DC Motor Upgrade? Yay or Nay?

[®smpr_fi_mac®]

Cool. Going tomorrow to pick it up. It's a single stage 2-bag mobile system. Gonna pull the motor and blower from it to build a 2-stage system. Will likely build a plenum box from ply to attach blower and cyclone together.

[fredhargis]

It's almost certainly single phase, but make sure before you but it.

[®smpr_fi_mac®]

I opened the box and checked; it's set up for either 110 or 220. Double checked it was correctly wired for 220, put a plug on the cord and plugged it in. It roared to life and man, does it move some air.

Now I'm hunting for a large cyclone.

[TDKPE]

I opened the box and checked; it's set up for either 110 or 220.  Double checked it was correctly wired for 220, put a plug on the cord and plugged it in.  It roared to life and man, does it move some air.

Now I'm hunting for a large cyclone.

Sounds good.  That should be enough for one machine, even with two inlets like cabinet and blade guard on a TS, as long as your pipe network is large, smooth, and not terribly long.

Do watch the motor current, especially when running it with no restriction.  It's easy to overload them.  I was able to increase the current draw on my little 2 hp HFDC blower by opening the inlet up to 9" dia, and that's with the added restriction of a duct system and the cyclone separator.  No bags or filters, though (out the window).  

With no nameplate on the motor, it's hard to know what its current draw is supposed to be (continuous) or if it's even 2 hp; originally, the HF ads said 12A.  Later they said 16A.  Now it says 20A, which I highly doubt.  But I keep mine to 16A or less with the ductwork, and it doesn't run under load for hours on end, so I'm not worried about it.  At least yours has a real nameplate (I think).

[®smpr_fi_mac®]

The motor plate is missing but there's ghost image still there. It's illegible. Power cord is 12/3. I'll measure amp draw unloaded and with the inlet partially blocked.

Six inch inlet so main line will be the same with four inch drops.

I'm thinking about just pulling the trigger on one of these ~$250 cyclones on eBay. Something like this, but without the bag or barrel: https://www.ebay.com/itm/High-Efficiency...890.l49292

[®smpr_fi_mac®]

Update:

I got all the parts in to build the new DC. 3hp blower with 14" impeller. ~4' tall separator. Stand and bag manifold from the old, underpowered unit. Blower will be pulled from the DC it's part of. Let over pieces go into recycling.

Made an adapter ring to fit the collector to the base in the stand. Separator has a steel flange welded on so that made it very easy to do. Gotta pick up some caulk tomorrow before I built it into place.

Question: Every DC I've seen has the air path intake->separator->blower->canister filter.

The setup I am building is air intake->blower->separator->canister filter. The setup I'm replacing follows this path, which is why I'm using it.

Any take on why the others are all the former type?

Please forgive the mess; I'm in the process of rearranging my shop and it's terrible.

[fredhargis]

One of the reasons the separator is ahead of the blower in the airstream is to keep debris from hitting the impeller. If you don't have to design the impeller for impacts of errant debris, you can streamline the design with less attention being paid to being robust. But another reason that may be just as important is having a smooth airflow coming into the separator. Many of the manufacturers will tell you to have a piece of straight pipe feeding the cyclone just so the air flow can smooth out form all the twists/turns it made getting there. Now imagine that airflow coming out of a blower, just won't be that smooth. Even so, while all this is true it may not make that much difference in a small shop setup. I'd probably go to the trouble of switching it around to have the separator ahead of the blower, but if you want it the other way I'm pretty certain it will work for you.

[TDKPE]

Your new blower is built for handling debris, as are most if not all bag system blowers.  So no harm in putting the cyclone separator after the blower (push-through).  One advantage of a push-through system is that minor air leaks at the dust collection barrel won't affect the performance, and you'll see the signs of dust leakage so you can make corrections.  You can also use a plastic bag without an air leak pulling the bag into the cyclone's cone.  

But you might want to consider putting the blower directly on top of the cyclone.  It's already turning in the right direction (CCW looking down on it), and it makes for a more compact arrangement.

[®smpr_fi_mac®]

I should have said I like the push-through setup because I don't need a rigid barrel to maintain the bag and I can see how full the bags are very easily.

I'm actually moving this out of my shop into a dead-space area in the garage bay where it fits perfectly so compact isn't a problem. Hopefully it'll help mute the noise a bit, too!

I'll give this a try and if I find it lacking I'll redesign it as a pull-through.

Thanks, gents.

[TDKPE]

I'm actually moving this out of my shop into a dead-space area in the garage bay where it fits perfectly so compact isn't a problem.  Hopefully it'll help mute the noise a bit, too!

Most of the noise from mine is from the exhaust, which exits the blower into some 10" insulated flex.  I really need to put some rigid pipe around that flex, near the blower.  Maybe a giant cardboard carpet tube, if they make them that large.  

So putting it in another room should go a very long way toward quieting it down.