BACOENG 5 Gallon Tempered Glass Lid Stainless Steel Vacuum Chamber Perfect for Stabilizing Wood, Degassing Silicones, Epoxies and Essential Oils.

I’ll be blunt. I have three vacuum chambers. All are Bac Eng because the quality is second to none. I have a small one for epoxy, a mid sized acrylic one for short term vacuum and special projects that require visibility. And of course this 5 gallon beast. I use it for storing things that require long term vacuum storage. This chamber was purchased almost a month ago and I pulled a vacuum on it all the way down to -28.5 inHg. I just checked it and it’s reading -28 inHg after all this time. That’s absolutely astounding for a vacuum chamber to hold for that long and barely lose any vacuum. The very thick tempered glass lid is a great innovation and is the reason for the incredibly effective consistent vacuum. Easily one of the best purchases I’ve made in a long time. Highly recommended.

The pot leaked around the hole where the air is sucked out of the pot where the vacuum gauge is mounted. It would only hold vacuum for a few minutes before all vacuum was totally gone. I tried to tighten the setup (hex nuts) that was provided from the factory and found it could not be tightened enough and squashed the rubber washers to the point of potential damage. After trying several different things and testing my various fixes I added a flat steel washer on both sides of the pot next to the rubber washers that came with the pot. The steel washer allowed the setup to be tightened enough without damaging the rubber washers to create a leak proof seal. I tested the vacuum over night and it is now holding vacuum as it should have from the factory. This ended up being a simple fix for me because I had the parts and tools, however, I should have never had to do this on a brand new vacuum pot. Every thing else has worked fine since I did my repair (only used it about 10 times so far). For someone who does not have the tools, parts and know how to perform the fix I did this item would have had to be returned and I would have been very upset. Had the vacuum pot worked from the start I would have given a 5 star rating based on value for the money and ease of operation. One nice coincidence is the vacuum pump and hoses all fit in the stainless steel pot. I used a bungy cord to hold the lid on during storage.

I love this thing, the capacity is huge and i like that the guage is not attached to the glass!

First things first, product does what it says on the tin. I can run this down to ~30"hg as indicated and it will hold there for hours. As others have noted, the valve+gauge mount to the body is flimsy and kinda just hangs there. Any force applied (like, having a vacuum hose attached) means the entire thing will twist to one side and hang at a weird angle. This doesn't seem to affect the performance of the unit, but it's a poor design and everyone using this will immediately run into this problem. Also, my unit came with the exhaust valve setup incorrectly, such that you need to be able to run the handle through the sidewall chamber itself to actually close the thing. I sent a support request to BACOENG on their web site, received an automated reply that a ticket was created, then never heard another peep. The fix wound up being easy enough (just unscrew the handle, give it a half-twist, then put it back on), but I would expect that A) the unit would come assembled correctly, and B) BACOENG would respond when asked about it. I don't expect all things to be perfect, but I do expect the vendor to deal with it. Two stars knocked off for all of the above. If you buy this thing, don't expect to get any support or response at all from the vendor.

Required some minor assembly out of the box, nothing I couldn't do with hands and an adjustable wrench. 5-6 minutes later the air filter was attached, and the pressure monitor was installed using two rubber washers. Connected it up to my single stage vacuum pump, 7 minutes or so later it was at -29. I didn't even have to apply pressure to the lid. Closed the inlet, turned off my pump, walked away for 40-45 minutes. When I got back it was still sitting right at -29 with no change whatsoever. I call that good. I only plan to use this for resin and silicon degassing, I will never need to degass for anywhere near that length of time, and it is big enough to easily accommodate my needs. If you are serious about getting into resin work and silicone molding and need a vacuum chamber, do yourself a favor. Spend the extra bucks and get something like this that will stand up to all your needs and get any job you need done, well... done.