Here's what happens when you let a shop vac suck on a 5 Gal bucket

[LCHIEN]

Closed bucket.
was almost instant.
Yeah, don't do this. I had to hammer the bucket back into shape.

[Jim Frye]

Yeah, that 14.7 psi is pretty strong! What's the surface area of a 5 gal. bucket?

Ok, I couldn't resist. I measured a bucket and got 12" tall up to the top ribs by 34.5" in circumference halfway up the bucket which would be 414 sq. in. of surface area not counting the bottom. So 414 sq.in. results in 6,085.8 pounds of pressure on the bucket. No wonder it caved.

[LCHIEN]

I don't know that the vacuum is that good to get a full 14.7 PSI vacuum, but yeah, several thousand pounds still.
And you didn't count nearly 200 sq inches on the top and bottom,

[dbhost]

Whoah... Not something I would have expected. I guess my Thien doesn't produce that kind of vacuum...

[leehljp]

Anyone remember the photo that Lee Styrone posted many years ago? The one in which the DC sucked up a basketball? It was hilarious! I doubt that it is still with this forum with all the changes it has been through.

[Jim Frye]

My feeble memory just recalled using a ShopVac and a plastic bag as a gluelam press many years ago. It worked OK, but my biggest issue was sealing the bag once I had pulled a vacuum on it. I actually scored a vacuum pump from an old IBM tape drive to use for veneering, but never got into veneering to use it. Many years later, when we moved, I took it to a local recycling yard and got $0.65/pound for its 80 pounds.

[capncarl]

Leehljp, I don’t have many basketballs in my shop for the dust collector to suck up, but there is not a housecat in the neighborhood that will drop by my shop for a visit when they hear my ClearVue dust collector running. They must have heard me tell a neighbor that it would suck up a housecat if it walked close enough! Once I was cleaning off the tablesaw outfeed table with a 4” dust collector hose and it gulped down a towel that I had my measuring tools spread out on!

[leehljp]

Lee was good with cartoons and had published many. He was also good with Photoshop. After he got a large DC, He took a picture of it with an 8 inch hose and a basketball just about to be sucked onto it. Then Photoshopped the basketball about 4 or 5 ft into the hose!