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This unit is not for pros. To get a dust free room sand very, very, very slowly so not to disturb the small amount of suction at the sanding tool (again the hose is too small).
Compared to the home made or home made looking units the pros use with the large diameter hoses this thing is kind of sick. Of course I read the instructions and closed all the bleed off valves to get maximum suction.
It is the first time I have owned one of these units myself. It only collected about 70 percent (at most) of the dust when I was sanding.
Would work great for a very small area where you can sand slowly but when time is money look to a different unit. I have seen this type of collection system used before.
The hoses are far too small in diameter and can't collect enough air (and dust) to keep a dust free room for a fast sanding drywall pro.
If your building a product used by the construction trades then make it out of construction grade materials and not the cheapest bucket you can find. I had the air bleed almost all of the way open to reduce the pull of the lid but even the lid on a bucket of drywall compound or kitty litter is heavier than this weak thing. I will convert an empty 5 gallon paint bucket to replace this one. This tool does reduce the amount of sanding dust. However, the lid is too flimsey and my vacuum litterally sucked it into the bucket.
I give this a big 2 thumbs up. After sanding half a room and getting dust everwhere throughout the house I bought the MT800 system. It worked exactly as advertised although if you had several rooms or a tight deadline you might consider some help.
I expected the tube to be under water. The orbit sander does overwhelm the system a bit. If you follow the directions this won't happen. I discovered it hooked up nicely to my random orbit sander (with a bit of tape) and I now have a super fast drywall sander.
However, I have discovered that 80+% of the dust is going into the vacuum. Please, however, use a wet/dry vacuum on it. Remember the 1/2 inch of water in the bottom of my vac. Bottom line: This is the single most cost effective drywall sanding system I have seen for the occasional user and the diy-er. I bought this about 5 years ago, used it, and put it away. I just got it down for a room renovation. At the end of a day of sanding there will be 3 inches of drywall guck in the bottom of the tank. If you over fill the tank you WILL come to grief, and your hose WILL clog.
In fact, I used this for completely mudding a fairly large room, changed the water in the tank about 4 times, and never checked the shop vac until I was cleaning up (that's when I discovered the 1/2 inch of water in the bottom of the tank).For complainers about it clogging up: Read the directions. It isn't. My feeling is that it would drive a professional crazy after about a week, but then they can justify a $300 drywall vac. Apparently this keeps the bubbling down. That's the one drawback: How do you dispose of a gallon of wet drywall mud. When properly filled the inlet is just above the water.
I was impressed 5 years ago, and I am impressed today. By the way, the first time you use it it will look wrong. If you use this correctly the vacuum filter will not clog. That is, after sanding the room is thick with dust. However, note that I said you could sand all day without checking things.
No thank-you, I'd rather deal with the dust. I suffer from tinnitus and when this thing began to scream, I thought I was going into orbit. I should have heeded the warnings of other reviewers regarding the noise level of this device. It may be very effective at removing the dust, but I just can't deal with the noise.
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