Converting HF DC to use 6" Ducting

[Ben Martin]

Does anyone have any pictures or information about converting their HF DC to use 6" pipe? I have read about it online but couldn't find much information.

Also, my shop is 30'X11', the DC is situated in the back corner of my shop and I wanted to run a pipe down the 30' side of my shop, with about 3 or 4 Y's ever 10', do you think this will work well with the 6" conversion? I wanted to set it up with blast gates so that I don't need to drag the DC around all the time.

If it helps, my DC is new with the Wynn Filter and a Thien Baffle.

[george wilson]

What is the CFM of your DC? It may not move the air in a 6" pipe rapidly enough to be effective if it doesn't have the needed CFM. How does its CFM compare with units that were made for 6" pipe? 30' is a long way,and friction also cuts down on the efficiency of the piping.

[Matt Benton]

I converted mine to 6", and it made a significant difference!

A couple of caveats, as George mentioned. I only have 4' of pipe on the exhaust side, and 8' of 6" flex hose on the intake side. Oh yeah, I also exhaust outside...

[Ben Martin]

What is the CFM of your DC? It may not move the air in a 6" pipe rapidly enough to be effective if it doesn't have the needed CFM. How does its CFM compare with units that were made for 6" pipe? 30' is a long way,and friction also cuts down on the efficiency of the piping.

Haha, it claims 1600CFM but that is highly debatable...

I converted mine to 6", and it made a significant difference!

Do you have any pictures? What did you use to hook up to the impeller?

[Matt Benton]

Here are some pics. Essentially, I removed the round outside cover that allows access to the impeller and replaced it with a round piece of 3/4" mdf. The mdf in turn has holes in it for the threaded rod support.

Let me know if you have any other questions...

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=105272

[Ben Martin]

Here are some pics. Essentially, I removed the round outside cover that allows access to the impeller and replaced it with a round piece of 3/4" mdf. The mdf in turn has holes in it for the threaded rod support.

Let me know if you have any other questions...

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=105272

Looks great, and pretty easy too!

Do you think if I convert mine to use 6" pipe that it could support about 25-30' of piping with about 4 Wye's with blast gates off of it?

[Matt Benton]

If each tools' run only has one bend, and you put the tools that need the most cfm closest to the collector, then I think you'd probably see improvement over where you are now, particularily on the shortest runs.

However, George's point is a good one. The unit is simply not large enough to say that you will definitely see an improvement across the system.

[chet jamio]

I went to Lowes and bought an HVAC flange. On my Grizzly, I cut off the existing 5" flange and installed the HVAC flange. 6" flex fits perfectly over it.

IMAGE_193.jpg

[David Hostetler]

Honestly, I wish the HF DC had a larger impeller. I have yet to determine if it is weird measurements, or if HF used different impellers on their DCs, but I know mine is 11.5" ish. A little on the small side for 6", but workable. There is a LOT of "extra" room under the cover, a 12.5" impeller could easily fit in the housing without having to wiggle it IF you could find one.

Having said that, there are plenty of folks I have seen that mod the HF DC, and other similar 2HP DCs for 6". The simply remove the face plate, cut a centered hole big enough for 6" HVAC duct, attach the duct to the face plate with some silicone seal and screws, and then reinstall the face plate.

At that point, the bottleneck is the 5" flex line between the impeller housing and the inlet ring. A bit of metal fabrication would get you up to 6" duct there, but is it worth it?

Bill Pentz won't approve, but for now, I am sticking with 4" on my HF DC... Maybe later bump up to 6" at the inlet but between the impeller and ring it is going to stay 5"...

[Matt Benton]

I can testify that the machine is definitely strong enough to see a pretty good benefit from going to 6", including the inlet, however mine has very short runs...

[chet jamio]

At that point, the bottleneck is the 5" flex line between the impeller housing and the inlet ring. A bit of metal fabrication would get you up to 6" duct there, but is it worth it?

Not worth it to me. What I did do was cut off about 6" of that 5" flex line. This gave a shorter run, but more importantly gave a much larger radius turn between the blower housing and the bag inlet.

[David Hostetler]

Not worth it to me. What I did do was cut off about 6" of that 5" flex line. This gave a shorter run, but more importantly gave a much larger radius turn between the blower housing and the bag inlet.

Another approach that goes a LONG way to improving air flow in that area...

Remove the hose and replace it with 5" stove pipe adjustable elbows. Seal the joints with tape.

I haven't done this myself yet, but reports are the results are impressive. It makes sense, You can create a much smoother long radius turn without the restriction of all those ridges that the flex hose has.


If you want to see the mod, go to www.bt3central.com and use the search function, and search for "Stovepipe mod". The title of the thread you want is Dust Collector "Stovepipe Mod" the author is LarryG.

Looks like a well worth the time and expense modification to pretty much any DC with a 5" flex line in this area...

[Greg McCallister]

Ben,
You can check out my changes here. This is the last post showing the outlet modification to 6" with a link to the origional post.

[Ben Martin]

I thought I would update this post with how I converted mine to 6". I had it apart because I am using chicken wire to prevent large debris from getting into the impeller and I was sucking up turning shavings too fast and it clogged...

I just ground of the spot welds holding the 4" adapter in place, cut a piece of MDF with a 6" hole, screwed that to the adapter plate and than two part epoxied it to the MDF.





I don't have a picture of it all put together, but can post one once I figure out how I am going to re-work the chicken wire...

[Jerome Stanek]

If you use a separator you should not have the chips clogging up your chicken wire