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Doc's Orders
- Foreword
- Woodworking Environment
- Cleanup
- Respirators and Masks
- Dust Fan
- Exhaust Fan
- Exhausting Outside
- Carbon Monoxide Monitor
- Air Filtering
- Downdraft Table
- PortableHood
- Clothing
- Foreword
This information will make the most sense if you start by reading the Introduction then the Dust Collection Basics page followed by the Medical Risks pages then this Doctor's Orders page.
My respiratory doctor teaches medicine, is one of the top in his field and is a very talented fine woodworker. He pushed me into putting up these pages that became a clearing house for dust collection information. This page started with the information he shared. Over the years he has enhanced his original suggestions plus approved options that countless others, especially my medical air quality inspector suggested. Because of his role and ongoing help I call this web page "Doc's Orders". - Woodworking Environment
Now my respiratory doctor recommends all woodworkers start by borrowing, renting, or buying a good fine particle meter such as the Dylos Products Pro particle counter shown. He knows a good particle meter is very inexpensive compared to the loss of our health, hospitalization, or the medications and equipment needed to treat respiratory problems. The unhealthiest fine dust is invisible without magnification and most know people who have done woodworking for scores of years, so they often assume they have little risk. Even when not doing any woodworking the particle counters show dangerously high airborne dust readings in the shops and homes of those with basement, indoor, or attached garage shops. Too much fine dust exposure will affect everyone, some quickly with allergic or toxic reactions and most after years of exposure develop permanent damage that reduces lifespans and worsen age related diseases. The problem is woodworking makes huge amounts of airborne fine particles compared to the tiny amounts that can harm our health, and these particles last nearly forever unless they get wet enough to break down. He really wants woodworkers to see a particle counter so they realize that most have a problem and need to take fine dust collection far more seriously. A good meter will also show how well our cleanup and future dust collection efforts work. You can buy one of these meters at a discount from Amazon using the link on the right or if you buy directly from Dylos Products please let them know I referred you.
After years of working with me and seeing lots of test results my respiratory doctor now tells his patients that the only safe way for those who already have respiratory problems is to thoroughly cleanup their homes and shops, always wear a dual cartridge NIOSH approved properly fit respirator mask when doing wood working, use a dust collection system that captures the fine dust as it is made, and then get rid of the fine dust so it never gets into our shop air! When doing dusty work that fills the air he recommends wearing the respirator and only working outside. The following link provides a video on the importance of NIOSH respirator approval.
For those who don't have problems, he cautions that working poisonous or toxic woods can cause serious problems quickly, and the fine dust created by woodworking over time will cause serious health problems. So, he strongly recommends that all woodworkers wear a good NIOSH approved dual cartridge respirator mask, vent our dust collection systems outside, and run a strong exhaust fan blowing out a side or back door. He recommends leaving our main door cracked about 5" when venting outside as the open door provides both cross ventilation and supplies makeup air to keep from sucking deadly carbon monoxide into your shop from the flues and vents on our fired stoves, appliances, and heaters. Based on what we found using the particle counters he now recommends your mask and strong fan must go on before we start making dust and both need to stay on for one half hour after we stop making fine dust. - Cleanup
Back in 2000 I developed a bad wood allergy very quickly but had very little idea of what went wrong or how to make repair. My respiratory doctor strongly suspected my repeated allergy attacks occurred because my home remained badly contaminated, so he told me to get my home inspected and if it was contaminated then it needed cleaned up. I paid a small fortune to have professional air quality testing. The air quality testing verified my home was badly contaminated just as my doctor suspected.
My doctor gave me a simple cleanup plan that did not work. He told me to go buy the biggest and best air cleaner I could afford, turn it on and leave it on, then do the home clean up. He said all walls and ceilings need vacuumed then damp mopped, all upholstery and drapes need cleaned, all cabinets, closets, drawers and contents need well dusted using a HEPA filtered vacuum then wiped with damp cloths, and then all floors need cleaned. Carpets and rugs need vacuumed then washed. Wood, tile, laminate, and vinyl floors need vacuumed and damp mopped. I followed his recommendation both doing a thorough cleanup and buying expensive air cleaners. I still kept having allergy attacks, so bought more and better air cleaners, eventually paying a specialty firm to install a central air cleaner on my HVAC system. After a ton of work and money I owned five portable air cleaners, and one large HVAC air cleaning system, but still was not recovering and had constant bad allergy attacks.
