Harbor Freight Dust Collector 5" Hose

[Ken Massingale]

The 5" hose from the impeller to the bag ring on my DC is squished at the bend. I saw Larry's solution using stovepipe, which looks like a winner if I can find 5" locally.
I'm interested in solutions others may have come up with, it seems this hose closing up is somewhat common with this DC.
Thanks much,
k

[eezlock]

dc hose

Ken, you might want to try a supplier that sells gas appliances ex: water heaters, gas clothes dryers, or maybe gas heat/ac units. they should have some thin walled pipe in that size to help you out. eezlock

[LarryG]

I saw Larry's solution using stovepipe, which looks like a winner if I can find 5" locally.

I may have mentioned in the other thread that I bought the pieces (two adjustable ells, one 2' stick of pipe) at HD. Unless I overlooked it, the Lowe's here doesn't have 5" -- their sizes jump from 4" to 6". YMMV.

[Ken Massingale]

Thanks guys.

[Ken Massingale]

Done! HD sure leaves Lowes in the dust as far as stovepipe selection.

Wow, I guess you don't know how bad something is until it's fixed. The HF DC didn't suck this good when it was a baby, I bet I have 30% better performance.

[JR]

The HF DC didn't suck this good when it was a baby, I bet I have 30% better performance.

Hmmm, I have a bit of kink in mine, too. I'll have to give this a try.

JR

[LarryG]

I know the feeling, Ken. I spent nearly two years uneasily eyeing that flattened section of 5" hose on mine, thinking, "I really need to fix that." I wish I'd done it separately from putting in my hard pipe system, so I'd know which change accounted for how much of the overall performance gain.

[Dale In Corona]

I've been thinking about changing mine out even though it is not damaged. I have just never liked the look of it... maybe I will try it now that I have seen these glowing revews.

Dale

[dkhoward]

pictures.. . can we see pictures!!!!!!!!!!!

[LarryG]

pictures.. . can we see pictures!!!!!!!!!!!

Sure, but they'll cost ya $20 apiece.

I thought I had some that were closer-in than these, but can't find them. If these don't tell the tale I'll be glad to take some better ones.

(The photo numbers are from when I posted these in a larger series, in another thread.)

[Ken Massingale]

pictures.. . can we see pictures!!!!!!!!!!!

If Larry's don't answer your question I'll get some shots this afternoon.
I used one 24" piece of 5" pipe and 1 flex elbow. I cut the vertical run ~13" long and the horizontal piece about 9" long. Stick it together and add some duct tape at the connections. (I taped the DC ends good since the pipe isn't a real tight fit) I added strips of tape along the seams in the pipe just for insurance. Yell if you want more pics, Dennis.

[jarhead]

Larry,
I just read through your entire thread with all 12 pictures. Did you fix the leak at the base where the stove pipe connects to the impeller assembly?

[radhak]

Larry, for somebody who has never done any such ductwork, could you explain the three types of ducts you have used - the green, the while and the steel (stovepipes) : did you buy all from HD? Are they from the plumbing section? They seem to fit pretty nicely with each other - is it easy find similar sizes (eg, I'd want to fix up my DC with 4" ducts)?

Also, how do they stay together : just tight fit, or did you use screws/glue? How about affixing the blast gates to the pipes- did you need to use screws/glue?

I have surfed for DC hookups and realized that while a ton of money would have made it easier, i have to work under the radar of LOML's eagle eye on my cc bills , have to do a bit of scrounging...

[LarryG]

Jarhead: Not yet. I tend to be shamefully slow to correct problems like these (see previous reply). And lately, in the evenings, it's been stiflingly hot in the shop (94F when I went to fetch my bicycle at 4:30 yesterday); and on weekends I've been otherwise occupied. Finally, the leak's really not all that bad. But I'll get to it, RSN. Maybe.

radhak: First of all, have you seen this thread?

The green pipe is ASTM 3034, Schedule 35 sewer and drain (S&D) pipe, which is thinner than the white Schedule 40 PVC used for plumbing. The white fittings are the sytrene ones specific for use with the S&D pipe ... they have slightly different ID dimensions and are cheaper than their PVC Sch40 equivalents. (Why they don't cast these from green plastic, to match the pipe, I don't know.)

Several members here, Tom Miller being one, learned through trial and error that the green S&D pipe and matching fittings match up best to standard black plastic DC fittings. For example, the blast gates slide right into the end of the green pipe. (Where you see a blast gate connected to a white fitting, there's actually a short piece of green pipe hidden inside the bell of the fitting.) A 4"-to-2.5" reducer also slides right in. The threaded quick-disconnect fittings that screw into the end of a 4" hose are a tight but managable press fit into the bell end of the fittings. And so on.

I bought the pipe at Lowe's -- my HD doesn't carry it -- and the fittings from both Lowe's and HD (strange that HD has the fittings but not the pipe, but there you go). In both stores, these items are in the plumbing section, but separate from the Sch40 stuff, in their own bins.

When I was designing my system, I priced the pipe at ~$15 for a 10' stick. When I actually went to buy it, it was down to $10-and-change. Now it's back to the $15 price. Fittings cost anywhere from a buck-twenty for a straight coupler to about $4.50 for a wye. You'll know you're looking at the right items by their prices. PVC fittings, which will NOT fit the green pipe, will cost MUCH more.

Everything is just friction-fit together, except that the tapered ends of the blast gates and similar fittings don't want to stay in place. So on those, I used three 3/8" pan head sheet metal screws to hold the DC fitting and the hidden short piece of pipe in the fitting. These screws were not in place at the time I took the pics in that other thread.

Metal stove pipe was used only on the DC itself, to connect the impeller outlet to the inlet ring on the bag/filter assembly.

I think that about covers your Qs ... let me know if you have any more, or if I missed anything.

[JR]

Radhak, Larry's given you some pretty concise advice that would otherwise be the distillation of lots of experimentation.

My setup is similar to Larry's, altough I have some black PVC pipe in there, too (someday I'll take some pics). Larry's is just as good and cheeper, so go with that S&D stuff. Also, stick to a main 4" distribution system. Trying to do 6", 5", 4", and 2.5" will drive you nuts.

I know Larry has some 2.5" stuff which, IIRC, he had before setting up this shop. Your best bet is to figure out how to get 4" to each tool, then drop down with either 4" flex or 2.5" flex, as appropriate. You can put the blast gate at the drop, making a convenient place for the tricky hard pipe to flex conversion.

I remember someone posting (Loring?) that it's best to have the blast gates as close to the main run as possible. The theory being that you lose some sucking power with more "active" pipe in the system.

JR