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Under Construction
Please be patient as these pages continue to get rewritten. If you find problem areas or confusion, please let me know via email at BPentz@cnets.net
- Introduction
You should read these pages if you are a woodworker or participate in any other activity that makes lots of dust. Most are unaware of how much fine invisible dust we create when using either hand or power tools. Most are also unaware of the medical risks associated with this fine invisible dust. Most also are unaware that almost all available small shop dust collector and cyclone systems even with fine bag and cartridge filters do such a poor job of collection and are such bad dust pumps we would be far safer to work with a door open and good exhaust fan blowing outside. This site shares information for you to better understand these risks and protect yourself and those close to you from the dangers of fine airborne dust.
- Summary
This site focuses on the finest invisible dust that often escapes collection and is known to cause the most damage to our health. It shares how little fine airborne dust it takes to fail an air quality test with dangerously unhealthy airborne dust levels. It shares how to test your own shop and why most find even when not making fine dust in their clean looking shops that their invisible airborne dust particle counts average over 100 times higher than considered medically safe. It shares why this fine dust often ends up badly contaminating our homes, offices, vehicles and other areas we visit. It shares the health risks from this airborne dust starting with getting all clogged up, to the chemical triggered allergic reaction and cancer risks to the long term permanent damage caused by these invisible particles. It shares what I learned is required to effectively capture and get rid of this fine invisible unhealthy dust. It also shares my recommendations and my designs with detailed building plans to make your own cyclone dust separator, fine dust filter system, blower, muffler, downdraft table, ducting design, and the other components needed for good fine dust collection. It also shares answers to frequently asked questions. My goal in providing this information is to help you protect yourself, and those close to you including your pets others protect avoid the serious dust created health problems I suffer.
- Applicability
This site started off as a project to help woodworkers, but all who are exposed to fine dust are at similar risk. Many ranging from those who work with fiberglass, those who roast coffee, to those who work with grain storage strongly recommend reading these pages. In fact, three of the best known large industrial dust collection providers whose customers must conduct regular air quality testing now make reading this site mandatory for their staff and highly recommend its reading to their customers.
- Acknowledgements
These web pages and my designs were not a one person effort and I would have long ago given up without lots of support and the incredible help and feedback from hundreds of people who have helped keep this information accurate and useful. Jim Halbert, Dr. Rod Cole (Ducting Static), and many others provided years of forum posts and articles to get my education rolling. Jim Halbert shared his neutral vane upgrade, portable cyclone design, his automated blast gates, his air measurement pages, his DC remote controller and circuit diagram, and his cyclone vacuum. He also looked over my shoulder for years providing constant feedback to ensure my efforts were accurate and understandable. Others like Don Beale, the air engineer who started the Wood Magazine Dust Collection/Air Filtration forum, iterated for countless hours helping me to get the CFM requirement tables, resistance calculator, hood designs, ducting designs, and many other portions accurate, complete, and also written with diagrams so they were understandable. Don also sent me enough reading material to earn another degree.
Many of my friends helped me through my cyclone, blower, motor, impeller, tool hoods, ducting, and web page work. My special thanks to Bob Lemon, Dan Moening, Mike Worthan, Dale Critchlow, Glenn Paskaruk, Steve Knight, Steve Cater, Daryl Adams, Richard Winchester, Peter Hunt, Jack Diemer, Rodger Holland, and innumerable other local and Internet friends. Larry Adcock (WoodSucker), Chris O'Connor (AAF), Paul Paton (Sheldon's Engineering), Allan Johanson who now moderates the Wood Magazine Dust Collection/Air Filtration forum , Dick and Rick Wynn (Wynn Environmental), Ed and Matt Morgano (Clear Vue Cyclones), innumerable Cal-OSHA, and many commercial dust collection firms helped keep me focused and relevant, provided small shop owners with discounted components, plus showed and shared how to do things right. Many others contributed time, expertise, and even a little money to assist this effort. Terry Hatfield kept me rewriting this information and adding graphics until it became something that most can read and clearly understand. I especially want to thank Steve Hall who took the time to use his expertise as a web designer to totally redesign this site in early 2007 so it is much cleaner and loads far faster. Thanks Steve!
To each who contributed, I am most thankful and sincerely believe you helped make a big difference, but we still have a long way to go as shown by my recent testing. Our reward is not a pile of gold, but instead knowing that we have helped create a source of accurate information to help woodworkers educate themselves to better protect their health. Our efforts are well heard. Since beginning this effort in 1999, hobbyist vendor filters, cyclones, and dust collectors improved rapidly, plus more “real world” testing helps woodworkers make better decisions. I continue to encourage all to keep up the good work. I think we all deserve a well-earned hand, and my thanks to all who helped and keep helping!
Bill Pentz- Financial Help
Helping the thousands who view these pages daily and knowing thousands all over the world use my cyclone design leaves a positive feeling, but does not pay the bills. Since 1999 when I began sharing this work I have spent at least $10,000 every year on these dust collection education efforts. In 2006 my actual expenses on ISP access, licensing, testing, test equipment, and refining the designs I share cost me $15,892.05 out of pocket. With only 14 donations in 2005 and 43 donations generating $492 in 2006 these donations plus a total of $3093.67 from advertisers for 2006 leaves this site not even coming close to covering its cost of operation. I admit this is a labor of love and my choice to keep this work going, but please, if you find this information useful support these efforts with a check for what you feel this information is worth or at least a small on-line contribution each time you visit these pages.
You may pay me through PayPal toBPentz@cnets.net
or by sending a check to
Bill Pentz
1909 Studebaker Place
Gold River, CA 95670- Navigation
These web pages regularly get changed and most browsers do not automatically get the most current version unless you do a page refresh, so please refresh each page that you come back to visit. Links to other Internet information are underlined and provided in blue you can click on these links for additional information. Please start by reading over the introduction then the Dust Collection Basics followed by the Medical Risks and Doctor’s Orders pages.
- Summary