I was desperate so bought a particle counter to find and fix each problem. The particle counter showed my home was badly contaminated even after cleanup and installing the HVAC air cleaner. My particle counter showed a huge amount of the dust came out of my HVAC vents. That made no sense after all I spent on my HVAC air cleaner. Frankly, my HVAC system had not heated or cooled well after that upgrade, so these high particle readings convinced me to call my regular HVAC firm. My long-time HVAC repairman showed me with his airflow gauge that the heavy filters the air cleaner firm installed killed the airflow needed to heat and cool our home. Plus, he warned that also killed the airflow needed to keep the fan motors cool so my fan motors could have burned up. He removed the expensive add on HVAC air cleaner system and had to clean or replace much of the insulated ducting as the poor airflow let a lot build up in my ducts. That left me using all of my portable air cleaners. My particle counter showed none of those portable air cleaners worked very well. Each kept cleaning the same air around each cleaner. I built my own much more powerful large HEPA filtered air cleaner for less cost than a brand name air cleaner (see my free plans at Air Cleaner). My air cleaner did a great job, but within a few hours of being turned off, my particle counts still went too high and my allergy attacks resumed, so I had to keep cleaning. Touching the walls with a clean broom launched a ton of dust, so all got vacuumed all with a HEPA filtered vacuum, wiped all down with a damp cloth then repainted. My particle counter showed I had to HEPA vacuum all my drawers, cupboards, closets and furniture. The particle counter showed my book collection also was a major source of contamination so it had to go. I had my carpets all deep cleaned twice. I still had allergy attacks with my particle counter showing my home kept filling with fine dust. My acoustic "popcorn" ceilings trapped and rained fine dust all day long. The ceilings had to be scraped, smooth textured and painted. After all that we still had dust coming from the ceiling. We discovered my attic which shares open air with my garage based shop was badly contaminated. I removed the insulation, HEPA vacuumed and damp wiped the entire attic then replaced the insulation. That helped, but there were still problems. Even after two deep cleanings, my ceilings and carpets kept launching fine dust. All helped, but what finally beat the fine dust problem was replacing the carpets with tile floors. In spite of considerable cleaning there was a huge amount of dirt and dust trapped between the carpet and its padding. After all the cleanup and changes, just regular vacuuming and running my air cleaner a few hours a day keeps the home particle counts way down. After the cleanup my health rapidly improved and allergies got far less severe.
Doctor Recommendations - My doctor has revised his recommendations. He still recommends regular cleanup of our shops. All should also regularly clean our homes if our wood shops are attached to in our homes. For those like me who are already sensitized my doctor said I needed to have someone else do the cleanup. He said even with a good mask, dust stirred airborne during our cleanup so covers us and our clothing, that it is near impossible to clean without getting heavily exposed.
Homes - My doctor now recommends our home cleanup should start with building one of the air cleaners like I share on my Projects page. He says that air cleaner is vital to have relief while the clean up effort is being done. He also recommends that you beg, borrow, rent or buy a good particle counter. Without a particle counter all you can do is guess. It is far better to be able to see exactly what is going on. He now recommends following much of the same cleanup that I went through, focusing of course on carpets and rugs.
Shops - To clean our shops my doctor recommends waiting for a breezy day then put on a mask, seal off any house access doors, open all doors and windows, run a big exhaust fan blowing out the side or back working with the wind direction and then thoroughly blow out your shop with an air compressor, leaf blower or strong vacuum on blow. He said to go over and over things until seeing no more dust and your particle meter shows outside dust levels. After the shop is blown out he said to leave all open and let the big exhaust fan run for at least a half hour. After that fan clears the airborne dust, close all down and let any remaining dust settle for at least a day. Then do it all over again. We carefully tested a few shops with a particle counter and found that two full clean outs is ample to clear most shops back to ambient air quality, meaning outside air quality. - Respirators and Masks
- Dust Mask
My respiratory doctor says every woodworker needs to properly protect themselves from fine dust. Woodworking makes a huge amount of fine dust compared to how little it takes to harm our health and because fine invisible dust lasts nearly forever unless it gets wet, most small shops that vent their dust collection systems inside have such a buildup of fine invisible unhealthy dust that just walking around stirs enough airborne to fail air quality tests without doing any additional woodworking. The best way to protect ourselves from the dust we are making and the fugitive dust we previously made is to own, use and properly maintain a good respirator often called a mask. He says we need to use a good quality fitted respirator mask that meets the NIOSH safety standards. It should have a good silicon-rubber airtight fit with two changeable cartridge filters. Organic cartridges should be readily available to also protect against the various solvents, fiberglass resins, epoxies, and other chemicals we use while doing woodworking. Unless we have thoroughly cleared our shops of the fugitive dust, our mask needs to go on as soon as we enter our shops and should not come off until our shops are properly cleared out. The best way to keep from building unhealthy levels of fugitive fine invisible dust is to use a strong fan blowing out an open side door or window with a large main door open about 5" across the shop to get good flow through ventilation. It takes a large fan about a half hour to clear a normal two-car garage sized shop, so our fan and mask need to stay on during that half hour. If we don't clear our shop, then we need to put on our mask as soon as we enter our shops.
