Workshop Vacuum Cleaners

I've got a DC500 and have had it for 3 months it seems really good for the sort of work I do (home maintenance , carpentry/handyman business) I like the portability and the suction is fine for my power planer. Don't know about the other 2. I used to own a B&Q Job the very small one with power take off and it was c**p. Incidentally I bought the DC500 on Ebay Brand new for =A375.

Ahem! That's 30l/_sec_ for the 1st two, 100l/_minute_ for the 3rd!

I'm still having trouble with the deWalt, or more specifically its filter: it blocks up almost solidly (though invisibly) as soon as you look at it. Mine is currently so crap you genuinely can't tell which is the suck and which is the blow end. I've had one replacement machine from TS so far but the new one has gone just as bad. It's definitely the filter: if you remove it the machine has a reasonable suck/blow (though obviously you don't want to use it without the filter for sucking up muck).

It's also a slightly odd design in that it has no more power on mains than on 14.4V battery. In other respects (i.e. if it worked!) it's a reasonably handy machine, though not what you want for hoovering up lots of muck.

The Earlex(?)/Wickes own-brand is another cheapie wet/dry machine, which has blow as well as suck (which can be useful). You can get a wet/dry filter for it so you don't need to change between separate filters for wet & dry. Snags are it tends to splutter wet splashes out from the top if it gets too full of water, and blow dust out if you suck up too much fine dust.

I use mine to follow the angle grinder when I'm cutting chases and if I cut slowly enough it keeps the dust manageable. Having a blow port allows me to stick another hose out of the window to help get the overall airflow to be out of the house so dust doesn't drift indoors.

Hi Hamish

Generic Italian machines, probably nothing much wrong with either, but spares might be tricky in future.

Almost all wet/dry vacs have a dry filter which you just remove for wet use. You can buy wet filters as extras.

I'd guess the cheaper one doesn't have the socket & elecronics - very useful feature. No vac ever has the right adaptor for every power tool, but Axminster sell loads of adaptors.

You must be paying a lot for the battery function. I'd never rate a battery vacuum, not enough run time and very limited capacity.

The Earlex Powervacs sold by Screwfix and others are very good value and you can get the parts for them.

Dave

Very happy with my Earlex for under £40 from Argos. And I just saw what seems to be an identical own-badged one in Wickes for under £30.

I used to have a filter element type vacuum with what turned out to be a pretty heavy consumption of expensive cartridges. I now use a Henry which has a fabric "shake clean" filter and it does the job just fine. Cleans up after work, cleans out boilers, fits to my diamond cutter etc. Been using it every day for three years now.

Inherited an Earlex (Machinemart in this case) from a mate.

Very pleased with it. It powers my triton dust collector just fine.

I use an old dyson, for portable hand tools, cos its a bit more portable.

Alex.

Another satisfied customer here - I wouldn't want to use it all day, every day, but for rough cleanup work it certainly does the job.

It may be worth paying a pound or two more to buy it from somewhere that sells the full line of accessories, particularly the reusable wet/dry filter.

They are sold by Machine Mart witht he full range of gear. What I found useful was to buy an extra length of hose, the lobngest available and fit that to the exhaust. When cleaning up after dusty jobs, poke the hose out of the window and that prevents the cleaner blowing fine dust around the room.

I've been very happy with the one I got, so much so that I regret not getting the slightly more expensive one with the HVLP spray gun, for some of the rough painting jobs I have around the place.

Hi, I've used an Earlex for about 5 years and am very happy with it. I "modified" the design to add a handle to the top so that it makes lugging the unit around much easier. I've never bought proper spare paper bags for the machine because I found that by cutting the stitched bottom off a "standard" upright cleaner bag it is a neat fit on the Earlex: perhaps a tip for others who have an Earlex and a few spare paper bags for long-gone vacuum cleaners?

I did renew the mains cable on the machine to allow me easy access to the other side of the car when cleaning it out (three kids, so it's a toss-up on whether to clean out the car or inflate the tyres more :-)

The Earlex's inlet and outlet holes are the same diameter, so you can use the machine to blow rather than suck. Makes for a twenty-second inflation for air-mattresses or for other inflatables if I could find my puncture-repair outfit... !

No qualms with Earlex then; can't talk about the others mentioned.

Mungo

I have an old aquavac that I use in the garage, works great but I just descovered while reading this thread about the accessory power socket to turn on the vac when you power on a power tool through the vac.......

Does anyone know of an off the shelf plug that does the same job that I can hack into my aquavac to do the same thing?

Paul

I think I found what I was looking for

this ->

Anyone know of a different source that just has one socket?

Paul

I asked the same question a while ago, and all the proposed solutions had an insufficient power rating. Can't see a rating on the Maplin one, but it would be advisable to check.

My initial thoughts were to build one from scratch but that would probably never happen!..... then I thought about one of these power strips, but realising that the power might not be handled I would need to modify it.... don't really want to spend £25 and then hack it up.

Might have to resort to just putting a really big on/off switch on the vac

Paul

Paul

I got a workshop cleaner from axminster, it does a reasonable job, cost about 120 quid. Things to note are

The bag (the size of a bin liner) fills up very quickly, especilly when I have it connected to my power wood-plane.

You need a whole host of different sized adaptors to connect to your power tools.

I also have a wet & dry vac, which simply fills up so quick its pointless.

Rick

They die when you run big woodworking machines through them.

Try a radio controlled mains socket. Remote control is nearly as useful as automatic control.