Improve Dust Pickup CS43

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Kerry Fullington
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Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Kerry Fullington » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 2:01PM

I would like to improve the dust pickup on a CS-43. The 4" flexible line from the spindle goes into a 6" line for approx. 12' which connects to an 18" secondary trunk into a 22" primary trunk to a 75 HP blower. I still get piles of dust left on the table. I can understand the down shear tooling leaving dust but I would thing it should clear the outlines cut using compression tooling.
Any tips for improvement? The vacuum system works quite well on the other machinery in the shop.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Scott Marshburn » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 5:40PM

Kerry just a thought but maybe try going from the 4" flex directly to the 22" (more volume more suction)But also make sure the ducting you have is not clogged this happens a lot to us. As we have a progressive system similar to yours.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Kerry Fullington » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 6:20PM

Thanks Scott,

There is actually a great deal of suction, it just doesn't pick up the dust out of the cuts so when I rake the parts off the table the dust is left there or on the floor.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Rick Palechuk » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 6:33PM

How about an air blower at the spindle to get the dust airborne.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Kerry Fullington » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 6:51PM

Rick,

I have heard people talking about doing just that but never heard how successful it is. Might be worth a try.
There are also the turbine type tool holders but that wouldn't be cost effective.

I was curious if everyone had this problem. It takes a lot of time to clean the table after every sheet and at the end of the day I am walking in a pile of sawdust all around the machine.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Kerry Fullington » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 7:08PM

Just watched the video of a 43 cutting melamine and think I found the problem. A worn out dust hood brush. Our brush doesn't even touch the material with some longer tooling. The brush in the video hangs 3/4" below the material when it gets to the edges.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Neville Bastian » Sun, Aug 12 2012, 8:17PM

Not sure if you are going to IWF this year Kerry but I have noticed that there is a varied number of hood designs on different manufacturers machines that leave little dust that I viewed at our Aussie version of IWF. There are a few machines that have a dust extraction in the push off bar that redirects the suction from the cowl to the bar. I believe there is a new Thermwood machine that is being displayed at IWF that has this system. Maybe a variation of the design might be available for retro fitting? I'm pretty keen to overcome this dust due to the occupational safety issues of breathing in this mdf dust and the time it takes my operator to clean off the table for the next sheet. Even if its 2 minutes per sheet it could add up to a couple of hours per day?
Would be interested to see how you overcome the problem long term.

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Neville
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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Josh Rayburn » Mon, Aug 13 2012, 5:32AM

Hi Kerry,
We always have a bit of dust left too - but I've noticed that it varies with the feed speed and RPM of the outline tool. Running the tool at the appropriate speed and RPM keeps the chipload large enough to allow the chips to be sucked out. It also helps the tooling last longer because the larger chips carry the heat away from the tool. Not sure if you have it tuned already but it could be worth a shot!
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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Will Williamson » Mon, Aug 13 2012, 8:46AM

I've been running my large tools 3/8" and 1/2" at 16000 RPM They are now producing chips not dust.
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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Will Williamson » Mon, Aug 13 2012, 9:00AM

Also I use 3 different brush lengths 3"-2" -1" According to my tool length. From Carr McMaster buy the 36 " and cut to lengh
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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Jeremy Schiffer » Tue, Aug 14 2012, 3:59PM

There's definitely a line you have to walk with the brush on the dust hood: Too low, and the brush squashes out across the board and practically seals the area, not allowing enough air to flow through. Too high, and the volume of air going in is high, but velocity is low. Play around with how far you leave the tools sticking out of the collets, so about half of the brush is against the table.

But, no matter what, you're gonna end up with dust left over. I too have reduced the spindle speed on the larger bits to 16k or so, and yes the bits last longer, chips are larger, but there's always dust left over. I would think an air nozzle would help tremendously. Until then, though, after I pick up the parts from the table, I pull the hose off of the top of the dust hood and use it to vacuum off the table, and then blow the remaining fine dust away. The floor stays clean(ish)!
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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Neville Bastian » Tue, Aug 14 2012, 7:06PM

So no one really wants to say the dust hood needs attention. The height could be a problem of how far the hood sits above the cutting surface? Well couldn't that be automatically be adjusted with a proximity switch each time it starts cutting a new sheet? I have asked other CNC shop owners about the dust problem and some say,what dust problem. Maybe we need a carpet cleaner designer to have a look. Is Hoover a US company?
When you think about it feed rates have gone up, the tools run better at faster speed and we in Australia cut a lot of mdf but the design is so DeLoren. :P

Regards

Neville
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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Steve Detina » Tue, Aug 28 2012, 10:36AM

We have a CS40 and there are two 4" pipes coming down so I am not sure if this will help.

We make a plastic type brush using the heavy plastic from walkin freezers.

I make long so it touches the material that we are cutting and the dust pick up is really good.
IMG-20120828-00070.jpg
I can't tell from the pics of the 43 and did not pay attention at the show but if you notice on our hood there are holes on a angle just above the skirt, this creates a tornado effect to help lift the dust.
IMG-20120828-00072.jpg
When we cut MDF Doors there are times when the dust really packs in there so we are looking at running a air line inside the hood and when the operator feels it is necessary he can manually send a couple bursts of air, this avoids your compressor running constantly.

Hope this helps.

Steve

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Kerry Fullington » Sun, Sep 02 2012, 9:47AM

This is the dust that hit the floor from 17 sheets. That is a 24" broom. This seems excessive. This is MDF but I get the same pile from plywood.
2012-08-30_08.32.25.jpg
We are going to try running a six inch flex line to the machine and reduce to 4" at the spindle.

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Re: Improve Dust Pickup CS43

Postby Michael Kowalczyk » Wed, Sep 12 2012, 7:51PM

Kerry... If you are using an up down shear/compression spiral you are pushing and pulling at the same time. If you are running your parts on a universal spoilboard then you are always holding the dust down, especially in corners or when you get up to top feed speed. We use HDPE dedicated spoilboards so we have fairly clean paths even using a 1/2" PCD 1+1 up/down shear bit. But they have some attachments now that will suck up the dust. Royce has one and so does Nap/Gladu. I am leaning towards the Nap/Gladu one since it is just a modified cover nut. My issue with them is small loose parts getting sucked up partially and then possibly wedged in between the unit and the material. Can possibly mar material, break bit or whole unit, damage spindle from upward force or maybe non of the above. Want to test one and see if it is worth it. May have to have a new tool holder made to accommodate it. Won't work in typewriter style. May have to be manually changed all the time. Could be an issue when running multiple tool changes....probably would only have it for final cut so it cleans as it goes also.

You should also check your static pressure at the main DC duct and at the spindle area. Don't know what you should have but when we put ours in back in 2008, the guy said ours was good, especially since we are running twin spindles on twin tables. We use a Blue Tornado system that is dedicated to the CNC. It goes something like 7" at the mouth of the cyclone to about 10" from the clean out and down shoot for a floor sweep with blast gate. At the top there is a TY that goes to 2 6" flex hoses down to the yellow tubes that split around the spindle and then rejoin at the tool holder on the spindle. We have a brush on this one and when we cut it is usually 3/4" longer than the top of the material. On our C40 we have a similar setup but with 1 4" flex coming down to a single yellow tube. Instead of a brush we have the clear PVC with no slots. Since we are always cutting Melamine on it we just push the PVC sleeve to within an 1/8" of the material and it cleans it out pretty good except for rooster tales and quick corners. When we had a slitted PVC sleeve or a brush on it we would use duct tape around the outside to help out.
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