Using a CNC router is a dusty business if your material of choice is wood. Sure, you can keep things tidy by chasing the cutter around the table with a shop vac, but that sort of takes the fun out of having a machine that can make cuts without you. The big boy machines all have integrated dust collection, and now you can too with this 3D-printed CNC router dust shoe.
Designed specifically for the X-Carve with a DeWalt 611 router, [Mark Edstrom]’s brush is a simple design that’s almost entirely 3D printed. The shroud encloses the router body and clamps to the mounting bracket, totally surrounding the business end of the machine. The cup is trimmed with a flexible fringe to trap the dust and guide it to the port that fits a small (1-1/4″ diameter) shop vac hose. The hose is neatly routed along the wiring harness, and the suction is provided by a standard shop vac.
Files for the cup are up on Thingiverse; we suspect it’d be easy to modify the design to work with other routers and dust collectors. You might even find a way to shroud a laser cutter and capture the exhaust with a DIY filter.
When I was confronted to the same issue, I put a big emphasis on having a transparent skirt so that I can see what’s happening, it felt really important to me.
Or stick a cheap usb camera underneath. As a bonus you can get some magnification too.
I made the top of mine with plexiglass. It’s starting to haze over though from the chips bouncing off it.
https://goo.gl/photos/fADViRTgALv3UrQA8
I feel like you really need these to either be:
A.) Transparent, so you can actually see where the cutter is.
B.) Extremely easy to remove/attach. As in, no tools required, snap on/snap off type deal.
I made mine out of some scrap acrylic and strip brush. As it is, it’s still difficult to touch off properly if it isn’t the middle of the day and I have the garage door open or I’ve got a flashlight.
Install some white LEDs inside the thing.
I designed and built one, too. The transparent skirt is just book cover tape folded on itself. The system has three parts: One attaches to the spindle and holds the vacuum hose, one clips to the bottom side of that using magnets and a rim that both aligns the bottom and top, also holds the skirt in place.
One problem I have is the router we use blows so much air down at the work, the vacuum cant keep up and dust blows out the bottom of the skirt.
Neat! I made one too: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:382778
Me too. This one is made with acrylic plate and heavy duty window film for the skirt.
http://www.dansworkshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/20160403_092900.jpg
I recently learned that my vacuum hose was pulling enough on my router (a Chinese CNC 6040) to make the cutter deflect down by about .003 to .005 in. That doesn’t sound like much, but It’ll ruin the flat face of a nice sign… so I took my vacuum off of the spindle and started developing a down-draft table instead.
https://www.norwegiancreations.com/2014/08/an-open-source-cnc-dust-shoe/
I’ve been using this one on my OX CNC with Makita router and I have been very pleased. I use clear heavy plastic for the skirt to make zeroing in a bit easier. This one has the added benefit of nullifying the downward air exhaust and directs the air away from the project. This works because the vacuum should be clearing the channels anyway.