Respirator masks and supplies are available in almost every large hardware or automotive paint store, but most work poorly. My doctor recommends strongly against use of the less expensive readily available disposable paper masks and the inexpensive cartridge or pad filtered masks because even with good filtering, they leak badly exposing us to far too much fine dust. If you see dust trails on your face after wearing your mask you are either using the wrong type of mask or an improperly sized and fit mask. Both my doctor and I tried many different masks then settled on using the exact same units years before we met. In my case I admit bias from over 4,000 hours of flying with a good fitting comfortable oxygen mask. Most masks I tried fit miserably, were uncomfortable and leaked badly. I do woodworking as a hobby to relax. Wearing an uncomfortable mask was anything but relaxing, so I bought a top quality 3M 6000 series respirator mask then upgraded to newer and better 3M 7500 respirator masks as pictured on the left. Mine were fit to me professionally at a paint shop. I bought my 3M 7500 series mask with a dozen R6001 organic filters, P-series particulate filters, and box of cleaning pads. You can click on the picture here to go to Amazon.com to buy that same set. If you buy a small contribution will be made to my web pages. There is a wealth of information on masks, testing for leaks, choices of filters, filter life, etc. If you want more information click here for a Google Search on "dust mask" for an overwhelming amount of good information. - Powered Respirator
After my initial allergic reaction my doctor told me that if I wanted to continue woodworking, I would always have to work in my respirator mask. Although my 3M was a good mask and fairly comfortable, it was miserable to wear on hot days, plus it provided no eye protection so my eyes became badly swollen from my allergic reactions any time I did turning even when wearing safety glasses or face shield. Following additional respiratory problems with repeated bouts of pneumonia, in 2006 my doctor gave me a choice of permanently giving up woodworking or always using a powered respirator mask like the shown 3M Airstream PAPR here. A Powered Air Purifying Respirator (PAPR) uses a blower to pull air through a course then fine filter then blow it into a covered face area so we have clean filtered air to breathe. I did a lot of homework and talked to many woodworkers who have long used the different powered respirator masks. Most wood turners including my doctor like the older Racal PAPR. 3M bought Racal long ago but continues to sell supplies, so my doctor said he will keep using his Racal as long as he can, but when it needs replaced he will buy the 3M PAPR shown. 3M made their own PAPR that is near identical to the Racal and is now the favorite of most serious wood turners.
I was not at all excited about the high cost for upgrading to a 3M PAPR, so I did all pretty much wrong. My research showed the Triton PAPR mask is the most frequently purchased by woodworkers, and the one my local woodshop experts recommended. At less than half the price of the 3M my doctor recommended I bought their full system with extra filters, face shields, shield protectors, spare battery pack, on and on. With my sensitivity to wood dust I am the best meter around and the first time I used that mask I immediately had an allergic reaction. It clearly did not provide ample protection. I initially thought it was just too underpowered so dusty air was leaking in around my beard. Groaning over the additional cost and under time constraints to get some gifts done, I bought the only other PAPR immediately available locally, a Trend Air Shield PAPR. It had the same problems as the Triton meaning the first time I used it, I had another allergic reaction due to poor protection. I called my doctor friend. He said I should learn to either listen to him or at least carefully read the product literature. Detailed reading of the product literature disclosed both of these PAPR units came with filters that freely passed the under 5-micron sized particles. With almost no protection from the finest dust that explained why my allergic reactions. Further research showed almost every available woodworking powered respirator has terrible filters that freely pass the unhealthiest 5-micron and smaller particles. The problem is it takes a much stronger blower which needs a far more expensive and larger battery pack to push the air through the fine NIOSH approved filters that operate at HEPA levels (99.99% effective down to 0.5-microns). We might as not even bother to wear one of these typical powered masks except they get rid of the larger nuisance dust particles.
