I tried to use the dust collection system today with the radial arm saw. I turned it on. I opened the slide by the tool I was using. I made a decent mess with a couple cuts.
I disconnected the hose from the tool (It was press-fit) and suction was miserable. it was barely functional as a vacuum.
Is our main unit massively undersized? Is the ducting that leaky? The suction didn’t ever compare to a regular vac let along a shop vac with a decent motor.
When I used it last night every gate was open before I got started. General rule of thumb, go around and close every gate before you start working because at least half of them are open.
However, even with everything closed and working it still sucks. This is not a problem with our cyclone, which is pretty close to top of the line, rather, the small connector on top of the saw is a crappy design that’s never going to work well. Since I originally hooked it up, and discovered how crappy it really it I’ve been looking into other approaches.
I added $50 to the dust collection proposal to build a custom enclosure. Essentially you surround the back of the saw, and attach it to the 6" connector in addition to the 2 1/2-3" connector from the factory.