J. Phil Thien's Projects

I'm sure there are plans for a tophat with 6" ports but I cannot find them, The search function in the forum is too limiting for what I have been feeding it.

I plan to use a 5HP motor with a 16" impeller. Thus it will be necessary for me to build a housing for the motor and impeller as well as the tophat.

Several years ago I converted a Grizzly DC from a single-stage to a two-stage using using 4" ports on the tophat. It really worked great. I never got around to installing good filters on the Grizzly but still it was MUCH better than the original Grizziy.

I have a Thien Top Hat on my modified Grizzly DC and for the last 2 years it has been working great. The other night I turned some green wood (wet) and this generated a LOT of shavings. At the end of the night I decided to clean up so I turned on my DC and started to vacuum up the woodturning shavings.

OK this was not the smartest move on my part and I quickly realized this when I viewed the Top Hat through the Plexiglas. I quickly saw that it was jammed full with the shavings. I turned off the DC, disconnected the input to the Top Hat, cleaned it out.

Aside from manually cleaning up the shavings any suggestions? Possibly I should use a cyclone for the separator?

I'm about to start a redesign of my DC system and hopefully it will included a solution for the woodturning shavings.

OK I've finally had it with my portable thien setup and have decided to route pipes in the attic area of my workshop. The roof over my garage/workshop is near flat and I have just over 3' of space between the garage ceiling and the actual roof. I plan to put the new unit in the right-front corner of the garage (where the red tool box is in the garage image). Initially I can just put the portable unit in this space and connect it to the pipes I plan to run in the attic area.

I'm attempting to solve two issues.

• I'm tired of moving the portable unit and connecting it to the tool I'm using
• I'm tired of the noise the DC motor makes

I plan to complete this project in several phases but I'd like to get as much of the planning in place before I start any work.

Phase One
Run Pipe in the attic area which presents the first question, e.g. should I run 4" or 6" pipe. The input to the Grizzly is very close to 6" (I had to modify a plastic pipe for the current fitting). I plan to use PVC. If I use 6" pipe my current thought is to make the drops from the attic pipe the same size and then reduce down to 4" for the blast gate and the run to the tool. Currently all of my tools have 4" ports for dust collection. The garage is about 28' x25'. I was thinking of running one continuous loop in the attic and if possible all bends would be made using 2-45 degree pipes rather than one 90 degree.

Phase Two
Build a new Thien baffle, if I use 6" pipe in the attic then a new unit will be required for the 6" input

Phase Three
Convert the Grizzly to utilize the new baffle

Phase Four
Enclose the system, Walls and doors to reduce the noise for the rest of the shop.

Please feel free to comment about any phase

I've looked in the forum and was not able to find any post regarding an automatic shut off when the DC can is full. I've been playing with my TopHat for what seems like forever and finally got all working.

First I mus say it works GREAT. As you can see I draw the air (saw dust) through the Tophat and the through the impeller. When I first got the Grizzly I sucked up a couple of things (bolt and wood block) and did not like the idea that large stuff could damage the impeller or worst yet create an explosion. Thus I went to pains to mount the impeller unint on top of the TopHat.

My original thought was to use a plastic bag in place of the Brute can but when I turned on the DC the bag got sucked up. I was going to use a 32 gal Brute but with the current design there is not enough clearance thus I used a 20 gal Brute.

Two things wrong with the 20 gal Brute

• 20 Gal is TOO SMALL
• I cannot find a bag that will fit inside the can

I plan to modify the unit and raise both sides thus allowing me to use a 32 gal Brute, The ring I have on the underside of the TopHat is large enough for the 32 gal Brute.

Currently I just use a couple of wedges to raise the Brute, this will be replaced by a Lazy-Susan on a threaded rod to easily raise the can.

As you can see the entire unit is on wheels, my first thought was because I'm using this in my garage I want all of my shop tools (well most of them anyway) on wheels and I can then wheel the DC to the tool I'm using, connect it and then turn it on. Now that I've done that a few times I don't like this idea, as I bounce between the various tools it is a bit of a pain to be disconnecting something and then connecting to another tool. This mod is somewhere in the future.

To make the unit more fixed will require installing pipes to the various locations in my garage. I need to think about this and optimize the locations. I could still use the flex hose from the fixed points to the various tools. My table saw and joiner are fixed at this time (I map put a base on the joiner but I'm also thinking of replacing the joiner and my planer with the Hammer A1 Jointer/Planer combo).

The other neat thing I'd like to install are the controls to turn on the DC when I turn on a tool.

