OK, you may not reach enlightenment with a water vacuum but I hope to help you see the importance of having one around your home. The lowly shop vac or wet-dry vacuum cleaner is usually relegated to the garage or other storage area. These large canister type vacuums typically hold gallons depending on their designed use.

Almost any workshop but especially one that is used for woodworking should always have a working water vacuum system to keep dust and wood sawdust under control. This is especially important if you're building anything for the outdoors using chemically treated wood material. The chemicals used to create pressure treated lumber, typically used for outdoor structures has long been suspected of being a cancer causing agent. Using a water vacuum, it's possible to safely cut and build playground equipment or decks without to much worry about breathing in the chemical laden sawdust.

Where a water vacuum really shines however is in the area of water pick up. Imagine having a filled bathtub and needing to work on the drain. Removing the water is the first action needed to let you even get to the drain that needs repair. Yes, it's possible to manually bucket out the water, making a mess along the way to emptying each bucket. The faster and easier way however is to just hook up that shop vac and suck out the water into the large holding tank of the vacuum. It's fast, easy and you will make fewer trips to empty a shop vac than doing it by hand.

There are many other emergency uses where a wet-dry shop vac can come in handy. If you're a homeowner, there always seems to be some problem lying just around the corner. A washing machine overflow due to a clogged drain pipe, a water heater leak or if you have kids, "someone" that used the toilet to give their a teddy bear a bath and overflowed the toilet. All these minor emergencies can be quickly cleaned up using a water vacuum cleaner instead of a mop and bucket.

The large vacuum hose also is great to pick up a variety of things that would take a long time to do by hand. Back in the workshop, kitty litter is great for cleaning up those accidental spills. Spilling the kitty litter however is a much bigger mess due to it's very dusty nature. Most kitty litter, at least the stuff we use in spillage control is made of clay granules. Clay however tends to be dusty in the bag causing little clay dust storms when cleaning up large amounts of the material. Using a water vacuum however, the kitty litter can easily be collected without making another dusty mess.

I hope that these few examples of how to use a water vacuum cleaner has helped you in your path to realizing how convenient having one of these wet-dry vacuums can be around the house.