Sawdust Everywhere from Chop Saw

[Old Bill]

Each time I use my Craftsman chop/miter saw it blows sawdust everywhere. Need to take the ShopVac each time. It has a bag which is not leaking and not full and is well clamped to its mount.
Noticed today that the dust is being kicked back from the blade. I presume it is supposed to be going up towards the tube which holds the bag. The tube is not blocked. The bag does get full but not now as its going all over the table. Am I missing something here?

 

[zkling]

Forget the bag, hook the shop vac directly to the dust port where the bag was. For a less portable solution you could build a small surrounding that has a vacuum attachment.

A few examples
https://www.google.com/search?q=mit...Fqa%2Fdust-collection-miter-saws.aspx;400;333

 

[#1SomeGuy]

All mitre saws will blow a bit of dust, a shop vac hooked up will help hugely. Although I actually find my makita usable indoors with just the bag.

 

[Old Bill]

Will try the ShopVac against the port. I imagine just the suction alone will pull the sawdust up from the blade. As it stands it seems like the sawdust is "avoiding" the bag.

 

[srmofo]

A vacuum on my 10" dewalt gets 90% of it. I borrowed a buddies 12" sliding compound and the vacuum did almost nothing so I impervised with a box fan and furnace filter behind the blade. The fan helped catch a lot of the really fine stuff but still made a mess.

 

[Fizbin]

All mitre saws will blow a bit of dust

^This... although it's a bit of an understatement.

I don't think there has ever been a built-in dust collection system on a miter saw which was worth a ****. It's just part of the inherent design of the tool.

There are a few commercial and homemade devices that can help combat this inconvenience (which I could direct you too, if you'd like), but they can be overly complicated and/or take up a lot of space.

Your best bet (and cheapest alternative) is to just use the miter saw outside.

 

[MFolks]

Maybe something like this will work:

 

[jakemac]

I'm wondering -

How old is the bag ?
Is it possible that the fabric of the bag has become clogged with fine dust and no longer vents ? Turning it inside-out and running through the washing machine might help, but as others have posted, there is very little you can do to solve the problem completely. Those saws always throw dust no matter what you do.

 

[Thumper68]

I have very little issue with dust on mine as long as I remember to open the port on the dust system, of course mine is in a fixed location connected to a 2 hp dust collector.

 

[Garage Coffee Roaster]

This thread comes at the perfect time, I am reconfiguring my garage and want to cut down on the mess.

Jim

 

[ChevyEFI]

Not to insult your intelligence, but make sure the opening of the tube is completely open, not clogged, and doesn't have plastic casting flash left inside. Just something that comes to mind.

 

[rlitman]

The bag behind my DW708 (DeWalt 12" sliding saw), is about as effective as someone using a shovel to catch a sandstorm. And that saw has a pretty nicely arranged scoop positioned right in the path that the blade throws the dust. Bag alone, I expect it catches something like 5% of the dust.

If I pull the bag and connect it to my vacuum, it seems to get around 75% of the dust.
The fine particles tend to escape, while the rougher stuff that makes piles behind the saw tend to get vacuumed.

The more teeth you have on your blade, the more dusty and airborne, and less chip like your sawdust will be. Something to think about.

 

[TerryH]

As the others have said, about the only way to really get the bulk of the dust is to build some sort of surround and plumb your shop vac or dust collector to that. I actually ran 6" to the surround that I built and 4" to the saw itself. It does really well but I also have a 5hp cyclone powering it. If all you have is a shop vac then attaching it to the port on the saw is certainly going to improve over just the bag but it's not going to get everything.

 

[Vegaman_Dan]

The bag on these tools is readily pressurized by the air blowing into the bag and without an active equal sized vent out, they prevent any new material from entering the bag with effect.

If you don't have a vacuum to do the job, you can even just hook vacuum cleaner hose to the outlet on the saw and trail it down to a bucket. It's not as good as a suction device, but it's better than the bag by far.

When you're ready to hook up a vacuum, you're already set. Watch garage sales and you'll find small shop vacs inexpensive and great for this purpose.

 

[Old Bill]

I have removed the plastic swivel elbow and cleaned it entirely. The bag is probably as old as the saw (about 12 years) and it seems fine but will take it as suggested and wash it. The bag holding clamp seems to be adequate.The bag does take the dust because I have emptied it a few times.
I don 't use the saw often although if I did I would certainly look into some device as suggested. The one on youtube listed above is good.

 

[1/2 Cup]

I do all my cutting out doors under our carport, my chop saw, router and table saw are all on castors.

 

[scaron]

it is really just the nature of those sorts of tools... my dad's RAS puts a fine layer of sawdust across pretty much the entirety of my parent's basement every time he uses it. but my dad's never been one to mess with dust collection systems too much

 

[softailgarage]

I have a craftsman mitre saw also. The bag aint worth a ****. I've been using it for 2 years and have just a pinch of sawdust in it. Worthless

Sent from my SCH-I800 using Tapatalk 2

 

[KnurledNut]

The best setup ive used to collect dust was a Powrflite "shopvac" and one of these...

Craftsman Auto Switch

 

[lilredex]

Had an early Delta mitre saw and it spit sawdust everywhere, with or without the bag......just a poor overall design. Now have a newer Delta and it is much better. Just point the 90* elbow towards a box and 90% of the sawdust goes in the box...good enough for me.

 

[Jim_No_Garage]

Well let me introduce you to the Festool Kapex . . .

Thats Mr Kapex to You!

I'm not a commercial carpenter or even a serious homeowner but Festool has a rabid following for their ingenious tools. They pretty much designed dust collection into the tool from the ground up - so your can buy their vacuums tool. Devious bastards . . .

Jim

 

[No Sweat Photos]

I feel that Chop-saws were originally designed as a portable job site saw. Mostly as a radial-arm saw replacement. I have spent lots of days in different types of woodshops saw dust and wood chips are a by product of the work. We always spent the last 15-30 min of our shift cleaning up the mess !!!

If I got a bunch of work with my chop-saw I carry it out side !!