45 gallon steel drum,6"reectangular inlet/6" bell outlet,top hat seperater build

[alan m]

hi there.
i started a new thread so that all the build would be  seperate from my usuall  ramblings and odd ball ideas.
my plan is to build 2 seperaters that are the same in every way exept one is clockwise and the other is anti clock wise. this is to solve a layout issue in the work shop so there will be a seperate motor and seperater for the two lines
i started this week  and have  most of the basic part done,


these are the barrels that i plan to use for the seperater . they are all the same diameter and have good smooth rims . i can choose which ever one i want at this stage. i will have the  others for back ups and storing the dust untill i can get rid  of it. nothing worse than having to emty the drum half way through a job. planing boards can generate a lot of shavings  so you wouldnt feel filling the barrel

[alan m]

the design i desided to go for was made up from layers of mdf. i chose this for a number of  reasons
1 . i have plenty of offcuts  so that would keep the cost down
2. easily worked
3. no fidly angles or groves to work with,
4 i coan make changes to the shape easily after wards unlike a bend piece of ply design.


i plan to put a layer of plex on the top so that i can see what is going on. it isnt as nice a s a clear side wall but you co get a view in. i did this on my other seperater (4" version)  and it worked good enough. there is a static issue where the dust sticks to the  plastic but i think that would happen  anyway.

i made a template  up to the shape of the layer and sanded it to the line . each layer  was then marked of  this template



marking out the slot

[alan m]

i glued up each  laer on top of the last with wood glue and scres to hold it in place.
i ran a bearing guided cutter around  each layer as i built it up so that they would all be the same.
it worked a treat.



so far i have only started on seperater, i want to finsh this one first and make sure it works properly before i start the second. also i want to do the  dc system for the  first seperater  so that i can be testing it  while building the second.

i then sanded the inside on my drill press to smooth out any rough areas.
no pic as they are too blurry but the set up is like this but thicker

[alan m]

this is a picture of the rectangular inlet i got made. it has the same area ar a 6" circle plus 10 %. it is not that well made but i will sealit up as best i can. if i was back again i would have made it up myself. there a few  good tutorials out there (one on here aswell ) on making round to rectangular transitions.




a mock up picture of it in place

[alan m]

i cut the slot in the baffel with a router and tramel .. i made the slot on the bottom for the top of the barrel a bit wider so that it has a bit of room to find its best postion and allow the barrel to be out of round a bit. i will put some draught strip in th egroove or else a bit of silicon.
i chamfered the inside of the slot 

[alan m]

i sanded the slot  to  remove more of that area so that there was only a very thin edge  around the slot. i used my festool ro90 to sand it with 40 grit. worked a treat

[alan m]

i chamfered the end of the slot with my dremel to reduce the chances of a build up of dust

[alan m]

thickness left

[alan m]

this is the top . i plan on using a sheet of plastic inside this so that i can see what is going on inside. this top mdf will hopefully help support the plastic and take the weight of the outlet port. it will also thicken up the area where the outlet will come throught the plexi making it easier to seal  and secure.

i jigsawed out the cutouts and sanded on the drill press .
i will round over the etop edge

[alan m]

today i varnished the inside of the seperater. i had a half tin of eggshell translac that i accidentally bought and used on a job (later sanded off ) instead of gloss. i diluted it roughly 50% and gave it 4-5 coats. tomorrow i will sand it and recoat.
hopefully this will seal the porus mdf and make the inside smooth which should reduce (albe it by a small amount) the losses of the system.

i havent sanded the outside yet  as i will do that when the top is on and flush they whole lot up in one go.
then seal that as well. im not sure what colour to paint it yet . any ideas.



what do you think of the progress made so far

[alan m]

does it look alright or are there any obvious  issues. now is the time to fix it,
i am planing to do a bit more to it in the next few days

[alan m]

bit of an update
i have this set up and runnings great.
il post some pics tommorow.
i didnt build a bell fitting  but wish i had gotten around to it
going to upgrade to an 8" version  next

[alan m]

a few finished (at least how far im going to take it) pics

[alan m]

[retired2]

How many router bits did you go through?

With the recent discussions about possible benefits from a "two story" top hat, why didn't you give that a try?

I hope you've thought through the lifting of that heavy top hat, and also the emptying of those drums.  I just overfilled my Brute plastic drum and had to empty it.  That was a chore for an old guy, and unfortunately I have to transfer it to a 33 gal. garbage bag.