J. Phil Thien's Projects

I am thinking of attaching the sheet metal, shown in the photo, to the top and bottom retaining rings with finishing nails spaced approx. 1" apart. Even though they can be countersunk they will still protrude slightly and the wall won't be completely smooth at the very top and bottom. Do you think that will affect the seperator's performance?
Thanks

First I want to say hi, and also say how glad I am to have stumbled on this great sight while surfing. It looks like a Thien Baffle will solve my dust collector problems. I have a pretty powerful 2 H.P. blower I picked up used,from a cabinet making business. It's mounted on a 50 gal barrel and blows into a 2' dia. by 6' high bag. Dust is collected very well but 2/3 goes into the barrel and 1/3 into the bag. Needless to say it's a major effort to empty. There is hardly any fine dust settling in the shop.

Finally the questions - I notice that top hat sizes seem to be determined by duct size and container diameter. I plan on mounting a top hat on top of an airtight square box that will hold a 26 gal trash can with a plastic garbage bag in it. I thought a 20" dia. baffle would be good but wonder if a 10" top hat height with a 6" inlet at the top of the wall might work. My thinking is that my blower is quite strong ( I don't know it's ratings but we try to keep cats and small puppies clear of intakes), and this might slow down the air stream and help settle some of the finer dust.  Do you think I'm close, or out to lunch? Also, would the plastic bag be sucked out of the container or do you think it would be O.K.

I don't mind experimenting but I'm so impressed by the knowledge and ideas of this group that I thought I could tap into that. and get off to a flying start instead of beginning with a crash.

Thanks all.
J.C.