Goat

I use minwax true black stain. It works great and can be found easily at most stores.

Update to the above: The 320 Grit Finishing Abrasive Buffs worked well and I liked that I could use them (gently) on the face of the finished piece without making marks (Aspen). However they pretty much disintegrate while touching the wood. They come 2 in a pack and they were both toast before I could clean up 1 project. So I couldn't really recommend they be used for this type of work. I suppose if you had to finish something and they were the only thing you could find they would work. The 220 Grit Detail Abrasive Brush works well, but you need to be careful as it is a bit aggressive. After it wore down a little it wasn't as destructive and became easier to use without fear of messing anything up. I was able to clean up 5 boards and it still has 1/2-3/4 left (hard to say without a new one to compare). As long as its used with care this is a good little brush. Now I need to order one of the mops recommended in this thread. I'm guessing you could clean up the entire boards in a few seconds with those. The dremel tools I tried you must work each cut 1 at a time.

After seeing what you use I took a look at what might fit a Dremel. I tried the 320 Grit Finishing Abrasive Buffs. They actually work pretty well, but seem to wear down extremely fast. I also tried the 220 Grit Detail Abrasive Brush. I really like this and it works really well. It seems to be wearing a little better, but need to use it more to determine how long it lasts. They are kinda expensive if they won't last very long. The only downside is it's pretty aggressive. Even at low speed it does sand a little more than the fuzzies. I don't think its much more than what I was doing to the piece trying to hand sand the fuzzies. I'll finish using it on this piece and report back. I don't know yet if you will be able to really see the extra wood removed when finished. I hope it looks OK because I do really like this brush.

The PVC is 3/4", its the 2 1/2" tube running to the PVC at the saw. It has that HomeDepot step down adapter which takes it to 1". Then I have a 1" to 3/4" PVC coupling. I think its boarderline caving all the time, but when it get a clog it caves. I have replaced it with a Menards bucket (20 mil thicker than the homer). I taped the "seal" like crazy. Initial tests seemed positive. I put it in a thick garbage bag for now. This way even if it fails nothing will escape into the air. I also can't see it so I can concentrate on cutting. I made a commitment to supply the prizes for a local club. I have a couple pieces I need to finish and deliver Wednesday. I'll make this all work for now and then rethink/rework everything once the pieces are done. I might try the thicker PVC as that won't take much time to install.

I can also confirm the Duststopper does allow dust to escape from the leaking seal. I picked up a new bucket to try. I removed all the aluminum tape I had around where the Duststopper "seals" with the bucket. About 1/4 the circumference around the bucket was packed with dust. Makes me wonder how much dust got thrown back into my room. At this point I'm thinking I'll just use the vac and eliminate the Duststopper.

I can now confirm the bucket inside CAN still collapse. Was working on a piece yesterday for about 4 hours. When I was done for the night I looked over and seen what I thought was a big hole in the side of the bucket. It was the inside bucket was totally collapsed. I'm going to need to totally rethink/rework my setup. Trying to concentrate on cutting is difficult with pieces constantly getting stuck in the bends of the 3/4" pipe and this Duststopper with a leaking seal/collapsing bucket. It worked good when initially setup and doing a few test cuts. However when doing actual work for hours at a time I have found several things I need to change.

Thanks. That is a bit different that I was picturing. Do you need to be careful that it doesn't catch an edge?

I think these will do the job for my intended use. I just want a HEPA system for cutting in the house. I'm OK with only using it on the scroll saw. I don't know if I want to sand in the house. I guess that depends on how well these capture the dust. I mentioned the Festool model I did because the price was decent for a HEPA system. I think the drawback is it has a 2 lb bag, but that should be plenty for scrolling with a cyclone. My main focus is to keep as much dust out of the house as I can. I can't find it now, but I thought I read somewhere the Masterforce I bought was in the 60 db range. I don't know what it is, but its nowhere near that. With ear plugs and earmuffs on I can still easily hear it. It still feels like I have the TV turned up really loud. But I can deal with it for now. The WEN air filtration system I can't even tell its running with the ear protection on. I can always use this outside when the weather and have it outside the garage.

I'm not into production, but I figure I might as well make a few extra for gifts/prizes while I'm at it. In this case I already have 3 people in mind. I'm far to slow at this to want to cut the same thing 3 times. I'd rather cut something new I cut a piece right before this and had all sorts of issues with the bottom boards cut being way too small. I was constantly having to "fix" cuts. I found I needed #5 blades and almost max tension. Anything smaller and it wouldn't cut the same on the bottom board. I meant for the stack to be only 3/4". But I guess my old planer's gauge is off. I wanted 1/4" but got something a little more. Between the 3 boards it adds up to about 7/8" total.

