I felt so accomplished when I finally assembled the new Oneida Air Systems Dust Gorilla Pro collector, wired it and fired it up. What a rewarding sound hearing the relatively quiet but powerful hum of the impeller and feeling the whoosh of the intake! But it still wasn’t connected to any machines. Little did I know that the fun was just beginning.

The system can be turned off and on with a hard-wired magnetic switch or the handy remote.

From wires to pipes

I’m not an electrician, but I’ve successfully wired my entire house, so I wasn’t really concerned about the hookup for the collector. The 5hp, 240-volt unit takes a 30-amp breaker and 10-gauge wiring, similar to an electric water heater or my air compressor.

I tested the unit with both its hard-wired switch and the handy remote, and all worked flawlessly. It will be great to be able to use the remote to turn the system on and off from anywhere in the shop. On to the piping.

All the piping components, including pipe, nipples, clamps and blast gates laid out and ready for assembly.

Best laid plans…

I worked with Oneida using the same order forms and procedures any customer would use. I told them about my machinery, drew a scale drawing of the shop and machine locations on graph paper, and talked with their technician over the phone. The result was a set of beautiful CAD drawings showing exactly the ducting required, including all the connectors, blast gates, adaptors and hose configurations. It was great!

This manifold and connections with blast gates serve the table saw and jointer.

Even for my small shop, the sheer amount of piping and connectors required was daunting. I laid everything out in sorted groups across four workbenches, with nested pipes stacked on the floor. It was a little overwhelming. Working from the collector out to the machines, I immediately realized I wanted to make some changes to the pipe layout. The engineer’s plan was excellent, but I realized I could take advantage of some beams and posts in my shop to streamline the layout further, use less pipe and put connections closer to machines and collector.

The heavy-duty Gorilla Ducting is connected with equally heavy-duty spring clamps and secured with strong wire hangers. A system of nipples and sliding fittings with O-rings makes sizing fast and easy.

Aerial plumbing

It was especially easy to make the changes because the Oneida Gorilla Duct has great adjustability. Most pieces snap together with spring-clamp connectors. Long pieces fit into adjustable nipples to offer lots of sizing options. The heavy-duty Gorilla Duct is not light, so lifting it into place in the takes some logistics. I really like the cable supports Oneida sent to suspend the ducting from beams and joists.

All of that makes assembly fast and easy. The worst part had nothing to do with the system: It was crawling under machines to wrestle hose connections. Once hooked up, I tested the system. What a joy to see the sawdust fly off blades and cutters right into the dust collection system. I still have some work to do for final connections, but I’m more than pleased at the results so far.

Thanks again to Oneida for working with me on this project. To learn more about their dust collection systems and products, visit www.oneida-air.com