Fein Turbo II's hot deal

[rookie432]

Hey fellow botters, thought I'd let you know Woodcraft is clearing out their Fein turbo II's for $139. Thats down from $199. though that was a good deal.
http://www.woodcraft.com/family.aspx?familyid=2059&refcode=06IN11NL

These are great vacs for holdowns and cleanup.

Bill

[paco]

Humm... actually this look to be the "Mini" model (not the turbo II)... still, looking at the spec. it seem just as powerfull; anybody got this model and have feedback about it? This deal is VERY low, I tempted to upgrade my vacuum...

Thanks for the hint Bill!

[gerald_d]

Fein vacuum models (http://www.feinus.com/p/newdustfree/vacmain.htm)

[jf_allie]

WOW! That's CAD$ 184.00 shipping included. It's listed at CAD$ 385.00 on Fein Canada website! Does anyone know if there would be other fees (such as broker fees, etc.)? They seem to be using FedEx.

I'm also very curious to know more about what people have been able to hold down with it.

cheers,

JF

[paco]

Hummm... disctontinued model...

[jf_allie]

Could this vacuum cleaner be used with pucks? In fact can any? The puck systems I have seen all used vacuum pumps if I remember correctly.

Paco, the only difference seems to be the lack of the autostart feature.

[billp]

Jean,
Usually vacuum cleaners don't work very well with pucks because they don't "pull"enough vacuum to hold very small parts. (This does NOT mean that it's impossible though because we're finding out that by using gasket tape ALL vacuums become much more efficient). One of the issues would be connecting the hose of a Fein to a puck since most pods/pucks are only about 1" thick. Perhaps some sort of manifold might be designed to get past this though.
Where they DO excel is in holding down larger items in dedicated jigs, especially if a gasket tape is used to minimize air /vacuum loss. The specs on the smaller units seem to be pretty similar to the larger ones in terms of CFM, and this means you could probably expect to get 30-40% more vacuum holding power than a comparable (or larger) "Shopvac" type of unit. I measure about 7-8" of mercury with a vacuum guage on my Turbo3.
And you have the added bonus(es) of having a double fan arrangement so it's very unlikely that you'd burn one of these units out, PLUS they really ARE very quiet when running under full load, and this in itself is worth quite a bit to me. I think this unit would work very well for sign blanks, and similar sized projects. of course as everyone has already pointed out, your material is a major factor in ANY vacuum rig, and porous materials would still demand a very large unit to have any possibility of holding something in place...Seems like a lot of suck for the buck.....

[paco]

Yeah... but I wonder about waranty and spare parts for a discontinued model... and since I'll be buying it from Canada... I already plan for the Turbo II... now I have my eyes on the III for a little more pull and CFM too. Man, I hate choices!?...

[billp]

Paco,
Considering the fact that it's hard to kill even a "Shopvac"in this application, I'd think you shouldn't have to worry about getting your money's worth with any of their units.
And just to make your life even MORE complicated; think about getting TWO of these little ones...They would cost less than a larger one, move MORE air, and you'd always have a backup unit, OR you could even do dedicated "zones".....

[Brady Watson]

Paco...the Turbo III is quite a bit more expensive than the II with a 'little' bit more suction (only 9" H2O difference). The TII is a no-brainer at that price. I think I paid $300 for my TIII after weeks of price hunting...

-Brady

[beacon14]

The new model seems to be identical except has an auto sensing switch and is rated at higher Amps but this may have to do with the fact that it's meant to have a power tool plugged into it as the cfm and vacuum rating are the same.

Amazon.com is taking orders for the new model for $229 but they are not shipping it yet.

I just ordered 2 of the sale models - thanks for the tip Bill you saved me a few hundred bucks (the wife thinks you cost me a few hundred but I know better)

[gerald_d]

It looks like the Feins only have 2 basic engines (116/90 and 126/99)- all the rest is in the packaging and accessories. However, the all-important noise issue is determined by the packaging. Please believe that an increase of 3dBA is a doubling of the noise volume. 6dBA difference is double.x.double=4.times the volume. Those cheapies are very much noisier at 63dBA compared to the Turbo II at 57.8dBA.

[bleeth]

For those interested Woodcraft is waiving shipping until the 4th.

[beacon14]

Follow up: I have been using the two new vacs on my recent project and I couldn't be happier, especially for the price. They may not be the quietest model but compared to what I had before they practically whisper. The holding power is noticably stronger than the old shopvacs I used before, and I don't have to worry about the motors burning out in the middle of a long file.

When I finally get around to making my full sized four-zone setup I may splurge for the model with the larger motor for my primary zones and use these guys for the lesser-used zones, but for now these are working very well indeed.

Thanks again for the tip.

[cabindoors]

Does anyone know how the Fein shopvac would stand up to the Ridgid's 12 gallon 5 HP shopvac? I don't currently have a hold down system but am considering making one.

Home Depot recently had the Ridgid on sale reg $70 marked down to $25. Needless to say I bought several. I really liked their lifetime warranty and their superior suction.

[alabama_davo]

the HUGE difference is that the fein has a secondary cooling fan for the motor that prevents it from overheating when used for a vacuum holding system. and it is about half as loud...
I have a III and I love it.

[gerald_d]

Fein advertises this secondary cooling fan, but every other brand that I've looked at inside also had the secondary fan - they just didn't mention it in their advertising.

[Brady Watson]

Tom,
Yes...I have a "6.5 HP" <---yeah right...Rigid Shopvac and my Fein T3 pulls exactly twice the vacuum as the Rigid.

-Brady

[paco]

ShopVac do have their own line of "secondary fan" (named "Industrial line) type of vac but I've had some problem getting info about it... they advertise about similar specs than Fein...

[ron brown]

Brady,

According to my calculations 6.5HP is 4849 watts or, on a 120V circuit, only 40.4083A (yeah, right). I am always amazed how the advertising firms can claim such outragous stuff and get away with it.

I've found a "3.25 HP Porter-Cable Router" is a lot closer to two horsepower. My Vacuum motors pull about 8A and I've never seen a tool that pulls the amps required for the nameplate "HP rating".

When I was a lot younger I used to have a few "fast" vehicles. Others would talk "my engine makes X HP" or this car/motorcycle/truck will go X mph. For some reason I was the only one who had things like dyno reports and time slips where I had actually gone as fast or my engines had made as much power as I claimed.

It would be interesting to see how much a 'shopvac' of a particular brand actually pulled in water/mercury and the CFM at the vacuum and at the end of a particular run of hose, PVC or whatever.

I think the old saying of how to tell a salesman and a farmer apart from seeing which side of the boots the manure is on could apply to tools.

Ron

[gerald_d]

Ron, in Germany the annual licence(tax) fees for cars are according to the engine horsepower. Exaggerated claims cost you money over there.

It may interest you that routers of the size commonly called 3.25HP in North America, are called 1800 Watt by just about everybody else.

[beacon14]

The Ridgid model is the one I "retired" when I bought the Feins. It stills works well for vaccuming up MDF dust, if you wear earplugs.

[billp]

Ron,
I ran a VERY unscientific "test"of my "QSP Super Quiet"Shopvac, and the Fein 3 unit. I just stuck a vacuum guage in the end of their respective hoses, and turned them on individually. The Shopvac "pulled" 4.5 "of mercury, and then the Fein pulled closer to 7.5".
I am inclined to believe that my vacuum guage may be a little flaky, but the ration of difference would probably still be the same even if I wasn't calibrated to "true zero".
I have no way to compute CFM at the hose ends.