I built an air cleaner from a furnace fan about six years ago and it gets moved around my shop were its needed, and im sure you will enjoy the cool air it provides, nice build Jay.
Man I just want to let you know how much I appreciate you giving this stuff. And while I understand it helps your brand I still really appreciate you giving this stuff away free. I'm a college student and I just started a woodworking business about 6 months ago and your stuff has been a big inspiration and has been really helpful to me along the way. So thanks a lot for all you do man.
Hi Jay, nice project! I like the idea of making a air cleaner yourself, saves a whole lot of money, and works just as well, or maybe even a little bit better compared to the commercially available ones. Thanks for sharing, regards from a fellow YT maker from the Netherlands.
Yo you need to patent that man that is so neat thanks for sharing. I want to make me a air purifier out of a box fan and some filters like you did thanks again keep on creating....
@@mooresmade I know. Prices on that stuff have doubled in my area within the last six to nine months. 1/8 inch is available, but it’s going for the price of yesterday’s 18mm!
With the blower being located so close to the floor, does this create issues? I'm guessing you keep your floors clean but thought it was worth asking because keeping floors clean is probably my number one challenge.
Great design and repurposed blower use! How has MERV 13 filter rating worked out in frequency of maintainance? A MERV 8 rating should be sufficient and much less in cost and combined with a filter mask (your face being close to the dust production) accomplish the goal.
What's the gap between the inside sides and the fan / casing ? Is this "restriction" or it does not affect the fans since you have filters that offer wind / air "resistance"
Nice design. I just scavenged one of 3 blowers that I have available and I love this design. My intent is to be able to run some ductwork from it so I can exhaust the air out the garage window. Do you have any thoughts on how to avoid sucking all the cold air in from outside and exhausting all my "warm" air from inside the shop? I live in New England and with winter coming I'd love to be able to run this in the winter. My shop is uninsulated and unheated, so I'm not losing $ but will be losing some of the benefit of having the garage door closed.
I do a few demos do u think this would work well in that application? The only thing i think i would do different is maybe make a round exhaust port to connect some vent pipe to blow out of house to not stir up dust into room.
I bought a homemade filtration system very similar to yours. Paid $5 for the box with blower and motor ready to use just needed to get new filters. The motor to run it is mounted above the blower with a belt driving the blower. I was thinking of making a funnel for one side to run a hose for my dust deputy instead of my shop vac. Also to used for a spray booth. Is this a good idea or not to use it for these other two uses?
Jay, another of your builds that I am adding to my shop. Thanks!Question: the sketchup file shows each leg with 1/4" countersunk holes along one edge that aren't shown in the video.What is the purpose of those holes?
Great simple build and well put together, however i dont get it, ive watched many designs for ideas to build one for myself but keep thinking to myself why am i filtering air on three sides and blowing air all over the place when i can extract it in an outside wall with just one filter on and a fly screen ? am i wrong or am i missing its important value ?
Sometimes you want to clean the air that is actually in the shop. Dust collectors don't capture everything, so you want something that will cycle the air and clean the fine (non-visible) dust out of it so you don't breathe it in. I suppose you could vent this outside, but Jay mentioned that he would be using it as a fan. Also, if you vent outside, you have to have replacement air coming from somewhere, and that replacement air will almost certainly be dirtier than the clean air coming out of this fan. Aside from safety, something like this helps cut down on dust nibs when finishing.
if you offset the casters inwards by like an inch or a half so they don't stick out ever, does that affect stability much? i've been doing that when i don't have locking casters for exact clearance and toe savings.
Unless he's HEPA vac'ing the floor regularly, he's never gonna catch all the fine (invisible to the eye & most dangerous) dust particles. His blower will actually do him the favor of kicking up the dust from the floor, then the MERV 13 filters will catch what's been kicked up if he leaves it running for 30-60min.
I was literally 5 minutes away from tearing apart my old blower for scrap metal because I needed more room in my shop then thought, "Hey, wait a minute, I bet i could make some sort of dust collection with it!" .. checked a few other videos and though "Damn, these people are sure complicating things!" ... Then came across your video which is more along the lines of what I was thinking, just hadn't thought about making it a cart for my planer and tossing its useless legs! THANKS! I LOVE YOU!! (I just said that to balance the fact that my girlfriend is going to really hate you since I'm going to be to busy building this to take her out tomorrow night... LOL!!)
Hi Jay, I just built an air filter system just like yours. I had a squirrel fan set up that I used. It is a little bit noisy but works great. I used 4 filters with a mere patting of 11. I now have bought some new filters that are better. Any way the system works great. I put in a switch from a swamp cooler that I can select the 2 speeds of the blower. I also have a remote control that I can push a button an the remote to turn it off and on. Thanks for doing this video. Works great.
