Modular chip collection/dust separator?

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With the recent addition of a nice vacuum, I’ve found myself looking for a chip separation system.

I know the dust deputy and such exist but I’ve got a slightly different requirement than many.
I’d like to collect the chips in a clean way for reuse.
I cut different plastics and machinable waxes that can be remelted and recast into raw stock. The chips just need to be collected without a bunch of other stuff mixed in.

For example:

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When I had the nomad 3, I didn’t worry about this too much. The time it took to remove a meaningful amount of material meant it wasn’t worth the trouble to reclaim. The nomad 4 changes that equation a bit (in a great way :slightly_smiling_face:) I can chunk through a large block of wax in no time at all and I can see the dollars I’d be throwing away :sweat_smile:

So, does anybody know of a small chip separation/collection system? Doesn’t need to be the most performant thing in the world since saving filter bags is not the goal here. I’ll report back if I can find anything.

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While not modular, I did put a small jar w/ second cyclone in-front of my Dust Deputy — the setup was sufficiently janky that I didn’t commemorate it w/ a photo, but I do still have:

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waiting for my next metal cutting session.

The cyclone was a small one which I purchased intending to use w/ my Nomad, so appropos?

Alternately, I just put together:

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though the intent there was to make emptying easier, and to save on filters (which last wasn’t as successful as I was hoping for).

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I feel like I posted this here already, but couldn’t find anything about it. If I did - sorry, if not - enjoy.

My dad used to service the MinuteKey automated key cutting kiosks, and when he decommissioned them, the company had him remove and send in some specific parts, but most of the parts of the machine were “throw them away”, so he (and I) ended up with some random parts and pieces.

One of the things he ended up with was 2 little mini cyclones that mounted to a small, custom made shop vac. It has these threads on the base for threading on to the vacuum top. Well, they wanted the vacuum back, and the top of the cyclone was integral to a large assembly, so I made a lid to replace that and a threaded base for the cyclone body so he could mount it to a small bucket lid. Then, because I could, I modeled the cyclone body as well. Not including the aluminum tube out the top, the thing is about 10" tall.

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Here is the cyclone body with the lid I designed. I printed it in PLA for a test before the PP-CF.

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Here is the threaded base adapter and bottom of the cyclone.

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Here is the cyclone mostly printed. The PP-CF has a weird silky look to it - but not like regular silk filament. I believe I used a 0.6mm nozzle for this.

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And done!

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Sadly, I somehow did not get any pics of it assembled with the PP-CF lid before I sent it to him.

If anyone is interested in this, I will try to get it up on Printables and Thingiverse, along with the hardware list for it in the next week or so. The two aluminum tubes are 1.50" OD.

5 Likes