Older shop vac belly inlet

[Sam Puhalovich]

ShopVacInlet2.JPGShopVacInlet1.jpg A few months-ago Mike Henderson and several others mentioned in a post about using internal dust bags to keep the filters clean ... thank you all. I have 4 older vacs that range from 2001 to 2014 ... each has a different inlet size and neither has 'belly' inlet. I searched, then called Rigid about buying the belly inlet that's available on some models ... not-for-sale. After much measuring-and-searching, I decided I was out-of-luck about finding some convenient parts to adapt. I was striding down one of the electrical aisles at the blue borg and noticed the 2" terminal adapter ... a quick measurement showed that it was 'close' to size. Next I found that the DWV adapter was a better 'shoulder' combination for tightening to the vac wall and the coupling would make a good mounting-retainer for the dust bag. Once tightened in-place ... a retainer-notch is easily filed for the hose-clip. If you decide to this conversion: be sure to put a generous lead ... taper ... on the coupling for inserting into the dust bag. When mounting the dust bag ... deform ... push-back the cardboard piece at the center of the dust bag inlet ... then mount to the coupling.

[Doug Garson]

Have you noticed any reduction in suction when using the dust bag? I have a dust deputy ahead of my Rigid shop vac and had the dust bag to catch the fine dust. I recently changed the filter in the shop vac to a HEPA filter and removed the dust bag. The suction increased so much that it collapsed the 5 gal Lowes bucket under the dust deputy, I had to replace the bucket with a more rugged one and added an internal stiffener.

[Sam Puhalovich]

Doug ... no reduction in suction that I can tell. I've been using HEPA filters for at least 12 years ... and knew that I needed to clean them when the loss of suction finally became apparent ... it's a slow process. I'd open-up the top and there would be, what seemed, a 1/4" coating of 'fines' all-around the filter. This was even the case with the stationery drill press vac that had a Thien Baffle ahead of it.