Quality air quality meter?

[semenza]

Looking for an air quality meter to measure particulates for dust in the shop.
Good ones?  Bad ones?

Seth

 

[live4ever]

Can’t go wrong with the Dylos DC1100…kind of the gold standard, at least it was when I got mine a while ago.  Well, been a while…maybe 7 years or so.  Maybe there are newer/cheaper doodads available now.

 

[hdv]

I use a Trotec BQ30 for about half a year now and am quite satisfied with it. Just out of curiosity I took it with me to a lab of the university where I used to work to find out if it was "trustworthy". The results were impressive. It wasn't perfectly dead on, but the numbers displayed were more than acceptable.

It measures PM2.5, PM10, and CO2. It does not measure VOC however. To me that isn't a problem, because I have another device for that.

 

[wwb119]

Dylos DC1100-Pro .  I have not calibrated it against anything else, but I use it, like it,  it tells me how my Jet air cleaner is doing, & when I should use a respirator.  I'd buy it again, even though it is not cheap....

 

[semenza]

Dylos DC1100-Pro .  I have not calibrated it against anything else, but I use it, like it,  it tells me how my Jet air cleaner is doing, & when I should use a respirator.  I'd buy it again, even though it is not cheap....

Yes, this is basically how I want to use it.

Do any of them measure the truly small particles in the HEPA range? Or am I not reading the size numbers right? Seems the really small stuff is what is most important.

Seth

 

[live4ever]

Dylos DC1100-Pro .  I have not calibrated it against anything else, but I use it, like it,  it tells me how my Jet air cleaner is doing, & when I should use a respirator.  I'd buy it again, even though it is not cheap....

Yes, this is basically how I want to use it.

Do any of them measure the truly small particles in the HEPA range? Or am I not reading the size numbers right? Seems the really small stuff is what is most important.

Seth

You’re reading the numbers right, in the sense that the Dylos measures down to 0.5 microns and HEPA filters are defined as removing 99%+ of particles down to 0.3 microns.  So there’s a theoretical gap there…but I don’t personally think it’s worth worrying about if your goal is just to track general dust collection efficiency in a wood shop.  Generally shop operations aren’t likely to produce particles that are any smaller than single microns…but there are some rarer situations that would warrant better detection at the sub micron range:
https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/particle-sizes-d_934.html

 

[semenza]

Ordered and received the Dylos.  It was then that I realized that it is not battery operated. Not a huge deal but certainly a nuisance to move it around to check different areas that may or may not be near an outlet.

Any good ones that run on batteries?

Seth

 

[MikeGE]

Ordered and received the Dylos.  It was then that I realized that it is not battery operated. Not a huge deal but certainly a nuisance to move it around to check different areas that may or may not be near an outlet.

Any good ones that run on batteries?

Seth

My Dylos DC1700 has internal rechargeable batteries that will last a couple of days in Monitor mode, or about five hours in continuous mode.

 

[Cheese]

My Dylos DC1700 has internal rechargeable batteries that will last a couple of days in Monitor mode, or about five hours in continuous mode.

Just curious Mike, when you use it just to monitor the room performance, do you use it in the particle concentration or mass concentration mode?

 

[semenza]

Ordered and received the Dylos.  It was then that I realized that it is not battery operated. Not a huge deal but certainly a nuisance to move it around to check different areas that may or may not be near an outlet.

Any good ones that run on batteries?

Seth

My Dylos DC1700 has internal rechargeable batteries that will last a couple of days in Monitor mode, or about five hours in continuous mode.

Yeah, I see now that the 1700 is a battery unit. I hadn't even noticed that the 1100 is not.  But the 1700 is $200 more than the 1100.  $475 compared to $260. That price difference seems ridiculous! I will probably just deal with extension cords and plugging it in. Unless there is a realistically priced comparable battery unit.

Seth

 

[MikeGE]

Just curious Mike, when you use it just to monitor the room performance, do you use it in the particle concentration or mass concentration mode?

