Who would have thought that using an old piece of bike inner tube you could make a universal dust extractor adaptor.

For this incredibly simple project all you will need is:

1 section of bike inner tube
Stanley knife or the like preferable 1.5"(3.8)cm diameter
2 fittings you would like to join
1 Ruler
1 marker

Step 1: The Issue

There are many different sizes of hoses and fittings for dust extraction systems

Proper adaptors are often quite bulky, cost money and require a confusing trip to the hardware store to make sure you get the right size adaptors

e.g. my new Thicknesser, has a dust catcher hose out that is around 2" (5cm) in diameter but my small cyclone system uses hoses around 1.5" (3.8cm)

So I Found a 'Free' solution to this issue using an old bike inner tube

Step 2: Construction for a 1/2" Stepdown

Cut a section of inner tube to the correct length (in this case 3"(7.5cm) more on this later.

Stretch it over the larger fitting so there is about 1" (2.5cm) of contact between the fitting and the tube

Attach smaller fitting in the same way

All Done

It's really that simple

The rubber pulls tight around the fittings making sure no suction is lost and you don't have to buy new adaptors hoses or fittings that are big bulky and costly

when the hose isn't hooked up to the machine you can pull it out and leave the tube attached to the machine ready for its next use

For different stepdown read on to the next step.

Step 3: How Big?

I found that the best length for a 1/2" (1.27cm) stepdown is around 3"

The key measurements for the adaptor are,

Diameter of the Bike inner tube
Diameter of the fittings you would like to join
The length of tube you cut

The most important measurement is the last one, the length of tube that you cut. This is because if it is too long it will be able to twist and kink as demonstrated in the photos, but if it is too short it wont properly hold the fittings together properly.

To find the length I would need, I stretched the tube over the larger of the fittings so it was around 1" down the fitting then I firmly grabbed the tube where it began to contract back to its original size and pulled it off then marked 2"(5cm) (1"(2.5cm) for the tube to become its original diameter again and 1" for connecting to the next fitting) down from that point. this method should work for finding

Obviously a road bike's inner tube is going to be useful for small fittings while a mountain bike's inner tube like the one I'm using is better for larger fittings. If you were working on really big fittings I guess a car's inner tube would work