Internal Thein baffle or Top Hat Separator?

[dbhost]

The losses from a baffle INSIDE the DC's ring are substantially lower than those of a top-hat separator.  Fine Woodworking's test indicated they saw little initial loss from adding the baffle to a Jet dust collector.

It is probably substantially easier to add a baffle to your existing DC ring than building a top-hat, as well.

The only advantage to the top hat really is that it prevents larger chunks of wood or screws or whatever from hitting your blower wheel.  But the blower wheels inside single stage DC's are designed with this possibility in mind.

@phil

I am guessing you have been AFK for a bit. I sure could have used this reassurance...

I have the baffle taken out of my 55 gallon unit and have been straddling the precipice on whether to cut it down for my DCs ring, not sure who it was, but the member that had the Plumb Crazy HF DC with a neutral vane and a baffle had the idea, but I never saw test results.

My main goals here are...

#1. Keep my airflow high in order to insure dust, shavings, and chips keep moving to the collector.
#2. Keep the dust, shavings, and chips away from the filter as much as possible to prevent clogging.
#3. Reduce the shop footprint of the collector and any separator. If they consume the same space, that is ideal. Where my 55 gallon unit was now has my roller stands, and one of my shop stools.
#4. Oddly enough, I want a clear dust vessel that I can view at a glance. Clear plastic bags are good by me. And my city recycler will take sawdust in plastic bags. I think that stuff goes to the paper mill...