External pump for shop vac
So Ridgid used to make this pump. It attached to the drain port of their vacuums and connected to a garden hose and would pump water out, so you didn't have to carry the vacuum to dispose of the water. It's discontinued, and it appears that the only option…
So Ridgid used to make this pump. It attached to the drain port of their vacuums and connected to a garden hose and would pump water out, so you didn't have to carry the vacuum to dispose of the water. It's discontinued, and it appears that the only option available right now is a DeWalt, which is $69. They have the market cornered for this product. It wouldn't be too expensive to make a generic one, a pump with a housing, adapter fittings, and undercut their price point while still keeping enough profit margin to make it viable. A few features could even be included that improves upon the design,like a float valve that turns the pump on and off as the vacuum gets full, to make it safer to run without constant monitoring to ensure it doesn't run dry and damage the pump/motor. Thoughts? Is this such a niche product that it would not sell enough to make it profitable and cost effective?
Collected discussion
Sounds like a great idea! Maybe a rubber impeller pump or like a trash pump.
Not sure how big the market is. There would of course need to be a filter. But sucking up floods or if you pressure wash inside a restaurant or something and want to use a floor suction to clean up quickly this could be useful.
Can’t you just use the dewalt one? Or is the ridgid version the only one that works with ridgid. Seems to me, somebody is already making this. Do you know how big the market is for this sort of thing? Maybe it’s not that big. The handful of times I’ve had to use a wet vac to suck up water was after a big spill, not really often enough to buy a separate device. I can easily walk it outside. I’d be worried about clogging the pump. A wet dry vac can handle debris much larger than a garden hose. Those pumps can’t handle that sort of thing, it really only works if the vacuum/pump is used for just liquid.