Dust control for turning - what really works? (newbie)

[Jim King]

Just have your wife stand downwind of the garage door supervising your work and all debris will be blown out the door. OSHA approved.

[Steven Wilson]

When creating lots of shavings I just wear a full face resperator. When I'm sanding, especially cork (fishing rod handles) I have a metal dust hood on a flex arm suspended from the ceiling connected to my DC (Oneida 2HP commercial) with 5" tubing. For a look at another style check the Oneway web site as I believe they're marketing a decent dust hood for their lathe.

[Jeff Myers]

I have a 1hp DC dedicated to the lathe, the hose is short at only about
4' so it has good suction. I use one of those acrylic hoods that has a flap
that extends out and over the top of the turning,,,works real well for dust but i still use a dust mask with the replaceable filters just to make sure
and see it's needed since i still have to replace the filters every 6 months or so. The hood is positionable so i can pull it up right to the back
of the turning, being acrylic, i use that flap a lot since i can see through it
to turn(just gotta remember to move it out of the way when using CA or
it'll get splattered quickly !) I don't need a dust mask when sanding
as the hood catches all the dust generated.

[James Duxbury]

For wet wood turning I use a tarp hung behind the lathe to control chips and sap. Clean up is shovel and buckets. I spread the chips on the lawn and mow over then. Seems to be working fine.

On dry wood I handle the chips the same way as wet wood but no DC made seems to catch sanding dust. It goes everywhere. After spending thousands of dollars on DC systems, fancy ducts, different hoods nothing really worked. Besides that they are a pain in the neck and in the way much of the time. Also expensive to run. The blower motor is often larger than the one on the lathe and runs continually but more than that, the bag filter is at best good down to 1 micron. That is when it is new.

I now use a shop vac at times for the big stuff. Cut a 2” hole in the bottom of an old 6” or 8” wooden bowl and attach it to the shop vac hose. Makes a great little dust hood. For fine dust and face protection I use the Resp-O-Rator™ with a full face shield. I invented this Resp-O-Rator™ for myself and for just this reason. It’s $50.00 and with an $18.00 face shield = $68.00. That is full face protection with HEPA filters. HEPA filters are a minimum filtering efficiency of 99.97% down to 0.3 microns. It is the best. And no batteries to charge or straps to mess with. It looks different because it is. Just another option.

Whatever you use for a dust mask or respirator keep it on until the dust has cleared or you get out of the area. You see this all the time. A person turns the sander off and takes off the respirator. That is often when the concentration of dust is at its highest. Keep it on.