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My old (revised #2) New dust boot! shoe was working great except when the material was small and the dust shoe hung off the sides so the vacuum tube was off the material. I would then lose suction near the bit…sooooo
New and improved version #3:
Wow. Such a simple solution for that. I’ve seen the same issues. But, won’t you possibly end up with less suction under the section below the vacuum because it has to travel so far? Maybe some holes would help?
Though probably defeat the purpose. Lol is nice tho I’ll be adding it to mine shortly.
It’s working out great. The suction is directed where it needs to be, at the bit area only. It’s like following it around with the vacuum hose. I did make a completely new boot tho, and have a full 1/2" channel for the suction air flow. I’m liking it!
Haven’t made a project file but here are the Easel files for the pieces. I wanted to keep the total thickness down to a minimum for max DOC, so I used 1/2" MDF. I guess you could run the skirting material across the middle, I had thought about that also, but that would mean having to make a ledge for the material to attach too and increase the total thickness. The tube is 1" id sch 40 PCV with washers glued to keep it flat against the bracket. It slips in to a pvc coupler cut in half which is a tight fit but allows you to adjust angle. Everything was glued together with superglue.
This is by far the best one yet, and works killer! Not to say there may be continuing evolutions…
Thanks. I hope to get my xcarve in the mail next week and this will be my first cut! For connecting the PVC to your gantry, do your bolts go all the way through your pipe? or do you squeeze your fingers down the tube to get a bolt in there?
My latest dust shoe is similar to @JeffParish 's. It’s working really well. So nice to be able to walk away from a job for an hour without concern that the kerf will fill up with chips.
Things I like about this shoe
can change the bit without removing the shoe
shoe height above stock is easily adjustable, without tools
That’s what I thought. I am contemplating using a similar method. I do not like the idea of the excess weight from the shoe and the hose being attached to the spindle itself. I feel as if This makes for more work on the z-axis to keep things stable.
Here is an export of the dust shoe to SLT. Looks like there were some problems with the export. I’ll try to find time to fix the file. But at least this file will give you a starting point for your CAD.
Thanks again Matt. In regards to the problems with you STL export, you might want to check this out (if you don’t know about it already). Helps catch issues with models when trying to get them to solids for a clean export.
With my shoe, I am having problems with not being able to suck MDF chips out of deeper cuts, but it otherwise works pretty OK. My shoe is similar to yours with the side mounted vacuum tube. How much did this mod improve the suction near the bit? I wanted to check if you are also using an air diverter or just the shoe?
