Controlling planer shavings on site

I recently purchased a DeWalt thickness planer, and I was amazed and pleased with the fan-assisted chip-ejection setup. In the shop, I can hook up the planer’s ejection port to my 4-in.-dia. dust-collection hose to manage the piles of chips. But what about taking this portable planer out of the shop and onto a job site? I reasoned that with the tool’s chip-ejection fan, I should be able to come up with a low-tech portable dust collector.

The solution was to take a Rubbermaid Roughneck trash can and bore a hole in it for a 2 1/2-in.-dia. vacuum hose that hooks up to the ejection port on the planer, as shown in the drawing above. Next, I had my daughter sew a bag from some landscape fabric with a drawstring large enough to go over the rim of the trash can. Propped up from the inside with a 2x2 scrap, it looks like a mini version of my shop unit. It catches 95% of the shavings. Cleanup is a breeze.