I have the DC1700 economy version, not the DC1700-PM.  The only display option for my Dylos is particle concentration.  When I bought it, I couldn't find any vendors who would ship the DC1700-PM model through the USPS, but plenty who would ship the less expensive version.

 

[live4ever]

Ordered and received the Dylos.  It was then that I realized that it is not battery operated. Not a huge deal but certainly a nuisance to move it around to check different areas that may or may not be near an outlet.

Any good ones that run on batteries?

Seth

My Dylos DC1700 has internal rechargeable batteries that will last a couple of days in Monitor mode, or about five hours in continuous mode.

Yeah, I see now that the 1700 is a battery unit. I hadn't even noticed that the 1100 is not.  But the 1700 is $200 more than the 1100.  $475 compared to $260. That price difference seems ridiculous! I will probably just deal with extension cords and plugging it in. Unless there is a realistically priced comparable battery unit.

Seth

Could you use one of those gizmos that converts your power tool batteries to AC?  Like Milwaukee Top-off (if you have Milwaukee batteries of course…TopOff is like $99).

 

[Cheese]

Could you use one of those gizmos that converts your power tool batteries to AC?  Like Milwaukee Top-off (if you have Milwaukee batteries of course…TopOff is like $99).

That's really a great idea...the Milwaukee Top-Off supports up to 175 watts of power usage. I can't imagine that the Dylos products that are powered by that dinky in-line transformer draw more than 150 watts, probably less. It is curious though that Dylos does not publish the equipment current draw.  Very [sad] 

I used one last summer to run a DX 93 for sanding a teak chair.

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[attachimg=2]

 

[squall_line]

Not sure what the price on this will be, or how accurate, or how badly one would want/need a smart-capable unit, but Ikea is launching a new monitor in April:
https://about.ikea.com/en/newsroom/...-a-smart-sensor-to-measure-indoor-air-quality

Theoretically, with the Matter-enabled features, you could set up automations to open a garage door, turn on a purifier (or a second purifier) or other such things.

Obviously meant more for indoor, in-home AQ monitoring than a shop use, so maybe even peace of mind to have it in the room closest to your shop to make sure that nothing is making its way from the shop into the rest of the house.

 

[semenza]

Could you use one of those gizmos that converts your power tool batteries to AC?  Like Milwaukee Top-off (if you have Milwaukee batteries of course…TopOff is like $99).

That's really a great idea...the Milwaukee Top-Off supports up to 175 watts of power usage. I can't imagine that the Dylos products that are powered by that dinky in-line transformer draw more than 150 watts, probably less. It is curious though that Dylos does not publish the equipment current draw.  Very [sad] 

I used one last summer to run a DX 93 for sanding a teak chair.

[attachimg=1]

[attachimg=2]

Input on the Dylos transformer is 8.5 watts.

Seth

 

[Cheese]

Input on the Dylos transformer is 8.5 watts.

Seth

That's weird Seth...that seems real low.

However if that is the case, Milwaukee claims that their HD12.0 battery will power an average LED TV for 280 minutes. And if the "average LED TV" draws 17 watts, that would give over 9 hours of constant run time for the Dylos.

If the Dylos was used in the monitor mode instead, it should operate for almost 60X that length of time.

 

[semenza]

Input on the Dylos transformer is 8.5 watts.

Seth

That's weird Seth...that seems real low.

However if that is the case, Milwaukee claims that their HD12.0 battery will power an average LED TV for 280 minutes. And if the "average LED TV" draws 17 watts, that would give over 9 hours of constant run time for the Dylos.

If the Dylos was used in the monitor mode instead, it should operate for almost 60X that length of time.

It's running a small electronics fan and a small laser. Maybe I misread and it is 85 watts. But I am pretty sure it is 8.5.  I can't check again because I decided I didn't really need it and returned it.

Seth