My needs differed from most wood turners because I have a full beard and too many metal working toys including different welders, so I needed more than normal protections. The higher end 3M PAPR could be purchased with a different face mask that allows using it for welding plus it had an optional secondary belt type filter system that let this mask be powered by a clean air compressor rather than having to put up with the battery packs. Unfortunately, the cost setup as I wanted was too expensive. Likewise, the less costly 3M that my doctor recommended no longer made sense either because repeated bouts of pneumonia moved my doctor to instead recommend that I totally give up woodworking. As a very stubborn person with three generations of tools, that was not the answer I wanted, so I went to work trying to find a more affordable solution. I finally stumbled on a dealer who was closing out his new but old stock Racal inventory on eBay and put in a bid for the works. While waiting for the results of that bid, I came across another interesting eBay deal for one of the very expensive 3M PAPR masks with welding, woodworking and spray painting face shields, plus both the air compressor and belt fan options. I put in ridiculously low bids on each and won both auctions and both turned out to be my size. I got lucky all the way around with a full Racal setup and full 3M PAPR woodworking, painting and welding setup. All were brand new in unopened packages with all the goodies including extra filters and very dead battery packs. I took those dead battery packs to my local Batteries Plus outlet store who upgraded to high end Ni-MiH cells that last far longer but did require a different charger. I now use the Racal for wood turning because it is lighter and has better visibility. I really like my 3M welder mask as pictured as it works great and came with both the 3M belt pack plus the compressor setup. You can click on these mask pictures if you want one, but be prepared for some serious sticker shock.
So enough of my bragging, what would I recommend to somebody today? I like and mostly use my 3M 7500 series non-powered mask pictured above with dual cartridge filters, pre-filters, and organic vapor cartridges. If you are a turner or are sensitive to dust then you should seriously consider the 3M Powered Air Purifying Respirator (PAPR) with face shield which are expensive but worth the cost. I continue to hear many recommend the latest versions of the same two PAPR masks I tried, but my most recent visit to the woodworking store showed even their newer units still came with the far too open filters. - Dust Mask Fitting
Wearing a dust mask that leaks is near useless, so we have to make sure our mask is properly fit to our faces. The better brand respirator masks such as the 3M 7500 units referenced above come in small, medium, large, and extra large. I was surprised when in spite of my being a pretty big guy, I needed either a small or medium sized mask. It all has to do with the width and curves on our faces. I was fortunate enough to be professional fit by our safety officer at the university where I taught, plus also fit by the Air Force where I flew for many years. Most professional paint shop suppliers can fit you with a mask as can safety officers, but you can also do a good job of fitting yourself. The secret is to make sure you don't have to pull the mask too tight to avoid air leaks, plus having a clean shaven beard. My 3M respirator manual does share how to make sure it fits and is properly adjusted. Cover the intake ports and inhale slightly. The mask should pull in and not leak. Likewise, if you cover the exhaust and exhale slightly it also should inflate a bit and not leak. This self test will let you know if your mask fits and works but is not as good as using the 3M fit tester. There are numerous hints on mask fitting on the Internet, but I think one of the better discussions and videos including fit tester information is the 3M Dust Mask Fitting Video.
- Dust Mask Care
Whether we own a dust mask or powered respirator we must regularly wipe them out with a non-alcohol pad to keep them clean. We also must change the cartridge filters when needed. Activated charcoal filters and many other types of mask filters lose effectiveness when exposed to air whether we are wearing them or not, so my doctor recommends storing our masks in a Ziploc airtight bag. When he puts his mask in its bag he sucks most of the air out to maximize filter life.
- Dust Mask
- Dust Fan
My respiratory doctor said even when working outside, whenever I made fine dust that was not being immediately captured I needed to use a fan. He recommended using a good heavy duty stand mounted oscillating fan with the oscillation feature turned off. This fan must be set to blow the dust away from me as I worked to keep me from breathing it and to help keep my clothing clean. My respiratory doctor also recommended I use this good sized fan in the back doorway of my shop with the garage door open a little whenever making fine dust to keep that dust from building in my shop. I have to sometimes make the fan in the doorway blow outward and other times blow in depending upon the local wind direction. In the few instances where I mess up and fill my shop with fine dust he recommended I use that fan on high with all doors open wide while also running my air cleaner and cyclone with fine filters, then after all settles vacuum all with my HEPA filtered vacuum.
