Popular Post JohnG Posted June 30 Popular Post Report Share Posted June 30 First of all, I apologize for the rambling format of this thread. I haven’t had time to properly organize my thoughts, but wanted to go ahead and post this before next year. Feel free to ask questions instead of reading through all of this. I recently bought a Harvey G700 Dust Processor when they had it at a steep discount. As I have posted before Harvey (and BCTW) prices fluctuate quite dramatically and almost always have some sort of sale going on. If you can wait and watch the prices for a few weeks or months, you'll get an idea of what you should pay for the tool. The G700 currently has a list price of $3,599. I had been watching it for a while and finally committed and bought it at $2,549, which was the lowest I had seen. It has since dropped a little bit more, to $2,479, but I still feel good about the purchase. If the list price was actually the selling price, I probably would have been looking at Oneida or Clearvue. There just isn't much info out there on the Harvey, other than a few youtube videos by people who were given the DC for free and a stray forum post here and there. I decided to take a chance on it and hope for the best. My reason for going with the G700 was largely due to the form factor. In my current shop space, there's a spot that perfectly fits its shape and layout. I previously had my HF 2hp dust collector in the same location. The HF had a slightly smaller footprint, but was twice as tall, limiting my use of the wall space behind it. The G700 gives me a much cleaner and more accessible spot for my clamps and plenty of space to add more clamp racks or other tools in the future. Back when I got the Harvey Alpha bandsaw I got surprised by the (awful) last mile delivery guy, who didn't let me know that it was being delivered that day until he was at the end of my driveway. This time around, the freight company called me to schedule the delivery day and then the (very friendly) driver called me about 1 hour before he showed up. You never know what you'll end up with with freight drivers delivering to residences. There is very little assembly required. The part that took the longest was unbolting the machine from the shipping pallet. The screws are inside the dust bin cabinet and the two rear screws are a bit awkward to reach and only allow about 90* rotation at a time. The unit weighs in at 445lb, so unless you are able to set the shipping pallet down in your workshop or on concrete that leads into your workshop, get help moving it. I had to put mine on top of another pallet over pea gravel outside my shop with a fairly significant threshold for the mandoor leading into my shop, so I decided to move it on my own... After much sweating, pushing, pulling, and a couple short moments of panic, I wiggled it through the doorway and onto the slab floor that it could roll on. On smooth ground it rolls very easily. It is a bit unfortunate that the casters only swivel on one end, so you do have to “drive” it into the spot you want it to go. I think they did that so that they could just have leveling feet on one end. There are large knurled knobs that lift the unit off the casters and have a high friction rubber foot to keep it from rolling when you don’t want it to. Not quite as easy as the foot lever on some mobile bases, but it doesn’t add anything to the footprint of the unit. There’s a rubber gasket that fits around the metal inlet to seal the connection to the reducer (6” to 4” and 2.5”), if used. It’s a bit fiddly to get the reducer over the gasket without bunching it up against the side of the unit. A little water helps it slide on. It comes with a remote control fob. It’s an RF remote, so it doesn’t require line of sight to turn the unit on and off, which is very handy. I was even able to turn it on from upstairs when I was testing out the noise level. Speaking of, it’s quieter at all speeds than my HF 2hp collector. Additionally, it seems to be a lower frequency so it’s a more tolerable noise as well. It is variable speed, but unfortunately the speed cannot be changed with the remote. It has a speed range of 40-75, which is odd. There is a bit of panel rattle at about 60, but it’s not bad and only happens in a narrow speed range. I haven’t bothered to check if I can tighten something to stop the rattle. The performance is absolutely no comparison to the HF 2hp bag unit. It seems to work better on the lowest speed than the HF ever was. I have it piped up to the same layout to serve all my tools and I can leave multiple blast gates open and still get better suction than the HF unit. The separators and filters seem to be working well, though time will tell. The overall build quality is very nice. The dust bin is very stout, the knurled knobs throughout are solid and nicely machined. 6 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coop Posted June 30 Report Share Posted June 30 John, first of all , congrats! I’d rather hear it from you as it’s easier than researching it. Is all of the dust contained within the unit or are there other receptacles? That’s a big time jump from the HF! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnG Posted June 30 Author Report Share Posted June 30 Thanks Coop! It has a dust bin inside the unit. This part opens up Opens by turning these two knurled knobs. They have a rubber bumpers that turn into feet as the panel rotates down. Then you can access the latch that lifts up the bin to seal it. And finally the dust bin rolls out on guides built into the bottom of the unit and the dust bin door. Hard to see but there’s a wheel in that shadow that rides on the metal track. The dust bin itself is surprisingly heavy and solidly built, maybe to reduce noise. It actually has two compartments, one large and one small. Don’t quote me but I think the smaller one is supposed to catch the extra fine dust and the bigger is for coarser dust/chips. The two red knobs on the top right of the unit are the filter cleaners, similar to what several cyclone units have. There are two cleanout caps at the bottom on the right end of the unit to remove whatever is knocked loose by the filter cleaners. My one ding against the unit so far is that these cleanout caps and the housing that they attach to are pretty cheap feeling plastic. They don’t match the quality and feel of the rest of the machine. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark J Posted June 30 Report Share Posted June 30 Looks like a super unit. What is the filtration level, is it HEPA? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnG Posted June 30 Author Report Share Posted June 30 It is not HEPA. It’s 99.35% 0.3um-0.5um and emission of 0.05mg/m^3. I think HEPA is 99.97 0.3um but I could be wrong. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chestnut Posted July 3 Report Share Posted July 3 On 6/30/2022 at 10:12 AM, JohnG said: It is not HEPA. It’s 99.35% 0.3um-0.5um and emission of 0.05mg/m^3. I think HEPA is 99.97 0.3um but I could be wrong. It's pretty close. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZombieMonkey Posted August 2 Report Share Posted August 2 Curious how the performance of this unit is. I recently upgraded from my Hammer A31 to a Minimax FS 41 ES and may want to upgrade my DC setup soon as I am not necessarily in love with my 2HP Jet Cyclone I have. Curious if this would be up to the task of a 16" jointer / planer that is capable of taking a healthy bite into the pieces I run through it. Also curious how mobile this is as I do not leave my unit stationary. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JohnG Posted August 2 Author Report Share Posted August 2 It rolls very easily on smooth ground. As I mentioned, the wheels are fixed on one side and rotate on the other, so you do have to "drive" it around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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