J. Phil Thien's Projects

Well, I found the bell mouth inside the the thein dropped my CFM significantly! at any height above the baffle.  I was getting 5500 fpm airflow with the straight pipe out of the top and just a chamfer edge on that hole in the top hat, so it already had a "mini bell mouth" that equates out to around 1150cfm.  With the bell mouth on the exhaust pipe, from 1.5" above thein to all the way to the top, it was around 4500fpm of velocity. 

My theory is this as to "why".  My bet is the bell mouth stats for efficiency are out of calm air, my guess is that big ol shape it introduced into the dust chamber make the air very turbulent inside instead of doing a toilet bowl swirl around the edges.

So I'm going straight out the top, I bondo-ed and really smoothed out the chamfered exit to flow right smooth to the pipe.  I used a lot of bondo in my thein build to make sure all was smooth. 

One efficiency spot I discovered that I haven't heard anyone mention, on the HF 2hp DC, which my guess is this will be true of all the different brand versions that look similar.  At the exhaust port of the impeller unit, the 4x6 hold was formed by bends and it created a spot the air would be hitting the open side of a "U" basically as it exited.  Mine is not that way anymore, a lil wire wheel and bondo and it in effect is a bell mouth exiting, so the air does not hit the back side of the "U" bend, it now is a smooth "ramp" on all sides leading to the 4x6 exit port.  Which I'm keeping 4x6 and not necking down to 5"

Folks, I'm in the middle of my build, I am aiming for max efficiency.  I have read a ton on here and I have seen Bellmouths mentioned and discussion but haven't found the practical final verdict, I didn't see any posts after folks had experimented with them. 

I have one printed now for my 6" exhaust out of my Thein... I will experiment a bit on if it adds efficiency and will attempt to experiment on amount of dust that comes out the exhaust and such.  But curious what others real world experiences have been with the bell mouth and how they ultimately mounted it in what location above the baffle and such so I'm not starting out completely blind about the bell mouth...

Hey folks, my name is Ray.  My wife and I are both handy, we have always done more remodeling type things than woodworking, but as our remodel wound down, we remodeled our garage into a woodshop to have an outlet for our handy energy and are now relearning woodworking skills to add to our remodeling ones.  I decided to take air quality serious, fist build for finished shop was just a filter dust extractor, it gets a lot of airborne dust.  But now am building a hot rod HF dust collector and of course incorporating a Thein. 

I'm really pouring my all into the build and have read a lot on here... I am going at it with the goal of maximum efficiency knowing that loss of power in a DC system sound like death by a thousand cuts often, not just one big thing.  My first passion in life is aviation, general aviation flying small planes.  The reason I mention this is two fold.  On my old 1947 Cessna 140 I set out to lighten it so I could haul more, I told folks my goal was 60lbs, they laughed at me.  I set out with the mentality "ounces makes pounds" and left no stone unturned to eliminate unneeded weight and I pulled it off! That is how I'm attempting to get my max cfm out of a 2hp system.  My second related thought is I currently fly a Mooney, Al Mooney designed the basic design in the 50s with pencil and paper, by in large same design they used when they last produced some in the 20-teens IRRC.  My airplane can fly at 150kts, and hauls 1050lbs, all other general aviation airplanes in that class are getting pulled around by 260-300hp typically, mine does it on 200hp.  All because Al was a "mad scientist" for efficiency.  So I'm trying to learn from all and bring that mentality into it.  I will share the build in detail once all done. 

Thank You to all who have posted here, letting us newbies learn! It is very appreciated

Ray

Ran into this info after I decided to try making a collector for my old 2.5" rigid vac. Most all my tools with dust fittings directly fit my shop vac 2.5" hose. I'm retired and not in business so it's not a daily usage, sometimes it goes weeks unused. So I wanted to keep my cost down.

My first collector try was based on a YouTube video showing two 5 gal buckets slipped together after cutting top ridge off of one. The end facing up is cut for the hose fittings. Even with an entry pipe fitted with elbow and 45 to direct the stream down and around the inner circumference, I got a lot of short circuiting to the exit vac line so not very efficient. To be fair to the guy in the video, he was using a much smaller vac with 1.25" or 1.5" fittings. Plus I felt the limited usable capacity would a pain to constantly need to be dumped. Looking at around $50 for a tiny cyclone also did not seem like an efficient solution.

I felt a larger collection vessel with larger diameter top would help by allowing better separation between inlet and exit. Better yet if it was somewhat tapered to encourage a cyclonic action. I got lucky, found a local guy selling surplus 35 gal plastic drums with top closure rings. They even have a bit of taper from top to bottom without ridges, clean and smooth inside and out. I cut a new top from some 7/16 osb scrap I happened to have on hand.

