Phil, Amazingly, my original question was going to be a two part question, but I decided not to complicate things till you answered the first part. Well, you answered both parts.
The second question was of course, what effect a turn ahead of the entry point might have? But your response showed some deeper insight that I had. I wasn't aware of the helical behavior of the air stream, but I was thinking that a turn results in the heavier particals being thrown to the outside wall. Maybe that is an over-simplification and it really doesn't work like that.
Whatever the behavior of the dirt laden air in a turning pipe, if it is known and predictable, then surely some turns are beneficial and some are counter productive. I would guess that most of us have some kind of change in direction just prior to entering our dust collectors or separators.
Chuck, I think an implementation like you sketched might produce too much turbulance and therefore be counter productive. I was thinking of an external transition piece that bolts to the mouth of the separator. I would not make any changese to the typical top hat design other than the inlet port would be rectangular in shape rather than round. The transition would be smooth like the one on top my thickness planer and it's length would be determined by the fabricator.
The second question was of course, what effect a turn ahead of the entry point might have? But your response showed some deeper insight that I had. I wasn't aware of the helical behavior of the air stream, but I was thinking that a turn results in the heavier particals being thrown to the outside wall. Maybe that is an over-simplification and it really doesn't work like that.
Whatever the behavior of the dirt laden air in a turning pipe, if it is known and predictable, then surely some turns are beneficial and some are counter productive. I would guess that most of us have some kind of change in direction just prior to entering our dust collectors or separators.
Chuck, I think an implementation like you sketched might produce too much turbulance and therefore be counter productive. I was thinking of an external transition piece that bolts to the mouth of the separator. I would not make any changese to the typical top hat design other than the inlet port would be rectangular in shape rather than round. The transition would be smooth like the one on top my thickness planer and it's length would be determined by the fabricator.