All that aside I ran into an issue when joining and planing a bunch of 2x4s. In the image if you look at the TopHat on the right side you can see that I used Plexiglas and I can easily see the TopHat in action (yea). Not thinking  far enough ahead I quickly overfilled the Brute and the sawdust also filled the Tophat and then the sawdust went directly into the bags on the left side of the image.

Thus I'd like to install a sensor that will shut off the unit when the can is full. Robert R. Payne makes a really neat Bin Sensor System (see http://www.clearvuecyclones.com/Bullentin/showthread.php?t=1272) but it only works with the Clear Vue Cyclones and he thinks that if I install the LED units under the Tophat the dust dropping down into the Brute will trip the control and shut the DC off.

Any suggestions for the sensor?

I just completed my build, turned it on and the collection bag (item 3 in the image) is sucked up and blocks the baffle (item 4 in the image). I started with  Grizzly 2hp unit (see the image below) and wanted to get better dust collection. The input port to the baffle is 4 inches and the input to the Grizzly impeller unit (item 7 in the image) is almost 6". The pipe connecting the Grizzly impeller to the baffle extends down into the baffle about 1 1/2". The distance between the floor of the baffle and the top is 5" (this is the inside measurement).
As you can see in the Grizzly image the original input was a double Y connector.

OK I think I'm slowly coming around but I'm surprised as to how long this is taking me and the mental mistakes I've made. Now I'm on a new track. I happen to have a 3' square piece of cabinet plywood that is comprised of two 1/2" pieces that were glued together for a project that never happened thus I'm thinking of using it for the bottom of my TopHat but have a few questions and would appreciate any feedback. 

• The total thickness is 15/16"
• Current plan is to use it for the bottom of the TopHat only, the top will be 3/4" MDF
• This TopHat will be used with my Ridgid shopvac
• I'm going to cut a 22" x 22" for the bottom
• I'm using a 20 gal Brute which has an OD of 19 1/2", ID of 18"

Questions:

• On the very bottom of the plywood which is the cap for the Brute I'm considering routing a 3/8" deep grove where the OD = 20 1/2". ID = 17" thus the 3/4" lip of the Brute has 1.75" track to fit in. Comments?
• Now if I flip the board over I make two circles  where the DIA is 16.75" & 16.25. This is a .25" track that will be routed out .25" deep for my .25" plastic. The inside circle will also serve as the outside circle of the baffle cut. Any problems here?
• The input and output for the TopHat will be 4" but in that it is being connected to my shopvac which has slightly larger than 2" hoses should I just use the same size on the TopHat? Until I get my bigger TopHat built I will be using this unit for all of my tools. At the rate I'm moving this might be quite a while.
• When I start the cutout for the baffle how close to the input should it start:
• Some of the baffle cutouts I've seen has a cutout of 240 degrees, is this correct? What determines how far it raps around the bottom?
• With respect to the input to the TopHat I've seen several different design with shoots of different lengths? What determines how long the shoot is? My current thought is to make it as short as possible. Suggestions?
• How wide should the opening for the baffle be? I've seen designs ranging from 1" to 1.5".

I've been working on this in SketchUp and can post my current model and or pictures to help with the above wording. I'm open for any suggestion.

OK I think I'm making progress with my SketchUp model and would appreciate any feedback and suggestions, if you have SketchUp please download the SketchUp file and review. I know that it is not complete and most likely I made some mistakes thus I'm open. At this point I'm just tired and need to get some sleep!

For the past few weeks I've been researching Cyclone Dust Collectors and was focused on the Bill Pentz model to use with my Grizzly G1029Z2 2 HP Dust Collector, while trying to create my SketchUp model of everything I encountered the Thien TopHat and Cyclone Separator Lid and because it is MUCH simpler I've decided to change but I do have a few questions.

• Why not use the TopHat for the big DC and the smaller shop vac, e.g. possibly a smaller version for the shop vac? For my big DC I will be using 6" pipe and for the smaller shop vac I thinking of using 4" with reducing adapters to work with all of my small hoses.
• Are any of the measurements in the TopHat that are critical or any ratios I need to keep in mind? The only thing I've seen is possibly the cutout in the baffle and this seems to have a range that is acceptable.
• When creating a ShetchUp of my pland when possible I use an existing SketchUp model (tools, or whatever I need) and found a great TopHat model by Tom Porterfield and after viewing a posting by rawdawgs50 on YouTube I'll modify the inlet in Tom's model to duplicate what rawdawgs50 did.
• Is the distance between the top and baffle critical, for one of my units I'll use 6" pipe and the other I'll use 4" pipe.
• For those with a big DC with the TopHat, how often do you change the filter?
• Any thoughts on sound reduction?