Cyclone filter cleaning: so you can be smarter than I was

[Andy Pratt]

I have been a bonehead and wanted my mistake to at least help others so I feel better about the sacrifice.

I have had an onieda cyclone for the last 7 years. It is a "dust gorilla" and has the clip on cap at the base of the filter like I think most cyclones do. I clean it every month or two...by taking the filter off the machine (somewhat annoying to do in an 8' shop) and blowing it out with compressed air in the driveway. It has always been a big mess and is the reason I didn't clean the filter more than I probably should have. (Read this whole post before faulting the machine here)

I was on the phone with oneida tech support a few weeks ago and, while discussing an unrelated question I had, the woman helping me mentioned the cleaning procedure for the filter. Something to the effect of "then you blow the filter out with compressed air, wait 10-15 minutes for everything to settle and remove the cap to empty the dust".

I had an awkward pause for about 10 seconds while I realized that I had been doing it the dumb way for 7 years: You are supposed to blow air into the filter while it is still on the machine and the dust from the filter interior settles down into the collector cap at the base for you to remove and dump into the trash can after it has settled. Doing this, the dust is contained/filtered at all times and never makes a mess. Not to mention you don't have to remove the filter from the machine.

I feel dumb enough about this to where I debated not posting it, but the thought of some other poor guy doing the same thing as me for lack of info got the better of me.

Sad thing is, I think I remember reading this in the instructions when I got it 7 years ago, but it was so long between that and the first cleaning that I think I had forgotten it and just did what seemed to make sense at the time.

Needless to say, I clean the filter a lot more regularly now.

[Glen Blanchard]

Timely post, Andy. It dawned on me this week that it was high time I cleaned mine. It has been quite a while since its last cleaning. Thanks for the primer.

[Mike Berrevoets]

Andy,

I'm 100% positive there is at least one other person who has regularly pulled the filter to clean it..... He probably has a real good reason for pulling the filter because he can't get to half of the filter because it is against the wall and wood rack. Reading your post he may have know realized that the better way is too blow out the side that he can reach, wait 10 minutes, empty the filter then loosen the filter, rotate it 180 degrees, re-tighten the filter and repeat procedure for that section he couldn't normally reach.

I bet there are also people who forgot to check how full the bin was and packed the throat of the cyclone with chips while planing SYP for their workbench. Probably even did it twice in one day too......

Thanks for sharing. I'm absolutely positive it helped at least one other person.

[Sam Puhalovich]

I'm with Glen ... time for the spring cleaning.
I'll skip the 'tedium', Andy, and get to the 'net'.
Instead of using a compressed air gun ... I found it far-more effective to use the shop-vac in the exhaust mode.
Moves a whole lot more of low-pressure air and covers a lot more surface area of the filter.
The 'clean-out' at the bottom has a 4" S&D elbow.
I attach enough S&D tubing to get the exhaust out-the-door.
Turn the DC 'on' ... apply the shop vac ... I can see a cloud of 'fines' blowing away.

[Dave Verstraete]

Andy,


I bet there are also people who forgot to check how full the bin was and packed the throat of the cyclone with chips while planing SYP for their workbench. Probably even did it twice in one day too......

Thanks for sharing. I'm absolutely positive it helped at least one other person.

AND filled the filter so full that it had to be removed and unclogged Not that it happened to me, though

[Craig Behnke]

hey, i did it the first time also before i realized that i could have kept it on the machine. taking off to clean was so messy that I thought "there has to be a better way of doing this, i can't handle this mess every month or so".

and just to make you feel better that every body does goofy stuff every now and then....one time i was planing all day, neglected to check the chip bin, when i did check it, the chips had filled the bin and having no where to go, started to fill up the inside of the filters, they made it about 2 feet up into the filter stack.

[Jim Andrew]

I bought a new filter from Wynn, he recommended putting a bag on the bottom of my filter so I can blow it out and all the dust goes into the bag. Haven't ran it over yet, but seems a bag would be a great idea when you do run it over. I just used 2 8" hose clamps hooked together to make one big enough to reach around the filter, and a 3 mill trash bag under the filter. Ran my old filter over so many times I can't count. Finally cut a hole in the wall and put a small window in front of the cyclone so I can see it while I am planing.

[Jim German]

I bet there are also people who forgot to check how full the bin was and packed the throat of the cyclone with chips while planing SYP for their workbench. Probably even did it twice in one day too......

No.. Nobody could be that silly. Maybe if they were planing Cherry for some cabinets though, I could see that

[Rod Sheridan]

Hi Andy, I normally blow mine out and empty the pan.

Once a year, I blow it out and then take it outside and wash it with the garden hose to get it really clean............Rod.

[Erik Christensen]

I have a pvc pipe with a 90 degree elbow at the bottom of the filter stack that is normally closed off with a threaded clean-out plug - remove the plug - jam the vac hose inside the pipe & seal with a bit of duct tape - turn on vac & blow out filters with compressed air gun - fast, easy & most importantly dust free.

[Larry Fox]

I have an enclosure for my filters to where the air circulates from the outside of the filter inwards so I have to remove mine. I point this pot only to say that I have tried a few methods and had very good results using a backpack leaf blower instead of compressed air to clean my filters. I have heard / read / imagined somewhere that using compressed air could tear through the filter media and shorten it's life and reduce its effectiveness. I have two filters and cleaning them makes one heck of a mess but if I do it on a windy day it gets carried into the woods.

Oh - and I NEVER, NEVER, EVER would let the bin fill up and back up into the cyclone. Nope, not me ever - well, unless you count the two times just this past Saturday ... or the times before.

[John Piwaron]

not dumb at all. that's the tuition for the school of hard knocks.

[John Piwaron]

Hi Andy, I normally blow mine out and empty the pan.

Once a year, I blow it out and then take it outside and wash it with the garden hose to get it really clean............Rod.

I used to wash my shop vac's filter (Cleanstream) with water every so often. It made it look so nice. But it would be dirty in a NY minute after replacing it in the vac and running it again. So I stopped bothering with that. It just didn't seem worth my effort.

[John McClanahan]

You guys are lucky. I have an old Onieda that has the filter inside the cone. There is no way around making a mess. Then I have to put the cone back together.

John

[Leo Graywacz]

I beat the heck out of the filter before I blow air on it. It's tough stuff.

Then eventually I took it off and vented it outside.