Dust Free Room?

General Discussion
1

I want a dust free room for glossing.

Anyone have luck with just running something similiar to this to clear out the room?

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=60056-32764-AP400&lpage=none

Thanks

2

Maybe this would be better?

http://www.maxtool.com/index/delta/delta_air_purifiers.asp

I’m not concerned about foam. Just dust paricles that cause glossing disasters.

Thanks.

3

Howzit rick, Even with a vac unit you have to have intake air which will have some dust in it. My shop had a dirt floor and my gloss jobs came out just fine. The main thing is to get any dust off the board just before shooting your gloss. What I do is get my gloss resin ready but before adding catalyst I pull tape across the board to get rid of any dust on it. You might have to repeat this a couple of times until you don’t see any dust/dirt on the tape. Any dust that might get on the gloss after it’s applied will be removed during the rub out process. Aloha,Kokua

4

Hey Kokua,

Thanks.

Does it make any difference that I shape, glass, and sand all in the same room?

So sand down the board and sweep. I let the room settle for a couple hours but still…

Thanks

Rick.

5

The basic clean room principles are

  1. non-absorbent walls, ceiling, and floor

  2. air input comes in ceiling, and is filtered at least as clean as you want the room

  3. air output goes out adjacent to the floor

Sweeping should not even be necessary, just wait long enough and the dust in the air will be cleared.

My work cleanroom (for making biological implants) has a HEPA filter in the roof blowing down. You wouldn’t need that level of filter, but such solutions exist.

I suspect there are other methodological differences, other than a clean room, between you and a master like Kokua that would help too…

6

Hey Rick,

You can try this, I’ve only used the plastic, and it actually works pretty well, but I work in a garage, which is essentially a dust bin anyway:

http://www.oneoceankayaks.com/Wshophtm/Shop27.htm

The rest of the advice is really good (I’m not sure abot the tack cloth, though, instead I’d use Kokua’s tape pull instead of a waxy tack cloth; it might leave stuff that causes fisheyes), I especially like the wetting the floor idea (I used to do that when polishing telescope mirrors). If you have a pretty powerful laser pointer, it can let you see the dust kicked up by just walking around, it’s more than you think, and gets higher up in the air than you think, too… One of the best ways to truly dustproof a room is to have a recirculating air supply with a false floor and HEPA filters on the ceiling, the way semiconductor mfg places use. The air gets pumped from under the false floor (it has holes verywhere in it), up theough the walls, and down the filters in the ceiling. Even if any dust is brought in, it gets sucked downwards, away from everything. They cannot afford to have dust at all, and that’s the way they handle it.

Good Luck, and let us know what works out for you.

JSS

7

Howzit rick, I don’t think sanding or shaping in the room you will gloss in is a good idea, That will just add more dust that can be stirred up into the air. I just did all my resin work in one room and painting and sanding in another room. As for shaping I use a friends shaping bay for that since I built his room I can use it. Another thing is wear shoes that won’t stir up any dust, when working I don’t even let anybody in the room that is wearing slippas since they are major dust makers. If you can water down your floor that will definitly help, but wait about 10 minutes after that before doing your gloss. Bill sounds like he has a nice room for glossing. Aloha,Kokua

8

Hey Kokua,

Guess that’s my real problem. My only option is to do everything in one space. I’m lucky enough to even have a space to use while living in nyc.

So just have to make it work as well as it can.

Thanks for the help.

Rick.

9

ditto…i feel your pain rick. it ain’t easy finding space in NYC for shaping…or even living, for that matter.

10

Howzit rick, Well then I would say to keep the area as clean as possible after shaping or sanding. You can make it work. How big is your space? Aloha,Kokua

11

Hey Kokua,

Yeah.

I’d say it’s about 220 sq ft. With 7’ 4" ceilings.

I have one window (large skylight) with an industrial fan I run to clear the room.

Though maybe some kind of air purifier would help suck up left over particles after cleaning out room.

Thanks…

12

Howzit rick, So it’s about 10’x20’, Partion it in half with plastic so it’s 10’x 10’ and that will give you enough room for everything. My sanding, painting and rubout room was only about 12’x6’ and my glassing room was 12’x12’. Originally It was 12’x18’ which is 210sq ft. actually the 1 room was a little smaller than 6’ and kind of tight for sanding since I had side lights. But I got used to the size and it all worked out fine.Aloha,Kokua

13

Right on Thanks Kokua.

About 1/4 of the room is for board storage racks.

The rest is just enough space to comfortably shape/glass in.

So unfortunately can’t partition.

Appreciate the help though.

rick

14

what’s up rick, rick, and rick.

i read/heard somewhere(swaylocks or elsewhere)

that to keep dust down for painting some painters

put down damp sheets all over the floors a few hours before.

i guess the idea is that the dust settles and sticks to the damp

sheets and won’t get stirred back up by your feet.

FWIW.

good luck and i’m interested in what you figure out because

i’m looking at a similar scenario… i was considering getting one

of those small “room purifiers”

15

The key to a multi-use room is to not make a lot of dust in the first place. Granted, you can’t capture all of it but if you use a vacuum system for shaping and sanding and clean up after each day, there is big difference. I do agree with Kokua that a separate shaping bay is preferable if you have multiple boards being worked on. Even a plastic curtain to partition a glassing area works. With very little space, you have to plan the where and when of each operation. I do heavy sanding outdoors (without a vacuum), med-fine sanding inside (with vacuum), polishing outdoors (no slinging compound on the walls). I do lam’s and hotcoats in the same area as sanding, but I save my glosscoats for the last thing I do for the day after everything is cleaned up (incl. vacuuming the floor). Use a vacuum and never sweep the floor except for heavy foam dust.

16

We do all our shaping (several boards) then switch the shop over to glassing and do a good cleaning. It starts with sweeping, then we use a leaf blower and go to town. Then we usually let the room settle overnight. That’s when you want to use your filter, and yes, they work. We’ve had pretty good results glossing with epoxy and not sanding at all. And any sanding during the laminating process is done outside to keep the place as dust free as possible.

17

hey rick,

this thread is good timing because after finishing my first few boards this summer, i considered sending future shapes to glassers to do the dirty work. the dust factor was becoming very discouraging due to cleanup and health issues, and therefore, was killing my motivation/momentum. however, after some research it seems that there’s lots that can be done to keep dust under control. i know how you feel, only one space to work with…gotta keep it clean!

i think pete has the right idea…minimize dust in the first place (or at least minimize the dust created by the sander/machines). the New Toy thread sheds some light on tools (ie. ROS w/ vacuum exhaust) that minimize fine dust. i went through the trouble of making an exhaust system for my planer, and it should work perfectly for a vacuum-enabled ROS.

i love my milwaukee rotary sander, but i’ll most likely swap it out for the ROS whenever possible. if push comes to shove and i must use the milwaukee sander, i’m thinking of using the DustMuzzle attachment.

and as far as dust from hand sanding (ie. rails), maybe try wet sanding to soak up and capture dust.

every little bit helps. hopefully my next batch of boards won’t leave my shop looking like Winter Wonderland.

kc