only effective way is to enclose it and then put a muffler on the exhaust. The I had those who told me they did not think it noisy at all!! The first thing I told every client before purchase is they were damned noisy and it was a fair bet they would have to do something about it. BTW never rely on the DB level meter app you can download, they are useless and a long way out from the real thing.

[Rick Potter]

My 3 HP Oneida vents directly outside. As others have said, it sounds like a dryer vent....on steroids. More of a rumble than anything else.

Rick Potter

[Jeff Nicol]

When I built my cyclone with a 2.5hp motor we vented it outside for a while without the muffler and a filter box, it was pretty noisy and it bothered me more than the neighbors as we butt up against a commerical plumbing yard and warehouse and they make more noise than me during the work day. But on weekends and evenings when all the other city sounds are done for the day it will become "NOISE" pollution for the neighbors to the left and right of my house. So I built a muffler for it and that quieted it down by say 40% and with the filter and dust box a bit more noise was subdued. The problem then became that I needed more space for tools and shop space and I enclosed the lean to that the cyclone was under. So my only option was to move the cyclone up into the attic of the shop and left the muffler on it and by having it upstairs in the back corner it is pretty quiet. But the best thing is that I do not lose any heat or AC in the summer because venting it outside caused a negative pressure in the shop and every little air leak would suck in -10 or +95 degree air which really sucked ! No pun intended! I have wood heat but still takes time to make up the heat/cooling loss no matter what the heat or cooling is. The only thing that I need to do is put a felt bag filter on the exhaust to catch the floor fine dust, but my large dust air exchange filter box catches most of that if I run them in tandem. This is also good in the winter as it moves the warm air from upstairs down and around the whole shop.

Not everyone has an upstairs in their shop so my situation may be only optimal for me.

Good luck and keep the neighbors happy,

Jeff

[phil harold]

I am not understanding how this is not a major heat loss in cold climates - how is 1,000 - 1,500 cubic feet per minute not a huge heat loss? Seems to me it would be like leaving a garage door open in winter - what am I missing?

air will travel the least resistant path
the whole shop will not empty out at once only little river of air coming from air leaks in the building or as I have a 4" make up air vent
then the air moves along the floor to the machine where the air is being extracted
so not all the air is removed, just a stream

[Chris Parks]

What you are missing is the building mass. When air in a building is heated or cooled from away from the ambient temperature what happens is firstly the air temp changes quickly and then the building temp begins to change lagging the air temp. If the heating or cooling goes on long enough the building will arrive at the desired temperature and stabilise. This took relative to the air temp change quite a long while and it will take quite a long while for it to move from what it has stabilised at while the air temp is easy and quick to change. If air is extracted after the building has stabilised and the air temp drops say 10 degrees the replacement air will be bought back to the desired temp by the building releasing its stored energy. It is a good idea to have fans to move air around in a temp controlled room especially if the air temp in the room is going to vary as it will create a more even temp by moving air away from hot or cold spots.