Riccar R-40 P2 Upright - good/bad?

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kitra

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Hello, We inherited a Riccar R-40, like the Title says. It looks perfect, hardly a mark on it. I think they were too weak to use it much since it's heavy. The local Riccar Dealer told us the used value to them is only around $45. They claimed the "P2" revision had lots of issues.

Is this Vacuum really problematic? I looked it up and it was a lot of money ($1500) when new. I restore Vacuums as a hobby and sell "some". My Hobby is completely out-of-control as I have too many Vacuums. I'd like to fix any issues with the Riccar R-40 but the Dealer wouldn't comment what they are. I don't want to sell it to anyone IF it's a lemon. It seems to work really well for the little time we used it.
 
I used to work for vacuum shops. The R40 in my opinion are overrated. The predecessor models that came before them (known as RAD) were better machines reliability wise. The R40 has some user improvements over the RAD but made them more complicated underneath the hood circuitry wise. I later learned that when we had more R40 machines come in for technical repair. And now I can no longer recommend them, they're just not worth it at least for the price that is. I think I'd agree that $45 is fair enough as once it breaks, good luck trying to get it fixed as the parts are super expensive and you have to deal with getting them shipped from Asia when they're out of stock.
 
OK, I guess I'll sell it to them? My Neighbor just gave me $120 for a Simplicity 7850 Series 7 and $50 for a Riccar 8900. I should not have sold the 7850 because it was one of our favorite Vacuums. It (7850) seems quieter than the others we own. It is in perfect shape since we never peeled the plastic off the lower cover when we bought it. He uses it for his Day care Business.

The Wife is currently using a Simplicity Cordless Upright. I bought it for $20 with a dead battery. I bought new 18650 Cells and spot-welded up a battery pack with higher capacity Cells. Does a good-enough job.
 
Both the 7850 and 8900 were great machines, one of my personal favorites as well. You can still get similar machines to those today under their commercial brand called CleanMax. Or there's a company that makes clones of those machines called Cirrus.
 
panasonicvac said:
Both the 7850 and 8900 were great machines, one of my personal favorites as well. You can still get similar machines to those today under their commercial brand called CleanMax. Or there's a company that makes clones of those machines called Cirrus.
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Din't forget Titan. Pretty sure they are made for the Titan brand by Tacony. I actually think some of the Titan models are better than what Riccar is selling now, which is sad.
 
Wish I could buy my Riccar 7850 back. Being my Neighbor, I sold it to him cheap. It really does look new. He took the plastic off the lower cover and it is new. The Serial number starts with 7A00.
 
panasonicvac said:
They are, however the Titan doesn't use a twin fan motor as the CleanMax line.
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Do you mean a two stage motor? That is neither here nor there for me. Modern single stage fan designs have fan elements that are curved lenghtwise and in cross section plus the fan is conical so the individual fan blades become wider towards the center. These are so much better than old flat fan designs. Panasonic and Hitachi have vacuum motors in their Japanese canister models that move huge amounts of air on less watts than most US household vacuums. Japan requires all vacuums to state their "Suction Work Rate", which is a method developed by Japan to measure cleaning performance of all vacuums sold there. Same standard applied across the board on all canister vacuums. It combines sealed suction and airflow measured over a period of time instead of an instantaneous measurement, and the product is multiplied by a factor. The best European vacuums from Miele and Electrolux sold in Japan earn a Suction Work Rate rating of 240 watts. There is one version of the Lux D820 that came with a high powered Domel motor rated at 280 watts. That is the most of any European vacuum sold in Japan. The top Japanese vacuums from Panasonic and Hitachi have suction work rate ratings from 580-680 watts. Fire one of those Japanese vacuums up on your 100 volt transformer ( Japan has 100-105 volt power ) and stand by because the power is unbelievable. Small single stage motors but very complex fan shapes that are based on a lot of computer simulation and the latest understanding of fluid dynamics. Superior in every way.
 
kitra said:
Hello, We inherited a Riccar R-40, like the Title says. It looks perfect, hardly a mark on it. I think they were too weak to use it much since it's heavy. The local Riccar Dealer told us the used value to them is only around $45. They claimed the "P2" revision had lots of issues.

Is this Vacuum really problematic? I looked it up and it was a lot of money ($1500) when new. I restore Vacuums as a hobby and sell "some". My Hobby is completely out-of-control as I have too many Vacuums. I'd like to fix any issues with the Riccar R-40 but the Dealer wouldn't comment what they are. I don't want to sell it to anyone IF it's a lemon. It seems to work really well for the little time we used it.
Click to expand...
I have 2 r40s bought new they even clean the air in the rooms you use the r40s but performance reviews YouTube channel has a video posted about complete repair of the r40s
 
Twin fan, double stage, I don't see a difference in what you call them. Personally, I'm a big fan of twin fan motors and I'd rather use a machine that has one. I usually find them to be quieter, more pleasant sounding and reliable. Sometimes even more powerful as well but that'd depend on what make and model. For Tacony, my Simplicity 7350 with a twin fan motor is more powerful than my 6570 with a single fan motor. And even my Simplicity 7750 with a twin fan motor is more powerful than my Simplicity Symmetry Entry or even my Riccar Vibrance USA with their single fan motor. The only single fan motor that I've noticed is more powerful than any of my Tacony uprights would be my uncle's Riccar Premium Vibrance R20P.2 back when they upgraded their single fan motors. While I really do like that machine, I wished my uncle had either a R20UP or a S20UP model instead because they're such quieter and pleasant sounding machines. I'm not too crazy with the way the R20P.2 sounds like, and I do question the reliability of the motor as one time someone put the wrong bag in it and one time someone didn't fully inserted the bag all the way in where alot of dirt was inside the bag chamber. If that happened on a Miele, chances are that Vortex motor would've likely already had bearing problems. So CleanMax no longer offers any model with a single fan motor, they're all twin fan now. And chances are if I had to replace the R20P.2 and still stick with Tacony, I'd buy one of the CleanMax models over the Titan or any of the Riccar Spirits. Because of the bag issue on the R20P.2, I now wish that my uncle could've bought a Riccar 8955 or my recommendation a SEBO X4 instead as we would've likely not had a problem with the bag issue but if it did, I know they're easier to take apart and clean.
 