Brilliant detailing, great execution. I would have wired the cart to be a power supply with auxiliary outlets and the switch in one box. You free up wall outlets with less cords on the floor.
Great build! I sure could use an air cleaner. Adding an auxiliary outlet would increase the usefulness even more, that way your planer could stay plugged into the cart, as well as any other tool that you might want to use near it.
Jay, I made one years ago using an old AC blower was happy w/it then saw a video stating these blowers worked better AGAINST restrictions (duct friction) it was hard to believe, I went down to shop & placed a small board partially in front of discharge - - - the fan increased in speed just doing that & now motor does run cooler. AFTER TESTING I installed a board partially covering discharge opening - - still using same , works great
Just ran accross this vid featured on the Popular Mechanics website! kool!! www.popularmechanics.com/home/how-to-plans/how-to/a21087/how-to-build-a-mobile-air-cleaner-cart/
If I can't find a blower, would one of those air movers (like mold removal teams use) work for this? Having a hard time finding a fan for less than retail...
A MERV 13 will trap less than 75% of air particles that are 0.3-1.0 micron in size (the coronavirus is 0.1 microns). HEPA filtration is the way to go, Mervyn 17-20.
Hi Jay. Just got a furnace blower motor that looks similar to yours. It has 4 speeds. I plugged it in on the slowest speed and it feels WAY too strong. I have an anemometer which gave 35 MPH+ readings!!When you say you tested yours with filtered restrictions… What do you mean?
Since you bought 6 filters from Amazon, 4 filters is over kill and you have 2 extra filters. You could eliminate the front filter and make that a solid plywood piece that way you have 3 extra filters for next filter change.
Jay I just made this and I have to say it does a great job and puts out a tremendous amount of air to keep cool. Used it on an outside project and it made a huge difference. Thanks for the video!!!
Hi, The DIY box air filter is fine with me. Could you help me get 1 unit and a few extra filters to fight dusts and other allergens? I am gonna pay for the costs and shipping. Can't shop online at the moment. Thanks for your help
Super helpful. I found this through a comment on Izzy Swan’s video on box fan vs air filtration. This gives me a great idea on how to turn dead space from a shop cart into usable air filtration and shop cart.
Hi Jay, Great build video and re-use idea! I have our old blower and to do the same thing. I want to download your plans, but for whatever reason they won't download, would you be able to share them in PDF format?
What is the best air filter? I bought a huge whole house style ceiling mounted exhaust fan. Replaced the motor with a 3 phase unit with variable frequency drive so I could turn it up or down. Rather then filter the air I am sending it outside. I do see the value in having an actual air filter like this though. If it is vary hot or vary cold I will not want to draw in outside air due to sucking the air from inside out. But much of the yr on nice days I can crank up my huge fan and get the dirty air out of the shop and not need to replace filters as often.
Mobile air filtration - while a cool idea - drawing all the shop air to where you are is counter-intuitive. You're pulling all the dust near to where you're working. Mine is planned for being on the wall nearby the shop dust collector system. Any leaks are drawn away from me and clean(er) air comes my way.
Nice thing you're doing there. Good for your health too. But watch out. Wood that you can use is not scrap. It's just expensive material you don't just throw it away.
I would consider not having a filter on the side where the fan exhausts to draw more unfiltered air through and less filtered air. There would still be plenty of airflow. Easily tested by replacing that filter with a plywood panel.
This is going to be one of my builds... once I get my wood shop together. I must admit though, I was expecting you to flex when it inflated your shirt.
It would be so awesome if you had a playlist which covered electrical. That way, you could teach those of us who want to learn, the basics... ...And, the electrical portions of builds like this.
You might think about adding an air register at the bottom so that you can direct the air flow up, down, or sideways. If you got a double sided one you could split the airflow in two directions.
Its been so fun watching your shop grow one custom piece at a time, Your editing is incredible including the music, I dont know why but when you sync the music to the nail gun it really makes the video come together for me. Keep it up.
Just got one of these ... (larger) with an external, top-mount / belt-driven version ... I tested it, in open-air, and after 5 minutes or so, it stopped. I was sure i burnt the motor, BUT, after reading the data, it says "thermally protected" soooooooo my thought was that wen it reaches a certain temperature, it switches off (logic) 10 minutes later, i heard a small "click" in the motor .... so i decided to re-plug it and start it again ... as expected, it ran ok, but i stopped it manually. Question : If i build an enclosure (box) for mine with reduced intake area, will that PREVENT it from stopping randomly, as i would believe, the motor would be working less hard with more restriction applied to the wheel inside ? Sorry for the long "question".
My suggestion is to use an amp meter to measure the current draw on the blower. Air restriction will change the current draw. Make sure you restrict it enough to be within specs on the motor. My motor had a tag with the recommended amp draw range.
