Shopsmith Forums

This is alonog the lines of the Frugal thread. I was originally going to use an old box fan for this project, but I don't think I would have been happy with it for several reasons, but mainly for lack of CFM.

So, I did some looking around today. I was thinking about finding an old blower unit out of a forced air furnace, but no luck there. I found this little 4500 CFM swamp cooler at the local Habitat for Humanity Re-Source shop. They wanted $100 for it. I haggled them down to $75 and then got a receipt for $25 (tax deduction) for donating back the panels. Motor is in great shape and it's very quiet at high speed.



I intend to take the squirrel cage and motor out of this and make a smaller cabinet that can be put on wheels and is the perfect height for sanding. I figure I'll rig it up to take a popular size filter for air cleaning duties.

Then it occurred to me that I could also use this to help trap dust directly off the top when I'm sanding for what the dust collecter misses. Anyway, I'll have an air cleaner for my shop with another work surface...

4500 cfm? Better strap yourself and everything in the shop down when you turn this thing on or you may get sucked in!!

I think this is going to work pretty well. I was hesitating on using plywood on the sides of this due to the price of plywood these days. I had bought two boxes of hardwood laminated flooring from a clearance table at Home Depot a year ago for a buck a box (26 sq ft). The flooring is tongue in groove and just under 1/4 inch thick.



A piece of trim will hide the screw heads and corners.

I like the idea of using the laminate flooring. I've got a blower unit out of an old furnace that I've kept kicking around with much the same idea in mind. You could even attach fittings to the box to make a vacuum/dust collection system. Make sure the motor is explosion-proof, however. Furnace ones definitely are. Not sure about swamp coolers. Rock on.

v/r,

Rick