How well does the Thien baffle deal with hand plane shavings?

[wilburpan]

Hopefully there are some hand tool users here.  I mainly use hand tools, so I have to clean up very long thin shavings from my hand planes.  Scooping them into a big plastic garbage bag gets old, and I still have to get the finer dust that I make.  Vacuuming them into a shop vac fills up the shop vac quickly because they take up a lot of volume.  My single stage DC clogs immediately with plane shavings at the plastic grate.

So I was thinking of getting a metal trash can and making a Thien separator for it.  But before I do this, does anyone have experience with the Thien separator and hand plane shavings?  These are very wispy and can easily be over a foot long, or as long as the board that I am planing, and I don't know if they will get hung up on the gap between the baffle and the can before getting underneath the baffle.

Thanks!

[POPJINX]

The really thin hand plane shavings end up going into the clear bag on my HF 2HP dust collector along with the really small particles or "fines".  The first time I bum rushed the seperator with a big pile of shavings, it clogged the output hose going to the impeller.  I cleaned every thing out and took it slowly after that and didn't have any problems.  None of this stuff likes paper towels, either BTW.  The main thing to remember is that you will not be throwing your dust pan away.  That won't happen with any dust collector system.  I keep my broom, dust pan and trash bag nearby.  It's much quicker to sweep a huge pile of shavings into the trash and then suck up what's left behind with the DC.  Just my benevolent opinion.

[JTJ]

Unfortunately, those long fine shavings (BTW congradulations on those) are so long that they tend to catch and hang on everything they can.  Mine have a nasty habit of stretching out and getting hung on the middle on the posts in the baffle, into any crevice, and in wind up in my filter bag and the poly bag on my Delta 50-760.

When I get around to it, I will try a couple of things to help and try to collect them better. 
1. Leave about an 1 1/2" between the bottom baffle and the inlet elbow to keep them from hanging on the bottom of the inlet.  I did not leave enough room down there in my build.

2. I might try to put a baffle to try and direct them around the inlet elbow, but much better I would think is to eliminate the inlet elbow and go to a side mount and get rid of the obstruction of the inlet elbow which I believe would be the best solution.

3. Possibly try a smaller radius inner baffle cutout diameter to see if those long shavings will drop.
4. Stream line the posts (using all thread at the moment), or use a slicker surface like a small diameter pvc pipe.

If someone has tried some of these, maybe they can save me some time on what works better than others.