Vacuum Cleaner

five gallon vacuum cleaner

Here’s a contractor’s quality vacuum cleaner that hooks up to a five gallon bucket. By using a handled bucket, you will have a relatively light, portable vacuum cleaner useful for on a construction site. I suppose it could also be helpful if you have dozens of gallons of material to vacuum up in a single day without a disposal option.

For more on how it works, see the item listing on Amazon.com.

Update: Mackey, one of our readers, has sent in a link to the “Dust Deputy,” which is a advanced vacuum that uses a “cyclonic dust seperator” to save your filter from constantly clogging. And of course, it uses five gallon buckets to capture the dust.

Swamp Cooler

At the time of this post, July 5th 2012, a large part of the U.S.A. is ravaged by a 100F+ heat wave. Here’s a timely five gallon solution to this extreme weather:

diy swamp coolerThis idea is sent in by a reader Geoff B. who has built one of these for his home. He says he is using a duct fan instead of a PC fan, but either works fine. Geoff says a single unit will not cool an entire room, but is effective for localized cooling around a single human being.

As you might already know, swamp cooler technology uses evaporation to create the moist cooling they are known for. Like the pot-in-pot refrigerator, this means the drier your climate, the better swamp coolers will work.

To make the swamp cooler, you will need the following Ingredients:

  • Five gallon bucket with lid
  • 2 computer fans
  • Irrigation tube
  • Shade cloth
  • Fountain pump
  • Air conduit
  • 12v DC power

If you think you’d like to take this project on, see the full step-by-step tutorial with lots of details and pictures on rengeekcentral.com.

See also a simpler design that will work in any climate: the 5 Gallon Bucket Air Conditioner

Refrigerator

Disclaimer: This experiment was not a success when using a plastic bucket. The principle is sound, but the impervious nature of plastic prevents enough evaporation to cool the system noticeably. If I can find a 5 gallon unglazed terracotta bucket, I will try the experiment again. 

The “pot-in-pot” refrigerator dates back at least 5000 years. The principle is simple, a small pot is nested inside a larger pot, and sand is packed into the gap. The sand is kept moist at all times. When the moisture evaporates through the top (and more importantly through the sides) it cools the inner pot to a surprisingly cool 59ºF (15ºC) – cool enough to keep meat for two weeks (source)

The evaporative cooling process is the same our bodies use to cool off when we sweat.

I built one of these pot refrigerators using one of my trusty five gallon buckets, but since the only contact with air is at the top, it did not evaporate enough to make any temperature difference. We tried to speed up the evaporation by putting our fridge beside a fire, so it would benefit from the heat and dry air, but it changed very little.

We live in a very wet climate, which is bad for evaporation. The drier your locale, the better this type of fridge will work.

Rocket Stove

five gallon bucket rocket stove

If you haven’t heard of rocket stove technology yet, I encourage you to look into it and take it seriously.

Unlike traditional wood stoves, rocket stoves operate on a double burning principal, where first the wood is burned, then the smoke is burned in a secondary chamber. This has the effect of eliminating smoke almost completely, and requiring far less fuel than a conventional woodstove. Also, rocket stoves are designed to be so simple than anyone can make one with a few standard tools in an afternoon.

This particular rocket stove design (there are many) uses a metal five gallon bucket. I will be building one of these for myself as soon as I can find a source for metal five gallon buckets, which are harder to find than the plastic variety.

See more pictures and plans to build your own on RootSimple.com

Wishing Well

Here’s an idea I discovered on BBC’s “Tightwads” documentary about extremely frugal people. This particular gentleman put a five gallon bucket at the end of his garden with a sign labelling it “Ye Olde Wishing Well.” On Friday, Saturday and Sunday, passers-by would throw money into the bucket, which he would collect on Monday.

If you want to watch the entire documentary, here is a link to a playlist of it on Youtube.