my new woodturning room

[robyn2839]

after deciding to sell up and give woodwork away, it has been playing on my mind something awful, and then it came to me in a dream, why no build a purpose built room designed for turning,with overkill dust collection and exhaust system, completely sealed off from outside with vents at floor level of the walls to let the air in as it is being sucked from the ceiling , with outside cyclone dusty to take care of the sanding dust ,and exhaust to take care of the fine stuff ,the wall go from the right
of the lathe and go to just past my wood shelf ,filled in at the bottom 1 mtr,then glass up to a bulkhead 200ml from the ceiling with a door to close myself in , may work, and i still get to make expensive sawdust............bob
ps
; what do you think??

[echnidna]

That's worth a good try Bob,

Though I think you should let fresh air in high and extract dusty air low.
Wood dust is heavier than air so exhausting low will clear the breathing zone quicker than exhausting above head height.

Maybe you should study up paint spray booths as what you basically need is a no dust room which is really exactly what a spray booth is, plus dust suckers on all machines

[BobL]

Though I think you should let fresh air in high and extract dusty air low.
Wood dust is heavier than air so exhausting low will clear the breathing zone quicker than exhausting above head height.


Your recommended direction is the right way to - not because the fine dust is heavier - the dangerous fine stuff is distributed all over the place anyway, Unless your shed is more than 3 m high the majority of the volume is usually below your head.

There is also another important reason to collect fine dust low. Dust is not only made by machines but by other dust. Wood dust laying around on the floor breaks down slowly into finer and diner dust the fine dust just sits on the bigger dust until it is churned up by something as simple as opening the door of your shed or just walking past a pile if dust will puff the fine dust into the air. In most sheds there is more fine dust on low surfaces like benches and floors than higher up above your head. Dragging all this fine dust up past your head to exhaust it doesn't make sense.

[robyn2839]

Your recommended direction is the right way to - not because the fine dust is heavier - the dangerous fine stuff is distributed all over the place anyway, Unless your shed is more than 3 m high the majority of the volume is usually below your head.

There is also another important reason to collect fine dust low. Dust is not only made by machines but by other dust. Wood dust laying around on the floor breaks down slowly into finer and diner dust the fine dust just sits on the bigger dust until it is churned up by something as simple as opening the door of your shed or just walking past a pile if dust will puff the fine dust into the air. In most sheds there is more fine dust on low surfaces like benches and floors than higher up above your head. Dragging all this fine dust up past your head to exhaust it doesn't make sense.
if the dust being made is just below your head ,would it not make sense to suck it straight away via up and out the top,why let it settle in the first place ,it wont be settling on things because it will be sucked away,and i dont leave till i have vacuumed the floor so i wont be disturbing when i open the door , and all the spray booths i have used have had top exhaust. my room will be a room within a room.bob

[Chipman]

Robyn,

Listen to what the other guys said!

You need to pull fresh clean air from behind you across/around your head and drag the dust down and away from you.

You should also set up your dusty to collect dust straight off your wood turning too

Have a read of this recent thread too
http://www.woodworkforums.com.au/showthread.php?t=73490


Chipman

[BobL]

if the dust being made is just below your head ,would it not make sense to suck it straight away via up and out the top,why let it settle in the first place ,it wont be settling on things because it will be sucked away,and i dont leave till i have vacuumed the floor so i wont be disturbing when i open the door , and all the spray booths i have used have had top exhaust. my room will be a room within a room.bob

Because sucking up means the fine dust has to be drawn past your face and you just breathe it as goes by! I wouldn't let the fine dust settle (and it won't settle for days anyway), so suck it out while it is suspended, but suck it down or away from you but not up past your nose. .

Good spray booth have the operator on one side (the clean air side), the object being sprayed in the middle on some sort of a turntable, and the gas/solvent sucker on the other side. Spray booths with exhausts on the top have been made by people who haven't thought OHS issues through properly.

BTW I like the idea of a "room within a room" for really dusty activities like turning as it helps keep the fine stuff out of the rest of the shed.

[Skew ChiDAMN!!]

I also like the "room in room" idea, not that I'd ever go so far as to build one.

I assume you'd still have a hose from the DC up close 'n personal to the work being turned to extract the majority of the dust and that this "room exhaust" is to catch what that misses?

[robyn2839]

exactly , an oversized one up close , and an industrial room exhaust to catch what the dusty misses.................bob

[artme]

Lotsa bloody good ideas and logic here Robyn.
I think the suggestion of having a look at Spray booth is a very sound idea.
I think the most important feature to think about is the actual direction of the airflow, as both BobL and Chipman say. I have intenentions of having a setup where the airflow is all one direction for the very reasons youare thinking of doing this.
At our woodturning club we have extractors at each lathe plus in room Jet air filters. IMHO these ae measures are crude, but they are quite effective.
Thought of a powered respirator?

[rsser]

The dust that does the damage to your lungs is the small stuff, < 5 microns. It'll float in the air for hours. Look at an externally vented dusty, or extraction fans, that'll move the volume of air in your room every 10 minutes or less.

[funkychicken]

after deciding to sell up and give woodwork away,

Never!!!!!!

Did I miss something?