I know the official holiday is still 7 months out, but I’m starting Festivus a little early this year…with the Airing of Grievances. Dust Collection:
If the red light is on, the dust collector needs to be emptied - false alarms have been eliminated. If you’ve used the woodshop it more than three times, you should’ve emptied it at least once. Same goes for the chip collectors at the planer and jointer if you have used those a few times.
I bring this up because I came in, saw the red light on, and asked someone wrapping up a big project for help swapping the bags. He said he’d never done it before, which is wild, considering he’s taken the advanced sanding class and used the planer, jointer, belt sander, and table saw for the project he was finishing.
That’s it from me and I feel better already. There is no way I could have kept that in until 12/23 . I’m sure others have their own Festivus grievances—feel free to share below.
I emphasize this during orientation, but it’s worth repeating: what @sneezix did is a great habit to build. When you’re emptying a dust collector, even if you don’t need help, ask someone to join you. Involving another person reinforces that it’s a shared responsibility and helps others build the muscle memory for the task.
I suspect many people avoid it simply because they’re unsure how to do it. Ideally, they’d ask a neighbor, a teacher, or post on Discourse to learn the right way, but more often, they just leave it. Let’s keep normalizing learning through doing (and doing together).
. I’m sure others have their own Festivus grievances—feel free to share below.