This Really Sucks

As you may have noticed, our little college campus in the jungle always has several different projects going on at any given time. Lately, we've been working on a new and improved dust collection system for the wood shop. When the shop was built and ready for its first project there was no kind of dust collection at all. Dust collection is important in a wood shop because without it it becomes hard to breath very rapidly. Imagine trying to sand down a large board with a heavy duty sanding machine. The roll of sand paper is flying round and round, flinging fine particles of wood dust all over the place. Now imagine several of the wood shop machines all going at once, each spitting out more and more dust. Fun to breath? I don't think so! The simple solution for most of this problem is dust collection.

One of the machines that was first to arrive in the shop was a large dust collector. It is kind of like a giant vacuum with a big bag that all the dust gets sucked into. Some large PVC pipe was awkwardly wired onto a couple of the main machines that led to the suction valve on the dust collector so it could work its magic. But the were a couple of problems with this system. First of all the pipe was all laying at ground level, creating a bit of a tripping hazard in the work space. Also, the first time the dust collector was used the bag filled up in no time. This wasn't going to work too well with the non stop projects that are going on in the shop so Michael decided to create a chute out the unfinished window space so the dust could just be spit out the window and collect on the ground below.

Michael had also really been wanting to cut some holes in the floor and send the pipe under the shop instead of through it for a safer, cleaner environment. Unfortunately there just wasn't time or resources to make that happen for quite a while. But as my mom always says, good things come to those who wait. And now I am very pleased to announce that we have finally made it happen.

It was a bit of a process, requiring some of the more unique pipe fittings to be purchased and delivered from the USA. Not to mention getting the time away from other projects to actually get it done. But this week was our time to shine. With 4 helpers working together we got the whole project completed in one day. That's pretty amazing as far as I'm concerned. Nothing seems to get done in one day around here!

Life in the shop will now be much safer and more pleasurable for our hard working men. So no more excuses boys, back to work!