That would ROCK! I want one.
How does the cigarette smoke kill them? Is it a poison or just a lack of oxygen?
This is just a WAG, M$CE, but I assumed that it was a combination of the particulate matter in the smoke clogging the tiny pores through which they breath, plus the nicotine and perhaps the elevated carbon di- and mon- oxide gas levels in the smoke.
And thanks, David Simmons, I’d overlooked the danger of a flour dust explosion. I actually used to have a book of do-it-yourself science experiments years and years ago and one of the demonstrations was to blow the hell out of a paper grocery bag inverted over a candle by injecting a puff of flour out of a bicycle pump.
Ah, the joys of science…
And I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords.
I wouldn’t be too concerned about dust explosions with a Shopvac since they are made to suck up massive quantities of fine sawdust. Get a CleanStream filter so that you don’t return the fine powder right back into the air. You could suck up some diatomaceous earth (sold at stores as a bug killer, it’s pretty harmless to people) to finish 'em off, but since you are using a wet-dry vac, why not just stick the hose into a bucket of soapy water?
Personally I’d use my shop dust collector which has many times the suction of any shopvac ever made, plus the added bonus of running the little beasties through a steel impeller (chop) and then swirling them around in a big bag of sawdust (choke). The bags even have clear windows so that one can watch the show.
Sawdust is one thing, flour is something else. Particle size is crucial in determing whether or not a combustible dust is explosive.
From the cite I gave above: “For a dust explosion to occur, several factors must come together, according to Dust Explosions in Process Industries by Rolf K. Eckhoff. First, there must be fuel, or grain dust. The critical parameter for grain particle size is 0.1 mm (0.004 in approx.) or smaller. As the size of the particle decreases, the risk of a deflagration or explosion increases.”
Sawdust isn’t particularly explosive because most of the particles are too big, although it is a fire hazard.
Dust explosions shouldn’t be a very large risk with a vacuum cleaner, since you’re not dispersing the dust into a large volume of air, but in fact collecting it together in a small space (the bag) explosion from aerosol propellants would be though (as per my earlier idea of spraying raid down the tube - if there’s a flammable propellant involved, it could well be ignited on its way past the motor brushes.
So anyway… are those spiders and other bugs I’ve vacuumed up likely to come crawling back out of the Hoover as soon as my back’s turned?
Probably not, unless the vacuum cleaner was fitted with a new, clean dust bag at the time and was only used to suck up the wasp, then switched off - otherwise it’s a reasonable certainty that the house dust already in the bag would choke the insect. Most spiders would probably be fatally injured on the rapid journey along the hose.
Some vacuum cleaners (particularly the upright sort) are designed so that the debris being picked up all passes through the turbine anyway and is pushed into the bag - in this case, the beasties would quite likely be killed before they hit the bag.
My husband’s Grandmother sucked up a large spider with the vacuum, and it crawled back out the hose two days later, or so I’m told.
Now that I think about it, I have a few questions about that story. Did she see the spider crawl out? If not, how does she know it wasn’t another one? Isn’t it possible that a second spider just happened to hide in the end of the hose and come wandering out when she looked? Or did she inspect the contents of the bag and find it empty… and if so, then how does she know it took two days? Ok, my husband’s Grandmother’s story isn’t the most reliable anecdote now that I think about it. Take it with a grain of salt.
Hey guys, dust doesn’t explode. My quite specific reference was to the suggestion that flour be put into the vacuum to kill the wasps. I think flour is just as explosive as insecticide.
Dust of various kinds (including flour and possibly house dust too) does explode when finely dispersed in air - my point is that the finely-disperesed bit isn’t happening in the vacuum cleaner bag.
Insert (when ignited) in my post somewhere.
Aerosol insecticide is likely to be a far more dangerous thing than flour to be sucking into a vacuum cleaner because the propellant gas (maybe butane or something) will pass straight through the bag and through the motor - flour won’t do this - picking up powders such as flour is almost exactly what vacuum cleaners are designed to do, without exploding.
And grain elevators are designed to handle grain and flour mills are designed to handle flour. But go ahead and dump in some flour, the world has too many people anyway.
I a little dismayed at the tone of your response David; can we not rationally discuss this subject?
If you want to be rational, no dust is ever drawn through the motor as you wrote in your last post. In the cannister type the filter coveres the motor and in the bag type the air pump impellor is in a separate compartment with a sealed bearing that keeps dust out of the motor.
And if we are being rational I think it is irrational to try to justify putting a known explosive substance into a vacuum cleaner.
I did not at any point say that dust was drawn through the motor.
Back when I was young and happy, I spend the summer shooting at paper wasp nests with a BB gun. I plug 'em with 10 shots a day to see how long they could handle the losses. Once a lucky shot hit the queen, it was all over for the nest.
Ah, the sweet memories of a wasted youth.
Cancer.
My leaf blower has a vacuum attachment, the leafs get sucked in, then pretty much get pureed by the fan. It’s stronger than any wet dry vac, any you could have the pleasure watching the disembodied thoraxi spitting out of the exhaust.
That’s right, you didn’t. Sorry about that.
As to discussion I don’t see that there is anything to discuss. I think that when flour into a vacuum cleaner is suggested it isn’t a bit out of order to warn that finely divided and combustible material dispersed in a cloud is a bomb waiting for an ignition source be it static electricity or two metal screws banging together. The fact that there might be other danger sources doesn’t make it any less a hazard.
And after having been told someone wants to ignore it that’s OK by me as long as they are in another part of town and I’m away for a vacation.
In a world where just this past week, an airport X-ray machine causes flashlight batteries to explode like a bomb, it is not unreasonable to exercise a little caution before sucking flammable powders into areas where they could conceivably encounter an ignition source. The warning on my ShopVac is very plain about not using it to suck up even sawdust without the appropriate, and vacuum robbing, filter in place.