RIGID Wet/Dry Vac

The Ridgid vacs aren't bag friendly. You can buy the fine dust or hepa cartridge filter for them though. These work equally well, but you need to clean them.

Bags are very difficult to attach and tend to rip also have the hepa filter and it does quite a good job.

I have an older Rigid 4.5 HP model I bought in '02, and same problem....no one makes dust/drywall bags to fit it. So I bought the HEPA filter as mentioned above, and that works great...no dust coming out the exhaust, and I just shake it out once in a while. If it's really plugged up, I wash it out w/ water, let dry, and it's like new again. A little expensive ( I think it was $25-28 at HD), but it's a one-time buy.

Great, a wash-and-dry filter. I have used the simple paper filter that has to be kept dry.

I do think the Rigid is an excellent shop vac, Consumers Reports has found the same, and now I know what filter to buy next time.


I guess the concern here is using the vac for cleaning the fireplace, i.e., when sweeping the liner etc, not for removing hot coals, of course.