Now, before I saw this idea which does seem effective, I simply used the 5 gal bucket from my first try with the exit pipe coming up through the center so it hangs inside the from the top and acts as both an inlet cyclone enhancer and as an exit air baffle. Initial results are looking great. I saw no new dust in the vac. I just recently used it for finer dust from my RO sander and so far it seems effective. I just got a new vac filter so will install it soon to better test it for carry over. Photos aren't great but get the idea across. I figured if it's not effective, then I'll make a baffle plate. But I had the bucket that already had the hole for the pipe so figured it was easiest thing to try it first. So far, so good.

Hi guys! I am designing a a separator using Fusion 360, and I am planning to cut some parts on CNC and 3d print some others. This allows a bit of flexibility without much hustle.

I have a couple of questions, hope you can help me.

1) In terms on the general geometry of the separator, does it matter if it's a spiral or a circle? If a spiral is better, does it matter what kinda of spiral it is?
2) What term do u use to refer to the air outlet of the sepator? (EG: I am talking about the pipe that's fixed to the top lid).
3) Is there any kinda of guide or calculations that are good to follow in terms of the location of the hole on the bottom plate, where it should start and finish?
4) is there any guidelines about using ramps or vanes?

Thanks in advance!

This is the shape that I am working with for now. I think this is called a quarter arc spiral, is simple 4 tangent arcs that are slighltly bigger by a fixed step. Fusion is kinda not good for sketching spirals so i have to work around it.


Here are some images of my general idea. I am still sketching the ideas.

Sorry for the delay.

It is THEEN.

Hi, I am also a Philip, and I have been doing wood work since 1957, my Seventh BIRTHDAY, I was given a "WARDS" Lakeside brand 16 ounce hammer, a carpenter's saw, etc.

I have built Stick Homes, Log Houses, Hardwood Floors, and finish carpentry.

Today, retired, I keep my hands busy with smaller projects, as well as working in other media.

My WOOD SUPPLY, includes species that folks do not see often, I have several Square Feet of MADRONE milled in the N.W. corner of CALIFORNIA, as flooring, and when I found it I asked about why it was hidden away: My BOSS told me it was from a Special Flooring contract, and he ALWAYS skept 10% of the contracted footage in case they needed repair, It WAS in the CONTRACT, for customer protection.

He had completely forgotten about it, and as he thought, WELL, it was almost 20 years old, we were talking in 1992 . . .

So I will be doing a Winter Project from it. IN 2025!!!

I also have quite a bit of Rock Hard MAPLE, the species used to make bowling alleys, WHICH was where I got it, a remodel, REPAIR of the first 10-12 feet of each lane!

I asked what the crew would be doing with their "waste" and was soon loading it into my Subaru Forester, Two trips to bring it home!

Does anyone else get SALVAGED WOOD that way

I'm making a YouTube video about the separator, and in my research, I've found very little connection between the work and the designer. I'd like to talk a little about the separator's development, as presented here, but I have a problem. I don't know how to pronounce Thien, and there's disagreement among YouTubers.

Is it pronounced like THEEN or like THINE??

Thanks in advance!

Soon after completing my HF DC separator (see my post: "Thein Separator with Younker Lift"), I decided what the heck and bought a canister filter for it. Being as it was at the end of the pandemic, it took a little over a year to arrive.
It was worth the wait.
It is light years ahead of the bag that comes with the DC in keeping the shop's air clean.
I am still amazed every time I use the DC at just how efficient the separator is. It even gets a large amount of the finer particles, such that I've emptied the bin a couple times and there is still barely anything in the bag.
I thought it must be on the inside of the canister filter, but an inspection of it showed very little accumulation.
After I received the canister, I considered also buying the larger impeller, but I've had no issues with the stock one, so I'll skip that. My longest run of 4" pipe is under 20 feet, and there are a few bends in all my runs.
I am curious to know, anyone who has installed the larger impeller, did you notice any difference in the quantity of dust that gets pulled through the separator into the filter?
I wonder if at some point, an increase in airflow would pull more dust through without separating it.

Hi folks, I am Bob Crane and I live in southern Ontario. I have a couple of design/engineering questions about Thein seperator design. All of the limited engineering skills that I have lead me to believe that there is some defineable relationsip between the diameter of the baffle chamber and the cfm rating of the air supply. Vacuums are slower yet more powerful that blowers. Does the air speed  affect the seperation efficiency and is there an engineering formula to follow if I know the cfm of my vacuum? My second question relates the thickness of the secondary baffle. I am building a "top hat" seperator and find myself wondering if I should use 19mm ply or 1/4" mdf. All feed back is welcome and thank you for allowing me to join.