Bissell 18P03 review

What the maker puts in writing

• “12 Amp Wet/Dry Vacuum: Picks up both wet and dry messes in the garage, car, workshop, etc”
• “Converts to blower”
• “Includes 7 Versatile attachments and accessory bag for cleanup on barefloor, carpeting, upholstery and much more”
• “4 Gallon Semi-Translucent Dirt Tank”
• “Includes Wall Mounting Kit with extra long hose that stretches 32-feet”
• Description: “Being able to mount the Garage Pro on the wall gives you more floor space in your garage… The 4-gallon dirt tank is semi-translucent and has an LED Full Water Tank Indicator so you won’t have to guess when it needs to be emptied”
• Catalog: 2835 g (100 oz) · 279 × 279 × 660 mm (11 × 11 × 26 in)

The only machine here that tells you when it is full

“The 4-gallon dirt tank is semi-translucent and has an LED Full Water Tank Indicator so you won’t have to guess.”

Two warnings — one you look at, one that looks for you — and eleven of these twelve listings publish nothing of the kind.

What they prevent is the single failure that ends a wet vacuum: water rising past the float and reaching the motor, which destroys the impeller and the windings in seconds.

And on a wall-mounted machine the risk is worse than usual, because the tank is above eye level and you cannot glance into it while working.

The nearest alternative on this shelf is a drain, which only the Shop-Vac at $139.99 has: a “bottom drain outlet… without lifting or tilting the machine”.

This listing does not mention one, which means four gallons — about 15 liters, or fifteen kilos — comes down off a wall by hand.

The Giraffe Tools pair have the right idea for a wall unit and this listing does not: “Press the orange quick-release latches to detach the heavy-duty tank. Slide it out, empty debris, and click it back into place.”

So: the best warning on the shelf, and no help once it fires.

Thirty-two feet, which is the longest hose here

“Wall Mounting Kit with extra long hose that stretches 32-feet.”

And the description gives the reasoning properly: “mounting the Garage Pro on the wall gives you more floor space… you won’t have to maneuver around it all the time. Since it has a 32-foot hose, you can still reach inside your car and around the garage.”

That is the whole argument for a wall vacuum, and thirty-two feet is what makes it work. A mounted machine with a short hose is worse than a floor machine, because you cannot bring it to the mess.

The shelf, for comparison:

this — a 32 ft hose Giraffe Tools ×2 — 30 ft, retractable Vacmaster VFB511H — “25 feet of cleaning reach” (hose and cord together) Craftsman 17040 — 15 ft cord + 7 ft hose = 22 ft Armor All AA255W — 18 ft · Shop-Vac and Vacmaster VOC508S — 16 ft · Armor All AA155 — 10 ft Kärcher — a 3.9 ft hose, cordless, so it travels with you

What this does not claim, and the Giraffe Tools pair do, is a retractable hose: theirs has “a guidance system [that] can roll up the hose neatly without kinking”. Thirty-two feet of loose hose in a garage is a genuine nuisance — it tangles, it gets driven over, and it ends up on the floor you mounted the machine to clear.

Twelve amps, which is a real figure

Twelve amps at 120 volts is 1440 watts of input power, and it is the larger of only two amp figures on this shelf — the other being this maker’s own 2035M at 11 amps.

Seven of twelve listings publish peak horsepower instead, and peak horsepower is not a power figure:

Vacmaster VFB511H 5.5 PHP = 4100 W · Craftsman 17040 5.0 = 3730 W · Shop-Vac 4.5 = 3356 W · Vacmaster VOC508S 4.0 = 2983 W · Craftsman 17250 2.5 · Armor All ×2 2.0

A 120 V socket on a 15 A breaker supplies about 1800 W, so the top four cannot be sustained — they are measured at stall or over a fraction of a second.

And Vacmaster settles it by publishing both scales on its own machines: “5.5 PHP” with “320 Air Watts”, against “4 Peak HP” with “135 air watt motor” — +37 per cent claimed against +137 per cent real.

