Contractor saw dust control

[django1]

I was looking through my pics and I came across these and I thought I would share this. I've never seen anything like this so I have to say I invented it. The motor on my contractor saw is sealed so don't do this if yours isn't. The frame at the bottom was filled in with plywood for stiffness and I left a trap door so I can empty out the sawdust. This system works great for dust control, with a dust extractor. I've been using it for about 10 years with no ill effects and no downside. The assembly over the motor is held on by just two screw so it is easy to remove. The case over the motor shows that I puzzled out what would work one piece at a time. The motor moves around under there and must be able to do so unhindered.

In my case the saw is bolted to a cement slab under the plywood floor. I hope this might be useful to someone. Of course if I was to buy a new saw I'd get a closed in cabinet makers saw and all this would be unnecessary.

[Steve_vai_rules]

nice. looks very good! Also of note, holy crap that is a clean lookin' shop! lol whats your secret? *please don't say it involves hard work* lol :angel:

I was thinking of just getting a new electric motor and a very solid very stable and near zero play BB bracket shaft (whatever they are called, cant remember off the top of my head) assemly, and do some minor structural tweaks to my current saw.. thus rebuilding it and in the process getting a nice "new" saw.. The frame is cast steel and crazy burly... plus it would be cheaper then getting a new one and could be very good quality (not cabinet super pro quality but definitely nice).. also there is an old compound radial arm saw that just needs a motor and i have a skil saw circular with a broken guide/running plate of my dads that is useless and could be ported over............... damn.. more projects!!! LOL.

anyways sorry to thread jack, nice shop, when i get a chance i need to setup a place like that for myself and get some sort of dust control in place. it would nice to not be covered in mdf/fir/pine/etc dust and also have it everywhere and need to clean so much up.. should i ever get around to doing something about my saw situation i would likely try to implement something similar. Question though, is that hose connected to a fan or vacuum cleaner of some kind and is that your dust extractor? do you run it while running your saw or just fill up your plywood bin and then suck it up later??


Matt

[django1]

That is a picture when I first made my shop about 5 years ago. It's changed since then but is rarely that clean.
A long time ago I used just a Shop Vac. Then I got one of these. You absolutely turn in on with the table saw. It's not perfect but I probably nab 95% of the dust. I still use a Shop Vac for the router table and portable tools.