I really liked what @FarOutRide did with his dust hose using pipe and his gimble design. I actually bought and printed his setup, but I desperately needed to mount the gas strut on my spindle as it wouldn’t hold itself up and just rested on the bit while sleeping. Once I added the strut the gimble wouldn’t fit since the strut is too close to the motor. I came up with this 3D printed design to keep the hose vertical and away from the strut, and I’m using the pipe setup previously mentioned otherwise. I still need to clean up the hose mounts around the pipes, but it’s gettin better (previously a bungee from the ceiling). Forgive the mess in the pics, I’m also building out the table and moving the control boxes so it’s mid-project mess.
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I like the design and now you have me thinking of changing my setup. 
This is what I came up with using stuff I already had.
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“Using stuff I already had” - the greatest feeling in the world.
Here’s what I whipped up a couple of years ago:
A length of steel rod, a fender washer, a couple of hose clamps, and a bungee cord. It might seem, well, janky, but it actually met a very specific design requirement: minimal constraint on the movement of the hose. I wanted to support the hose but allow the hanger to tilt, pivot, or do whatever it liked to stay in a “low energy” state and minimize any forces on the spindle mount or the vacuum hose adapter (I was worried that if there was enough side loading, eventually it would crack the vacuum adapter but after 18 months, everything is still perfect).
Here is an overall view (the vacuum and dust sep are behind the machine in the view on the right hand side as you are facing it):
It seems to be very happy doing modest pivots and tilts as the spindle travels over the entire bed with no binding or loading on anything - the machine or the vacuum setup.
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Not gonna lie, the bungee was working just fine but I want it to at least look like I know what I’m doing. Well from a distance anyway. As long as no one is looking too close
Do I spy keepers for your drag chains? I was thinking about doing something similar myself.
You do indeed.
Right from the C3D downloadables - just stops them from getting pushed to the inside when you’re working from one of the sides.
Well worth the almost zero effort.
I’ve got a nice 3D printed caddy I designed for the jog pendant, the bitzero, and a mount for the e-stop (and plus hangers for hearing pro and a fixture for engraving 4x4 slate coasters) - stop me before I kill again…
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Oh yeah, and a mount for a mister bottle and the air block.
I’ve got a couple of mills and couple of lathes and I was telling a buddy about making parts to fix or tune up the machines and his response was “So if you didn’t have a machine shop, you wouldn’t need a machine shop then?”
My response was “That’s not how I look at it.”
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I’m still setting up for for foam cutting production. The vacuum wasn’t doing the job. The 5" hose was causing the spindle to droop about 0.015" I took advantage of the height, and centered it.
I still need to finish the 5" dust shoe, currently using the prototype 4". I did find some cheap heavy duty retractors on Amazon. 2 months in, and they are working well. They lift 25 oz each. If they last a year it will be a good value. 2 of them for $10.
I’m going to pick up a few more to hang the track saw hose.
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I’ve looked into these retractors, and couldn’t find the details that I was interested in; the pull of the spring.
The 25 oz. figure is for the hold of the magnet which is only available if the spring is fully retracted. In your case, David, your setup never really fully retracts to the magnetic part of the clasp. Your hose is held by the internal spring rewinder.
So, guess I’ll have to buy a couple of them and test them, because my rubber bands are losing their spring! 
Based on the testing I did, they will hold 25 oz. at position. at 15-20 oz they retract. I 3D printed some spacer beads to prevent the magnets from sticking together. I included the stl if you happen to have a 3D printer.
I still need to design and print some better mounts that don’t slide on the clamp.
Bead stop for Retractor.stl (506.2 KB)
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Brilliant! Seems like a clever solution
Are your jigs and fixtures posted in here somewhere? I’d love to see them.
ah a fellow clear tube spacer person. I’ve been really pleased with the length of rigid tube instead of the hose going all the way to the dust boot.
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I like that extender tube. Good idea
Couldn’t help it. Had to get some specs on these retractable keychain gadgets.
So, I got my grandson involved in the formal test. He’s 12 now, going on impatient, but I managed to throw in a digital scale that I’d been hiding from him which allowed his current psyche to control him just a bit. (The scale has a small piece counter function that I’ll hold back on for a while.)
What we found was interesting at least. On the two that I bought, they consistently held magnetically at over 2 lbs. (35 ounces).
Then to test the spring capacity to “balance” the load, we obtained a closely consistent 1.4 lbs. (22 ounces). This weight was a little bit of an average, probably because the spring retracting mechanism has a variable torque curve. It pulls less close to maximum extension than minimum extension, but there does seem to be a middle ground where it just holds the weight.
Anyway, I was able to explain / demonstrate a basic engineering process and the difference between raw engineering versus technical engineering, theory versus practicality and Engineer versus Technician.
I’m sure the folks that created this retractor went through many iterations of this process to develop a viable product, but so many people have access to so many technical products that they rarely consider all that went into them so they could find some use for the product (even a use that the original team never considered. )
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