Tool Tuesday: Floor Sweep
This week’s tool is something I’ve been waiting for ever since I got into wood working, even though it can barely be considered an actual tool. That thing being a floor sweep for your dust collector!
Weirdly enough this is one of the things I’ve been most excited about getting since I started this hobby about a year ago. “Why?” You may ask. “Who knows” I would say. It’s such a simple thing but set up properly, can be a huge asset.
Imagine not having to bend over and sweep your dust into a shovel again (or however you pick up your dust). That’s the dream, right? A floor sweep is your easy solution to that. After treating myself to this $8 toy and new dust separator lid, I quickly hooked up my floor sweep yesterday to try it out. While it didn’t pick up 100% of everything I swept into it, it did do pretty good. I imagine once I actually have it secured to the ground and the proper hose connected it’ll perform a lot better.
Installing a floor sweep is probably one of the easiest pieces of a dust collection system there is, too. It should be kept close to the dust collector itself, being after the separator but before any tools. This way any big objects that are swept into the floor sweep have less distance to travel to the separator and are much less likely to get stuck in the system. By leaving the separator between the collector and the sweep though, you’ll be able to avoid any objects like larger pieces of wood or nails from getting to the impeller and damaging your collector.
Have you ever thought about installing a floor sweep in your shop? I think it’s an invaluable time saver and coupled with a dust separator, a very effective means of dust collection in any shop. I’ve seen many different sweeps for less than $15 so you really can’t go wrong when deciding to pick one up, it just might be your new favourite thing!