- Exhaust Fan
A few of my friends also recommend using in every shop that is attached to our homes an exhaust fan wired to turn on whenever we turn on the lights. If we have all doors and windows closed and run that exhaust fan to the outside it will create a negative pressure. This fan does not have to exhaust any air. A small bathroom exhaust fan creates enough negative pressure to keep a blast of dust filled air from contaminating our homes when we open a connecting door between our shop and home.
- Exhausting Outside
My respiratory doctor says ideally we would all do just like commercial shops and just blow the finest dust away outside. Although most small shop woodworkers should exhaust their shop air outside, most do not. Venting indoors even with fine filters is bad news. Woodworking just makes far too much fine dust. Every twenty pounds of sawdust that we create contains enough fine dust to cause over 15,000 two-car garage sized shops to fail their EPA air quality test. Most dust collectors miss collecting 40% or more of the fine airborne dust. If we just miss collecting 1% of the fine dust each twenty pounds of sawdust adds another one hundred and fifty times more fine dust than it takes for a typical two-car garage sized shop to fail an EPA air quality test. Because this dust does not go away unless it gets wet and breaks down, most shops that vent inside rapidly build dangerously large amounts of fine dust. Venting inside also increases our fire risks as most dust collectors and even cyclones come with collection bins that are not fire proof.
My doctor said there are many bad excuses to not vent outdoors, the main one being that it is easier. Most wrongly claim that they cannot vent outside because it costs too much to heat their shops. My surgeon friend lives in Canada where minus twenty is not unusual. He says he vents outside and stays comfortable with a pair of IR heat dishes even in the coldest weather.
The only valid reasons to not vent outside is venting outside is not permitted or you air condition. If you vent inside then he recommends you should setup your shop with really good fine dust collection or only work in your mask, then thoroughly clean out your shop before you take that mask off.-
In some areas like mine venting outside is illegal. Although this is what I heard from my County building inspector's office, it turns out that it is illegal only if I have a large commercial firm with many employees, so is not enforced for small and home based shops. This is one of those things that upset me considerably because I tried to do all right, got bad advice and spent a lot of time and money to avoid venting outside then found I could and should have vented outside.
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The noise can upset neighbors. Adding a little sound proofing either around our dust collection equipment or storage shed, plus using a good muffler, homemade or commercial will address most of the noise issue.
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Too many small shop owners foolishly worry about blowing the heated air out of their shops when commercial firms have shown that doing so really is not as expensive as trying to filter the air. Large commercial shops with huge blowers that turn over the entire air volume many times every hour have known for years a good infrared heater will leave us feeling little discomfort unless it is below freezing outside.
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Our small shop dust collectors and cyclones are built for indoor use. Repair is as easy as providing their own shed or covering to place our dust collectors and cyclones outside. Many simply choose to keep their cyclones inside and vent outside.
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Also, a good many of the woods used in woodworking today can kill our landscaping plants, and can harm our pets and children when they play outside. Repair is fairly simple, use a cyclone separator to remove the heavier sawdust and chips. The remaining fine dust will dissipate in the outdoor air without causing problems.
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Finally, Unless we provide a way for makeup air to enter our shop, blowing the air outside can suck deadly carbon monoxide backward through our fired appliance vents such as water heaters, stoves, and gas driers. Most need to just open a door or window and they the risks of pulling the carbon monoxide out of our fired appliances vanishes.
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- Carbon Monoxide Monitor
My respiratory doctor and many safety organizations warn our dust fans, exhaust fans, dust collectors, and cyclones can pull deadly carbon monoxide backward through the vents from our gas water heaters, heaters, fireplaces, furnaces, stoves, and other fired appliances. My carbon monoxide detector showed my shop exhaust fan and dust collection blower both pulled carbon monoxide from my attached home furnace and gas water heater. Carbon monoxide kills and hurts more people than any other kind of poisoning. My doctor strongly recommends every small shop woodworker install good quality carbon monoxide detectors in their home and shop to immediately know if we have a problem.
