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

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.

I have seen a good number of these "emulated" at DIY websites, normally with acrylic tops. I had expected to get a pot much like what I had in the kitchen and nice piece of glass. I was flat out blown away by the quality of the this Vacuum chamber!The pot itself is very heavy stainless steel, much thicker than what I expected. A true pressure vessel! The glass top? 3/4 of an inch of tempered glass! Incredibly thick and hard to believe at this price point. Set up was a breeze, screw on the gauges and in moments I had -26 inHG.It comes with a top quality hose with 1/4" flare fittings, fit my current setup nicely.So much better than the dinky desiccator I was using, I am very pleased with every aspect of this unit! I would give a sixth star if I could.

I've been testing this over the past week and it really does work well. I'm using a diaphragm pump with it and I only really need to achieve about -28 inches Hg of vacuum and the combination works well. It has held the vacuum for several days, no problem. It might leak about 0.3 to 0.4 inches Hg/day, but with barometric changes thrown into the mix, it's hard to nail down exactly what the amount might be.I had to contact support to ask them what fittings to use with the included vacuum hose. If you can't supply them with an order number, they just ignore you, which makes NO sense. I gave them the manufacturer part number and they couldn't be bothered to answer this simple question. If you're curious, I measured the fittings and it's a 1/4 inch flare fitting at 45 degrees. Knocked a star for poor support.

3 gallon kitI originally purchased the kit with an Acrylic lid, ASIN B00W8ZU5FK.I needed a stabilizing chamber to stabilize very soft, 'punky' wood for turning pens and other round work. I have lots of hardwood firewood with nice figuring due to spalding in the exterior edges. I have been using CA glue to harden the soft wood but this has been expensive and time consuming, so I decided to use stabilizing.Being new to stabilizing I had several questions that weren't satisfied by online research.I registered the kit with BACO and submitted a ticket with my questions, and BACO responded the next day with detailed answers and encouragement to contact them with any further questions.I had no issues with the pump and stainless steel chamber maintaining ~28.5 Hg for 24 hours+. After reaching 28.5 I can turn the pump off with no decrease in vacuum.During the support discussion I was asked to evaluate this chamber with a glass lid and the gauge assembly mounted on the chamber instead of on the lid.I received the new chamber on Oct. 14 and have stabilized several batches of pen blanks the past week.I am very happy with the new design. Any resin splash that gets on the glass lid is easily cleaned.One concern I had was that I use a Pyrex bowl in the chamber to hold my blanks, and with the new side mounted gauge assembly being mounted 5" from the bottom of the chamber I feared resin may be drawn into the vacuum line.This proved to not be an issue so far. But I found 1000 ml glass beakers at Michaels for $5 and will start using those if necessary.BACO has indicated they will address the concern of the vacuum port location.As for stabilizing, the pic above with the 2 blanks shows the raw punky blank (soft enough to indent with a fingernail) on the left and a stabilized blank from the same piece of wood on the right. The stabilized blank weighs 2.5 oz., the raw blank 1 oz, the vacuum filled the blank to the center with resin.The pic on the right shows a Cigar style pen after turning the stabilized blank in the left pic.I haven't used other brands of stabilizing equipment so I can't compare the BACO, but for the price, quality and BACO's demonstrated concern for customer satisfaction I would not hesitate to purchase from them in the future.

Great product. Just add some pressure on the lid when starting and it does the rest

This setup is built like a tank. I was hesitant to buy it, but my setup finally gave up. The glass lid is heavy and I was able to get 29in hg out of my pump with it no problem. I let it set for a couple of hours under vacuum with the valve shut off, and lost 0 Vacuum with itI needed a 5 gallon set up , but this will be a good compromise.I have seen YouTube reviews and others complaining about the handle that his pot. This is a very easy fix by simply rotating the handles 180ﾟ. No issues by doing this . I was also concerned about the sealing of the Gauge mounted on the side of the pot. This is also a non issue.They also included assortment of seals for the Gauge to the pot. This is one of the better purchases I have made.Not one regret so far.

Very well made, nice heavy lid.