Craftsman 16-Gallon Review

The easily removable lid and a drain plug make emptying our messes straightforward once the vacuum is full.

Airflow & Suction Power

The Craftsman led the pack with an outstanding airflow of 274 cubic feet per minute. This translated into impressive cleaning abilities that handled all the debris we through at it without slowing down. While the measured water lift of 50 inches (inH2O) was middle of the road, we believe it was enough to get the process going, while the superior airflow was able to do the rest of the work.

When you widen the diameter of the hose, you typically lose out on power, but the 6.5-horsepower motor is able to compensate for the design. Add in the high-volume canister, and this machine is designed to handle much larger messes than the competition. We loved this shop vac for heavy projects like home renovations or outdoor work that required picking up a variety of objects of different sizes and masses. With its flawless real-world work, there isn't much that the Craftsman can't tackle.

Floor Cleaning

The Craftsman boasted the fastest dry mess cleanup time of any vacuum tested. Cleaning up 2 gallons of dry mixed debris in 35 seconds, it experienced no clogs or slowdowns. Debris moved through the 2.5-inch wide hose quickly and entered the large canister unobstructed. Even submerging the nozzle in thick wood chips and tree bark did not slow it down, and it continued to wolf down the debris.

It's also able to extract a high volume of water quickly, with its pack-leading wet mess cleanup of 6 seconds, lending a valuable tool when you experience floods or surprise water leakages. This product proved its worth as a powerful vacuum fit for professional jobs or serious hobbyists.

Not only did the Craftsman clean up messes quickly, but it also cleaned them up thoroughly. After hours of working with it, cleaning up messes from carpets, lawns, garages, and hardwood floors, we can confidently say that it excels in the real world, and not just in our laboratory tests. When removing pine needles embedded in thick carpet or sticky tree buds from car floor mats, it had more than enough lift to remove even the most stubborn debris.

Tool Use

This vacuum comes armed with 4 different attachments: a utility nozzle, a wet or floor nozzle, a car nozzle, and a crevice tool. This gives the vacuum great versatility to handle a variety of different jobs. The utility nozzle was the most useful. At 8.75 inches wide, it was wide enough to clean up big spills, but still nimble enough to reach into smaller spaces.

Whenever we need to get into a nook and cranny, the crevice tool is perfect for reaching those hard-to-reach spots. The dedicated car nozzle is the least effective. It fits into an awkward space of being too wide for crevices, but too small to clean up wider messes efficiently. After tracking in piles of mud and water into our garage after working outside, the wet nozzle, complete with an integrated rubber squeegee, was the perfect tool to clean up spills and liquids.

When it came to storing all these attachments, they were either on the lid or the top of the caster feet. Both featured friction-fit storage points for keeping all the attachments with the vacuum. We never knocked these loose accidentally, and having all the attachments together kept us from misplacing them.

Hose clips on the lid also kept the hose secure while in transit, and the handle doubled as wrap storage for the power cord. When moving between job sites, this storage system kept all parts together and made it easy to move between projects without misplacing any crucial pieces.

Portability

On a day when we went from using this vacuum in the garage to out in the driveway and back into the garage again, we were struck by the ease of movement of this heavy-duty machine.

The slightly larger diameter casters are located around the outside of the canister, a unique design where many are located directly underneath. This gives the vacuum more stability and a wider base, making it harder to tip over. With the four casters spread around the round canister, 360-degree movement is easy and unhindered for moving quickly around your work site.

With a measured weight of 23.75 pounds, the Craftsman is on the heavier end of shop vacs in our lineup. That being said, hoisting it in and out of the back of the truck wasn't overly difficult thanks to a well-placed handle in the center of the vacuum at the top. You likely won't be carrying this vacuum around very much, but thanks to its well-designed wheels, you won't have to.

Should You Buy the Craftsman 16-Gallon?

The Craftsman 16-Gallon is perfect for the serious hobbyist or seasoned professional needing a high-power vacuum, with simple yet effective attachments and features. Its strong suction power and impressive cleaning performance make it a must for anyone needing to accomplish large tasks quickly and effectively. However, the sheer size of this vacuum makes it not the best choice if you are tight on space, or do not have a dedicated workspace to store it in. This makes it less useful for household use and better for life in a dedicated workshop or garage space.

What Other Shop Vacs Should You Consider?