New blower for boat lift? Can I use a shop Vac?
 

I have a 20+ year old econo lift thats in great shape but the other day I couldn't get the lift to come up and noticed the housing for my super old lift blower is deteriorated. I went and grabbed my shop vac and used it raise the lift by connecting the hose the the outlet and holding it up against the lift tubing.

After searching for a replacement housing or reasonably priced lift control box I started wondering why can't I just buy a small shop vac and use that. Bonus, I'll have a vacuum mounted to the dock and ready to vacuum the boat any time.

FYI, my current setup has manual valves for filling and draining the lift tank so the actual procedure would be identical using a vacuum as it was when installed 20+ years ago.

What are your thoughts?

Most of the lift blowers use a commercial duty vacum motor, I ended finding my first one at a commercial car wash supplier, I found the one I just purchased at a central vac site, not sure if this is the one, but it'll get you started;

http://builtinvacuum.com/parts/vacuum-motors.html

Jack,
My motor is fine but my housing is jacked(no offense ;-) up. However, I was able to build a housing with parts I found at a plumbing supply store. I used a rubber 5" pipe coupler which fit right over my blower motor and capped the other end with PVC. Works great and looks pretty good. I'm back in business.

I really appreciate the link to the motors. I may pick one up to have a spare since mine is super old. Thanks again!