What kind of sanding mop do you use? I have the one from Rockler and it will literally throw pieces across the room when I'm doing intarsia. So I can't imagine using that thing on delicate work.

I liked this so much I'm starting to cut it myself. All I can say is this is allot harder than it looks. You have some serious skill to pull this off. I can see why you chose the spiral blades now. I'm cutting a stack of Aspen that is a little under 1". I'm struggling with it right now. I was able to use some #5 Ultra Reverse on the stars and they turned out OK. However I was butchering the lines in the wings. They are a challenge because most the spots you cut aren't much wider than the blade itself (and the size of the piece is kinda hard to spin/control). So one side of the cut I can do fine, but then when I turn around and am just shaving off the rest its hard to make the turns without having the blade totally in wood. I've tried spirals in the past and quickly went back to regular blades. But this time I think I'm going to have to use them if I want to finish. I'm trying out the FD New Spirals. Smallest I can use with my stack is #3. So I'll have to sacrifice some of the finer details. They cut OK, but I really don't like the mess they leave on the bottom of the cut. I hope all the boards in the stack won't have that mess. I only have Olsen spirals for comparison, but I don't like the "shaving" ability of the FD spirals. What I mean is if you need a cut about 1.5 times the width of the blade it cuts nice on the first cut, but to widen that cut with these blades is a challenge. It wants to grab and skip, making a smooth line frustrating.

Festool 575280 CT SYS HEPA Dust Extractor. Is this the model you have? Do you know if it will do the low speed/come on with saw feature? Now that I know about these features I'd really like to have them. lol. This Masterforce always at full speed isn't ideal. It runs HOT. Its not so hot to burn you, but its enough you wouldn't want to touch it very long. I'll dig out my temp gauge and see what its running at. Its also mostly made out of flimsy plastic. The last thing that bothers me so far is it seems to bog down or something randomly, even when I'm not cutting or have any clogs. So I'm not sure how this experiment will turn out. All I can say is its doing a decent job at this moment.

Thanks, that is what I was wanting to hear. In my mind I seen no way for dust to escape, but I've assumed things before and turned out I was wrong. I actually have the vac running all the time at the moment. I was only turning it off to clear the clogs and troubleshoot the leak. I actually had no idea you guys turned the vac on/off after each cut. Or that there were vacs designed to be turned on/off constantly. I can see where it would be hard on my vac as it dims the lights when I turn it on. I'm wearing ear plugs to help with the noise. Its loud, but with the plugs in it just feels like noise. I'll go pick some ear muffs up tomorrow. I think I'm going to try and make everything out of 1" and see how it works. 3/4" is actually working great. I have the tube about 2" from the blade and its sucking the scrap piece up instantly.

Yeah, that's about all I read as well. I didn't see anyone saying it was allowing dust to escape into the work room. Home Depot has a HDX bucket, but I didn't see how thick it was. Menards bucket is 90 mil, which is more than the Home Depot standard bucket which is 70 mil. So I'm trying to decide which bucket to try next. Menards isn't very close to me, so I might try the HDX bucket next. The Oneida buckets in their kit (I noticed they use 2 buckets) say 100 mil, so the menards one might work. I figure I could also use some of that plastic reynolds wrap around the seal as an extra precaution.

My biggest question/concern is do you think dust will escape when the seal is broken? I realize it effects the efficiency of separation and suction power. But if that is the only issue and there isn't a safety concern then I'll be less paranoid about these things getting a leak. I'll see if HD or Menards has a thicker bucket. The bucket inside a bucket I think only helps it from totally collapsing. I didn't really see any of the youtube videos showing the 2nd bucket fix and also testing for leaks. I mean honestly its hard to even tell if just going off performance alone. It seems to work fine. I only noticed it as the vac slightly changes its tone. At first I thought this meant my 3/4"PVC had a piece stuck inside. And this seemed to be the case the first few hours. But one time I just cleared the PVC and didn't start sawing right away. I noticed the vac change its tone again. Thats when I noticed the bucked was slightly caved in. I went to move the bucket and where I grabbed the lid I could "hear" the air pass my fingers. The collapse is pretty minor, I'm kinda skeptical that it would even change the shape of the rim. Maybe this duststopper just doesn't seal as good as the others. I think the aluminum tape actually did a good job at fixing the leak. But this obviously isn't a permanent fix as I don't want to tape it every time I empty it.