Dust has a potentially huge detrimental effect in wood-processing facilities so dust extraction is a vitally important issue – but one where innovation is often overlooked.

The extraction of dust has an enormous influence on product quality, tool life, power consumption, health and safety but it will only be effective if the dust hood and the tools are set correctly.

Over the past few years Leitz Tooling has developed the dust extraction concept and produced its own patent-pending dust hood for new machinery.

The company’s Dust Flow Control Technology (DFC) demonstrates a co-ordinated effort in tooling and dust hood design.

Through specialised gullets and tooth geometry, a DFC-tool focuses the dust stream to the extraction equipment. DFC dust hoods are designed to fit the aerodynamic characteristics of the chips. Consequently, Leitz dust hoods manage heavier chips, which have a high kinetic energy, as easily as lighter dusts, which are primarily conveyed via the airflow. The DFC dust-hood captures more than 95% of chips. With the use of spoilers and vents they eliminate the recirculation of chips and thereby eliminate recutting of chips which, as a consequence, increases tool life.

DFC-equipped machines also require lower air speed, and therefore less energy.

In 2008, a prototype hood was designed and delivered to Austrian laminate flooring producer Kaindl. The benefits achieved convinced Kaindl to equip all its production lines with Leitz’s dust extraction system.

News travelled fast, and orders were received from several of the European factories for Kronospan and Egger. The Swedwood Group, part of IKEA Industry Group, was the first company from the furniture industry to investigate this technology and, as a result, Leitz developed new module system hoods for Swedwood’s applications.

The system provides numerous benefits, from reduced downtime, reduced cleaning and maintenance times to improved tool life and improved workpiece surface finishes.

With controlled chip and dust evacuation the risk of fire is reduced, along with reductions in the risk of operator injury as the dust hoods envelope the moving tooling. Power consumption is also lower; Kaindl’s energy use has fallen by 10%.

Leitz’s Tooling app is available for iPhone, iPad or Android.