Chips, fines & air
Chips on the floor are a nuisance; the dust you cannot see is why this category matters. Wood dust is classified as a Group 1 carcinogen by the IARC, and the fine fraction is the part that stays airborne. We compare chip collectors against workshop vacuums, cyclone separators and ambient air filters — on airflow, suction and filter class.
1,250 W · 120 m (394 ft)³/h · 5 L
A €79 three-in-one extractor that publishes its airflow — and that airflow figure tells you exactly what it is for.
Best for: A single small machine at a time — a sander, a small router, a bench top
≈ $235
Wet and dry · automatic start
A wet-and-dry workshop vacuum with tool-triggered start, at a third of the price of the professional machines here.
Best for: General workshop cleanup and light sanding extraction on a budget
≈ $450
2 × 18 V · 30 L stainless · Ø 36 mm (1.42 in) hose · bare tool
A cordless wet and dry vacuum with a 30 liter stainless drum — the machine that goes to the dust rather than waiting for it.
Best for: Site and garage clean-up, and extraction at small tool ports away from a socket
≈ $490
Chip collector · wheeled · 4 adaptors
A proper chip collector on wheels, with four machine adaptors in the box — the right machine for a planer or a table saw port.
Best for: A planer, a table saw or a band saw with a 100 mm (3.94 in) port
≈ $380
Spare inner filter for the AC400 two-stage air filter
Not a machine: a replacement filter cartridge, useful only if you already own an AC400 — and 60 per cent dearer in Spain than in Germany.
Best for: AC400 owners replacing a clogged inner cartridge
750 CFM · 2 micron upper bag · auto-start outlet rated 7 A · CSA listed
The finest bag on the American half of this shelf at two microns — and the only auto-start outlet here that publishes its limit.
Best for: A sander, a router table or a band saw on auto-start, where the fine bag matters more than the volume
≈ $270
HEPA · semi-automatic filter cleaning · tool-activated · anti-static hose · 6.5 HP claimed
HEPA filtration and semi-automatic filter cleaning on a shop vacuum — and six and a half horsepower claimed from a domestic socket.
Best for: A sander, a track saw or a router connected by hose, where the fine fraction is the whole point
≈ $130
1,300 CFM · 14 A · 10 in impeller at 3,450 rpm · 5 micron · dual 4 in inlets
The only machine here to publish its impeller — ten inches of steel at 3,450 rpm — and the only one with two inlets.
Best for: A workshop with a table saw and a planer that both need a 4 inch port, on a dedicated circuit
≈ $390
600 CFM · 7.4 A · 9 in impeller · 5 micron · wall mountable · 41.1 lb
Half the amps and one inch less impeller than its sibling, for less than half the air — and it will hang on a wall.
Best for: A one-machine shop with no floor to spare, where the collector hangs on the wall
≈ $230
550 W · 1,150 m (3773 ft)³/h · 75 L · Ø 100 mm (3.94 in) hose
A €169 chip extractor that moves 1,150 cubic meters an hour — and publishes nothing at all about what it filters.
Best for: Feeding a planer, a bandsaw or a table saw in a single-machine workshop
≈ $635
1,200 W · dust class L · semi-automatic filter clean
The professional L-class vacuum with semi-automatic filter cleaning — the feature that stops suction fading halfway through a job.
Best for: Site and workshop extraction where suction has to stay constant all day
Dust class M · automatic filter cleaning
The M-class machine on this page — ten times less fine dust returned to the room, which for hardwood is the whole argument.
Best for: Hardwood work in an enclosed workshop, where the fine fraction is the point
650 CFM · 30 micron bag · wall mount on keyhole slots · 1 micron canister optional
A wall-mounted 650 CFM collector supplied with a thirty-micron bag — the coarsest filtration on this shelf, with a finer one sold separately.
Best for: A shop with wall space and no floor — bought together with the one-micron canister
≈ $440
A thicknesser or a table saw produces a volume of chips a workshop vacuum cannot keep up with. Air flow decides, not suction pressure.
Wood dust is classified as carcinogenic. Even the most modest set-up in the aisle is infinitely better than nothing.
An extractor louder than the machine it serves doubles the fatigue of a day in the shop. The stated noise level counts as much as the airflow in a closed room.
For portable tools, yes. For a thicknesser or a table saw, no: it has not got the flow and blocks immediately.
100 mm (3.94 in) and up for stationary machines, 32 to 40 mm (1.26 to 1.57 in) for portables. Reducing the diameter throttles the flow far more than people expect.
The finest, invisible particles, which stay airborne and penetrate deeply. The pile of chips on the floor is the least problematic part.
On an installation that exhausts into the workshop, it is the serious minimum. A classic cloth bag lets the most dangerous fraction through.
Very: it drops out most of the load before the filter, which stays clean and keeps its flow. It is the best addition to an existing installation.
It is the most effective solution for indoor air, and it also expels heated air. In winter that quickly becomes expensive.
Yes, for operations where extraction is impossible — hand sanding, sweeping up. FFP2 as a minimum, FFP3 for exotic timbers.
Technically yes, but the airflow splits and neither one is properly extracted. A network with blast gates solves it; a plain branch does not.
Extraction is not a comfort accessory: fine wood dust is the real risk in the workshop, and it is invisible. Distinguish flow from suction according to the machines, watch hose diameters, and add a cyclone before changing extractor.
There is no table here, and the reason is in the listings. The figure published most often across these 13 products is motor, given by 7 of them — short of the four in five a column needs to compare rather than to display gaps. Each product page says what its own maker published.
$130 – $235
3 models
ECOMAX EM18412PE, 8 gal HEPA extractor, WEN DC3474, 600 CFM collector, Scheppach HD2P
$270 – $390
3 models
Bucktool DC50, 750 CFM collector, Scheppach DC500, WEN DC1300, 1,300 CFM collector
$440 – $635
4 models
Dust Right 650 CFM wall mount, Einhell TE-VC 2025 SACL, Einhell TE-VC 36/30 Li S-Solo
Specifications: manufacturer sheets for woodworking machines and the matching Amazon product pages. Prices and availability: Keepa.
Most recent revision in this category: October 7, 2026.
Prices quoted in these summaries are dated readings. The live price is shown next to each product.
