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Comment by fein | Hacker News Reader

That's why we have respirators.

As long as the apartment wood shop isn't heavily used for sanding, it will be fine. I have a full garage woodshop and still do sanding out in the front yard, even in the winter. I built a bar top and did the sanding in the garage; was brushing sawdust off of everything in there for weeks.

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I don’t really like giving out healthcare advice on the Internet. But also... I feel bad for folks being harmed. I’m an amateur woodworker and a non-amateur medical professional, so I’ve looked into this topic for my own self. Putting on the n95 while you’re sanding isn’t sufficient in that sort of environment.

But I’d really rather you didn’t take my word for it: perhaps you’d consider reaching out to a pulmonologist with experience in carpenters’ occupational lung diseases, and get their take on it?

Spoken, honestly, as one stranger wishing another no harm.

Is there a particulate size where a respirator becomes necessary in woodworking vs a dust mask? Like, above 120 grit you should really have a respirator on? I'm probably not as concerned about wood dust as I should be, so this is interesting to me.

I don't use the n95's, I use the dual filter half mask respirators.

Similar to this: http://a.co/1jM2zu6

That’s still N95 with respect to particulate filtration. P95, to split hairs, but equivalent with respect to the topic at hand.

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