Dewalt recently announced that they’re coming out with two new compact wet/dry vacuums.
The DCV580 is a cordless-only vac, and is compatible with both 18V stem-style and 20V Max slide-style battery packs. It comes with a high efficiency washable and reusable filter.
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The DCV581H vac can be powered off of 18V and 20V Max batteries as well, but also features a 5-foot long AC power cord. It is equipped with a HEPA-rated washable and reusable filter.
The new cleanup vacs were designed to be compact and multi-functional. In addition to the expected suction mode, there’s also a blower feature. On-board accessory and cord storage help keep the vac nice and neat.
The 1-1/4″ hose is 5′ long, which should be plenty for smaller tasks. Both vacs also come with a crevice tool and wide nozzle. Tank capacity is about 2 gallons.
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The DCV580 is available now for about $110-120 for just the vac. Batteries and a charger are not included. The DCV581H will likely be priced closer to $129, and will be available starting in the Fall of 2013.
Correction: the DCV580 is a cordless model, DCV581H is a cordless and corded model.
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First Impression
Cordless vacs, or corded vacs with a cordless option, can be pretty useful. I have a smaller Dewalt DC515K vacuum that I purchased nearly 3 years ago (kit via Amazon) and it comes in handy from time to time. Sure it’s noisy, somewhat clumsy to use, and quick to clog and fill up, but it can go where full size dust extractors and shop vacuum can’t.
Thumbs up to Dewalt for making these vacs compatible with both 18V and 20V Max battery packs.
mnoswad1
Definitely getting the one with ac power and battery option. Still using 18 volt and plan to do so for quite sometime, so this is perfect to keep me from defecting from DeWalt once I eventually switch to new battery tech.
mnoswad1
According to some videos i just watched, seems the DCV580 is battery power only and the 581 has AC cord. don’t know why they would even consider a non AC version when the AC option is so obviously a more versatile product.
I’ll wait for the 581, but it’s going to be a must buy for me.
Stuart
Oops, you’re right, thanks for the correction!
Hang Fire
I had the 18V deWalt Vac at work, it had both the battery and the 110V power cord.
The batteries would last less than 10 minutes, but you could get a whole lot of cleaning done in that time. Also it didn’t fall over all the time like the 110V 1.25gal Shop Vac.
My only issue with it is that it didn’t recharge its own battery.
It seems strange they would take away the power cord from the battery powered model. That versatility was great!
Jason
It’s just so they can offer it at a cheaper price. The cost of parts to go from ac power to dc power probably add 20-30 bucks to the price of the tool, so they gave the option to people that figure they wouldn’t use ac power that often and gave them a discount.
mnoswad1
wouldn’t it make more sense to have one item, one design, one inventory, one manufacturing contract and one good product that every customer could use with any power source. Building twice as many of one thing is cheaper than building half as many of both….combined. Thus the price overall could be lower. Same profit, better product, better customer value, no buyers remorse, less returns for buying the wrong version, win, win, win.
The quest to add SKU numbers seems to be the only inspiration for this kind of marketing redundancy. Dewalt should ditch the battery only version.
Jason
Yea I would think in the long run it would be cheaper to offer one unit and most stores have been wanting to cut down the number of sku’s they carry, I’m not in marketing so they must think it’s worth all the hassle of doing it this way.
John S
I would tend to agree that being able to use either/or is the best option… When such an option exists, I find it hard to believe people would really prefer saving a few pennies to get the battery only…
Stuart
Dewalt has said that the price of the vacs will be $99-129. If the cordless model street price drops to $99 and the HEPA version comes out at $129, you can bet that $30 difference is going to be very influential to users’ purchasing decisions.
$10 might not be a significant enough difference, but $15, $25, or even $30 would be enough to justify there being two models.
My feeling is that the pure cordless model will appeal to heavier Dewalt users that have plenty of batteries to spare, while the corded version will appeal to those who need a HEPA filter, longer runtime, and those who might not have any other cordless Dewalt tools at all.
Javier
How much hp do these have? I like the idea and would love a cordless vac but I need a powerful portable wet dry vac. I have the ridgid 4 gallon 5hp portable wet dry vac on wheels and its great only thing I would like on it would be a cordless option.
Stuart
Probably not very high – cordless vacs never are.
Javier
Just spotted the cordless only vac at lowes for $89. Also the 20v/12v radio was next to it for $179. No display for either tools
Bill
Let’s hope it’s not the ear-splitting disaster that was their previous 18v vacuum. That thing was HORRENDOUSLY loud, and had a too tiny canister. Worst purchase I’ve ever made from DeWalt.
Chris
This looks like a good product. It looks more like the milwaukee 18V vac which I’ve had for a year. Honestly these cordless vacs are fantastic. The 18V vac is literally my most used tool because it gets dual use on basically every job I do as well as general use around the house.