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Dust collection automation project

Darren Wright

Darren Wright

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Springfield, Missouri
About 7 years ago I set out to automate my dust collector by having it automatically turn on/off with the tools I used it with. I didn't want to run a bunch of wires to every tool and given my DC was located next to my electrical panel, I went with sensors on each circuit with tools and turned on the DC when the amperage draw was over a certain threshold. Here is a demo of that system.


It had it's draw backs. I had to remember to open/close the gates. I had hand tools that I wasn't connecting to the dc that I plugged into the one or more of the circuits that often toggled the power on to the DC when it wasn't needed. I had added a main switch that I often forgot to turn on when I needed to use the DC.

Fast forward a few years and components to build my ideal system have become more affordable and I've learned a few things about designing and engineering a better mouse trap.

My goals for the new system were:
  • Easy to install
  • Easy to setup and configure
  • Easily expandable
  • Add automatic control of dust gates
  • Have manual control of the DC at each tool
  • Have visual indication of what tool sensor is running the DC and its status
  • Have remote control of the DC
  • Able to have more than one DC system (which I do).
So, the new system is mostly plug and play, no opening the electric panel, no tapping into tool wiring, just plug the sensor in and plug the tool or a bank of tools into it. Same with the Controller side, just plugin the controller and plug the DC into it. Only wires I'm running are from the sensors to the dust gates they control.

The sensors can be setup for single phase 110v & 220v, and theoretically 3 phase tools.

It's wifi connected, so I can configure the threshold values and see reported sensor values from a web page on the controller. I plan to add more configurations to it over time, possibly to control additional remote gates. I'm also working on adding a bin sensor to alert me if it's nearing full.

Here is a demo of the sensor side:

This is the sensor communicating with the controller side:

This is a demo of the sensor with my sander. I've simply plugged in the sensor, the sander into it, and waited about 30 seconds for the sensor to sync up with the controller. Listen closely and you can hear the DC kick on, then you can hear the DC running in the background once the Sander is powered off. I turned off the sander, you'll see the light start to flash as the lines are cleaned out, then when the sander is turned back on, the light goes solid again, then I power off the sander and allow the system to shut down.

I've only got one gate connected, but I have connections for two gates at each sensor, both will open at the same time for tools that can utilize multiple ports (table saw, router, etc). Also multiple tools can be used at the same time, so I could be working at the Table saw and the cnc can also be running, the last tool off will turn off the DC. If manual control (button pushed) is done, it over-rides any tool sensor and stays on until toggled off by the same button.

For the safety side of this. I'm planning to power the relay from my lighting circuit in the shop, that way the DC can't run if the lights are out.

I'm currently assembling more sensors and adding motors to gates.
 
Whoa! Automatic gates! Holy smokes, this is fancy!

Also curious what you're looking at for the bin sensor. I played around with a cheap proximity sensor but I couldn't get it to not read the barrel because the beam width was to wide (it was one a friend had in their robotics pile). That's a project I should get back to someday...
 
Thanks guys!

@Ryan Mooney The E18-D80NK sensor I had only seems to have a range of 3cm to about 20cm with my hand, a bit longer shooting at a piece of paper (expected). So saw dust may have a different range depending on the wood color. I had a couple others of that style I found in the parts bin, will test them to see if they are consistent, but not getting anywhere near the 80cm measurements the amazon link claims. It's a npn type of sensor if I recall, so pulls to ground when sensing, 5v when not. it has its own LED that lights when it's sensing something in range, off when not, so could use it alone in you have clear bags and 5v to power it, otherwise use the senser pin to light up a larger light.

The beam width seems to be pretty focused when shooting at my hand. At about 20 cm I can make a circle with my fingers and it seems to pickup only when my fingers move about 1cm in any direction when the sensor is pointed to center of the circle.
 
Nice, that's much narrower than the rig I was playing with it had a 15"+ radius at the max detection distance (which wasn't super far, it's been a few years but close I think to the range you're seeing) which pretty much meant it would always go off. That looks like a super simple sensor to wire in to, I like the binary on/off mode.
 
Got the first of the sensors installed at the Sanding station.

I'll be working on connecting the lathe and my dad's old table saw, which is setup dedicated for doing box joints.
 
Ryan Mooney said:
(y) (y) (y) That does look really good and the price is extremely reasonable. When I looked 6 or so years ago I wasn't finding anything sub $100 that I liked (but may well have been looking at the wrong things).
Click to expand...
I still need to actually test it in the bin, but expecting to work just fine. I'll probably have it setup with an led and maybe a buzzer that goes off after shutdown.
 
You've obviously put a lot of thought and time putting this together.

I bet you could turn this into a commercial product.
 
I spent a little time on Dad's old table saw and put a link belt on it tonight and a dust hood under it to replace the saw dust box he's had under it for years. I'll be closing up the back later this week.
2020-08-23 21.05.45.jpg
A while back I made a new zero clearance for it on the cnc.
2020-08-23 21.05.51.jpg 2020-08-23 21.06.11.jpg

I've got some small set screws to install in it yet for leveling it to the table.

Brent Dowell said:
You've obviously put a lot of thought and time putting this together.

I bet you could turn this into a commercial product.
Click to expand...
It's been a few years since I built that first controller, so I've been making notes of my likes/dislikes of it. I've thought about trying to make it a product, but there are other similar products that have come out over the years and most haven't sustained. I think iVac Pro is one that is probably close to what I'm doing. I still have some improvements to make, but I think mine may be more scale-able than what they offer.
 
Today I removed the old DC controller and replaced it with 2.0.

The contactor/enclosure on this one was the old septic grinder controller my house had before the city sewers went in.
2020-09-07 16.01.32.jpg

My early circuit board prototyping work on an arduino mega with a stacked ethernet board, and a emon daughter board.
2020-09-07 16.04.14.jpg

The new enclosure is all-in-one.
2020-09-07 16.14.54.jpg

The first sensor on this DC is my table saw. I mounted the sensor enclosure in the front to make it easy to toggle on manually, but also where I can unplug the TS if I'm changing blades.
2020-09-07 16.14.23.jpg
 
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