What amps does not tell you is output. Input watts describe the electricity; air watts describe the work at the nozzle, and only Vacmaster publishes those. Three machines publish kPa, all at 20 kPa — including both Giraffe Tools wall units, which is the direct comparison this listing cannot answer.

So twelve amps is honest and incomplete.

A weight that cannot be right

2835 g is 6.25 pounds, for a wall-mounted four-gallon vacuum with a 12 amp motor. A 12 A motor and its housing weigh more than that alone.

The shelf, for scale:

Armor All AA155 2087 g — a 1.5-gallon handheld this 2835 g — a 4-gallon wall unit Kärcher 3629 g — a 1.8-gallon cordless Armor All AA255W 4985 g · Vacmaster VOC508S 5300 g · Shop-Vac 6804 g · Vacmaster VFB511H 6985 g · Craftsman 17040 7257 g — a 4-gallon floor machine · Bissell 2035M 7303 g — 6 gallons Giraffe Tools 27,216 g and 27,302 g — 4.5-gallon wall units

The two Giraffe Tools listings publish their weight in words as well, twice each: “The vacuum diameter is 291920 inch, and 60LBS, needs team lift” — and their catalog figures agree exactly, at 60.0 and 60.2 lb.

So the figure here describes something other than the complete machine, and the consequence is practical: you cannot plan a wall fixing from this listing.

Before drilling, weigh the unit or assume something near the Craftsman’s 7 kg (15.4 lb), plus four gallons of water at another 15 kg (33.1 lb) when it is full. That is a fixing into masonry or a stud, not a plasterboard anchor.

Seven attachments, and a bag to keep them in

Seven, with an accessory bag, for “barefloor, carpeting, upholstery and much more”.

The bag is the part worth noting on a wall-mounted machine. The Giraffe Tools pair mount their attachments on the wall beside the vacuum and state the reason — it “reduces accessories missing” — and a bag is the less elegant answer to the same problem.

Count across the shelf: Armor All AA255W thirteen · Vacmaster VFB511H nine · this seven · Armor All AA155, Vacmaster VOC508S and both Giraffe Tools machines six · Craftsman 17040 five · Craftsman 17250 four · Kärcher two.

What the listing does not do is name them, which the Armor All AA255W does in full — including the two filter types, and a floor brush/squeegee nozzle for standing water.

That omission matters here for one reason in particular, below.

What is not published

No filtration, and no statement of a wet filter. On a machine sold as wet and dry, this is the significant gap.

A cartridge filter traps fine dust and is ruined the moment water passes through it — it clogs, sags, and then lets dust straight into the motor. A foam sleeve handles water and traps almost no dust. So most machines need both, and you swap.

The Vacmaster VOC508S at $74.99 states the pairing — “a cartridge filter for dry pick-up and a foam wet filter for wet pick-up” — and the Armor All AA255W supplies both. The Kärcher at $172.99 is the only machine here that needs no swap: “the top-mounted cartridge filter… no matter if wet or dry dirt.”

This listing names neither, so check what is fitted before the first spill.

No filtration rating. The Vacmaster VFB511H at $97.64 is the only machine on this shelf that publishes one, at 1 micron; the sibling 2035M publishes “2 stage filtration”.

No air watts and no kPa, where both Giraffe Tools wall units publish 20 kPa — the figure that would let you compare the three wall machines directly.

No drain, as above.

No hose bore. Three listings publish one: the Craftsman 17040 at 1-7/8 inch, the Craftsman 17250 and Armor All AA255W at 1-1/4 inch. On a 32-foot hose the bore matters twice over, because a long narrow hose loses airflow along its length as well as blocking on debris.

No retractable mechanism.

No warranty. Both Craftsman machines publish 3 years and both Giraffe Tools machines 24 months. The other eight, this included, publish none — which on a $249.99 machine you are about to bolt to a wall is the omission worth weighing.

And no gallon qualification — only the Craftsman 17250 admits that “gallons indicated reflect drum volume, not necessarily” the usable capacity, which applies to this four-gallon figure too.

Availability

Read on the day this page was built: $250 at the American Amazon shop.

Read from Keepa on the day this page was last revised; stock and price both move without notice.