I had a few issues with my dust collection that was drawing from the rear. I was running a project over Christmas and wasn’t paying attention when I moved the router after completing a cut and crashed into one of my hold downs. This resulted in a broken support arm.
I decided I wanted to go with a longer brush so I would have more clearance and also to get better suction by placing the hose on the front side. Bringing the hose to front side also made it possible to raise the dust collector higher since it would no longer bump into the bottom the Z axis support plate. Since I have a custom hose connection I needed to design my own dust port. At the same time I designed a hose support that also connects to the slots in the Z axis plate. This new system works really well. Only problem is that my dust collector is so powerful it sucked up the small piece of brush that fills in the gap designed to pass through the router bit. Here are some pictures.
New Front Side Dust Boot with 1.5" Brushes
New Hose Support Bracket and Retainer Ring
New Hose Support Bracket and Retainer Ring Assembled
Complete Dust Collection Setup, including magnetic quick release hose connection