- Air Filtering
My respiratory doctor recommends we buy filters with enough surface area and ample fine filtering. Unfortunately, most small shop filters provided with dust collectors, cyclones, air cleaners, and even shop vacuums are too open so pass most of the unhealthiest invisible dust plus have too little surface area so clog constantly requiring frequent cleaning and quickly wear out. Moreover, our testing showed that most air cleaners fail to stir the air very well, so they just keep cleaning the same bit of air over and over needing a very long time to fully clear our shop air.
- Shop Vacuum Filter Upgrade
My respiratory doctor said to immediately change my vacuum filter from their paper and cloth bags to HEPA air filters. Luckily both of my vacuums are name brand units for which good quality HEPA fine filters are readily available. Early on the cost of one of these fine filters for a shop vacuum came close to the cost for a smaller vacuum. Now that there is far more interest, prices have fallen far below the somewhat painful $30 each I had to pay.
- Dust Collector & Cyclones
My respiratory doctor remains pretty strongly against upgrading to finer filters on our dust collectors and cyclones because even fine filters work poorly. The medical air quality testing he has seen show regardless of vendor advertising claims almost all small shop cyclone and dust collector fine bag and cartridge filters freely pass the finest unhealthiest dust. This at best creates a false sense of security because these so called fine filters get rid of the visible dust while allowing the finest unhealthiest invisible dust to just keep building. He instead recommends venting these units outside into standard open 30-micron filters and letting the fine dust blow away into the outside air. He said venting outside also helps get rid of the fugitive dust that escapes collection from these too open filters, dust collectors and cyclones that move too little air for good fine dust collection and tool hoods that allow the fine dust to spray all over.
I thought I could do air filtering by just letting my cyclone or dust collector run as both had upgraded commercial finer filters. An air engineer friend said that AAF had done extensive testing and found both dust collectors and cyclones make poor air cleaners and their use as air cleaners can be expensive. An air cleaner stirs the whole volume of air in a room. Without that stirring, much of the fine dust will be missed. Unless you setup the air coming out of your filters to blow in a wide stream at close to ceiling height, the air simply creates a narrow racetrack between the open gate and your filters without doing a good job of cleaning the rest of the air. Moreover, a good air cleaner uses a small motor. Running the huge blower motor for the roughly four hours it would take to clean my shop air could create some costly electric bills. - Air Cleaner
My respiratory doctor says he likes and regularly uses his air cleaner but does not rely on it for anything except keeping his finishes from being spoiled with dust contamination. He explained that it takes a typical small shop air cleaner four to six hours to clear the larger airborne dust particles, but most of these come with such open filters they never really do clear the finest unhealthiest dust. He also recommends against trying to upgrade these units with finer filters as most don't have the air pressure to work against the finer filters as these filters become dirty. Plus upgrading to finer filters makes for a constant cleaning chore and cleaning quickly wears out the fine filters.
He said the magazines rated Jet, Delta, JDS, and Penn State all pretty close, but he bought a Jet for himself because he likes Jet tools. In looking at many woodworker posts and some magazine reviews, it appears that he did pick one of the best. He now says we either capture the fine dust at the source as it is made or work outside.
- Shop Vacuum Filter Upgrade
- Downdraft Table
My respiratory doctor next told me to go buy or build a good quality down draft table and always use it when sanding. I looked at him kind of funny because he has been bugging me for years for a set of plans for the down draft table I built ages ago. We both have long known that there are no good affordable hobbyist downdraft tables. I teased him back saying he was the one who made the big bucks. After looking suitably hurt, he smiled and said if I built another, he could have my old downdraft table and I would get a new one. The projects area of my index gives directions on how to size and build your own downdraft table.
- Portable Hood
Years after putting up these web pages my respiratory doctor now recommends every woodworker have and use a good portable hood connected to our dust collector. Too many large tools, smaller power tools, and even hand operations generate lots of fine dust. Often even a downdraft table is not enough to provide good fine dust collection unless we also use a portable dust collection hood placed right next to the dust source. He recommends buying or building a stand that supports this hood and permits positioning it right next to our woodworking operations. I found having both a stand and gluing a few powerful rare earth neodymium magnets to my hood lets me cover almost any need firmly holding the hood right where it is needed without slipping.
- Clothing
My doctor also reminded me to not only wear my apron, but also when making fine dust to wear a cap, light jump suit, and bandanna that I take off before going into my home. This keeps the fine dust from being tracked all over. He also recommends wearing wear gloves and good skin protective clothing when working with the more toxic woods.
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