As I mentioned before, I wanted to have the shop up and running for a while before I ran dust collection. Good thing: As I've been working in the shop for the last few months, I've moved almost all my tools--at least a little--from where I'd originally planned for them to go. In the end, my jointer, bandsaw, drill press and scroll saw all wound up along the front wall of the shop--in front of one of my garage doors. Because the other door is still easily operable (for bringing lumber in and taking furniture out), there's no reason to waste the wall space created by the other door. This arrangement also frees up the back corner of the shop for worksurfaces, a router table, a grinder and a mortiser. I may wind up tweaking things a little before the ductwork goes in, but this arrangement seems to work well. Once the ductwork goes in, I'll post pictures of the inside of the shop again.
When it came time to choose a dust collector, I talked to numerous people about what I might need. Generally, there is only one tool running at a time, which means I could have gotten away with a 2hp collector. But because I do occasionally have someone else working in the shop with me, I went with a 3hp collector. The larger collector will allow me to run 2 machines at a time, and still leave me a little room to grow and add tools. Also, I can't imagine that installing ductwork will be the most exciting of tasks, and I don't want to be redoing it every six months.
Consensus among everyone I talked to was that Oneida has the best and most affordable systems designed especially for the woodshop. I went with the 3hp Super Gorilla (http://store.oneida-air.com/item.asp?PID=771&cID=1&scID=89). Another reason I went with Oneida is that they will take a drawing of your shop layout and help you design your ductwork. They'll also give you a shopping list of all the ducting parts you need--you can order it directly from Oneida or shop around and buy it somewhere else. I just sent the drawing off to Oneida and should hear back from them about ductwork in the next few days.
This quick sketch is all the manufacturer needs to help design the ductwork for dust collection.
To see the layout of tools more clearly, click http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=418825183&size=l
Because the dust collector was delivered on an 18-wheeler which couldn't couldn't make it down my dead-end street, I met the truck a few streets over and offloaded it into my pickup.