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Well, I just sold my Riccar R-40. It had nothing wrong with it. It was near NOS as it had no scratches anywhere and the original Bag was 10% full. It was my Mom's. I think my Mom used it once. I got $700 for it. The Lady was ecstatic. A Dealer in Colorado I buy parts from sometimes told me they sell used R-40's for $650 - $900. He said try $700 after I sent him pictures. He agreed it was mint condition.
 
panasonicvac said:
I used to work for vacuum shops. The R40 in my opinion are overrated. The predecessor models that came before them (known as RAD) were better machines reliability wise. The R40 has some user improvements over the RAD but made them more complicated underneath the hood circuitry wise. I later learned that when we had more R40 machines come in for technical repair. And now I can no longer recommend them, they're just not worth it at least for the price that is. I think I'd agree that $45 is fair enough as once it breaks, good luck trying to get it fixed as the parts are super expensive and you have to deal with getting them shipped from Asia when they're out of stock.
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Are you referring to the current style R40 with the Synergy dual headlights or teal blue Radiance R40P.2 that was sold just before then?
 
panasonicvac said:
That's with any 40 series which came out after 2014, these were the very first ones introduced.

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Gotcha. I've definitely noticed I hear about less problems with the older Tandem Air units vs the newer models. The ones made after about 2019 ish seem to be the worst offenders in terms of reliability.
 
I don't see the advantage of tandem air. All any appliance in North America is permitted to draw is 12 amps. So the sum of the amps from both motors cannot be more than 12. That means when using the vacuum for above floor or hard floor cleaning where the brush roll is turned off you have an 8 or 9 amp suction motor to work with. And that downstream through flow motor is operating in the heat from the upstream direct air motor, shortening its life. If you only have 12 amps to work with then a single through flow motor is, to me, a better choice and mechanically simpler too.
 
There is no advantage to tandem. It was a marketing gimmick invented by Tacony. The circuit boards in all of them were a huge problem. I know, I used to work at the factory for 10 years. I saw them throw a flaming radiance down the concrete stairs. I was standing right there. They hauled it outside and threw water on it. The Chinese motors that power the tandem air vacuums are garbage. Cheap to make. Constant broken fans in the direct air motor because the plastic they make the fan out of it so cheap. Again, ask me how I know. I guess the moral of the story is to never hire a vacuum cleaner collector to work in a vacuum cleaner factory, because he sees everything. The good, the bad, and the ugly. The engineers at the company were complete assholes.
 
dysonman1 said:
There is no advantage to tandem. It was a marketing gimmick invented by Tacony. The circuit boards in all of them were a huge problem. I know, I used to work at the factory for 10 years. I saw them throw a flaming radiance down the concrete stairs. I was standing right there. They hauled it outside and threw water on it. The Chinese motors that power the tandem air vacuums are garbage. Cheap to make. Constant broken fans in the direct air motor because the plastic they make the fan out of it so cheap. Again, ask me how I know. I guess the moral of the story is to never hire a vacuum cleaner collector to work in a vacuum cleaner factory, because he sees everything. The good, the bad, and the ugly. The engineers at the company were complete assholes.
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Tacony didn't invent tandem air vacuums. Airway and Kenmore had tandem air machines decades before Tacony.

The very first tandem air machine was a lash up of a Eureka direct air upright with the bag replaced by a normal canister vacuum wand and this was attached to a hose to a big Airway Sanitizor model 88. A cord ran down the hose to power the upright. Tom Gasko has one in his collection.

There was also the late 1980s Kenmore Ultravac. This was a normal 4.5 hp Whispertone canister that used what was called the Powermate II. The Powermate II was a weird device that was a power nozzle with a direct air suction motor very much like you would find in an Oreck, but instead of a wand it had a dirt chamber. You could use it like a regular power nozzle attached to the vacuum hose, or you could detach it from the hose, attach a separate cord to the same three pin socket the vacuum hose attaches to when it is on the hose, plug it into a wall outlet and use it for quick clean ups. Afterwards you could empty the dust bin by attaching it to the vacuum hose and turning the vacuum on. There was a seal where the hose attaches so dust didn't blow out the top when using it as a stand alone upright vacuum. I have one. They are kind of rickety because Kenmore made it so the handle could turn 90 degrees so you could get the Powermate II under furniture when using it with the vacuum hose. The swivel is loosey-goosey and makes it feel really cheap. Kenmore only made them for a few months. I have never seen one in a catalog. Jimmy Martin tells me they only sold them in a few markets as a test, a test that apparently failed. The nozzle base however was used to create a series of lightweight direct air uprights for Kenmore and the Panasonic MC-V100 Innkeeper.
 
cheesewonton said:
Tacony didn't invent tandem air vacuums. Airway and Kenmore had tandem air machines decades before Tacony.

The very first tandem air machine was a lash up of a Eureka direct air upright with the bag replaced by a normal canister vacuum wand and this was attached to a hose to a big Airway Sanitizor model 88. A cord ran down the hose to power the upright. Tom Gasko has one in his collection.

There was also the late 1980s Kenmore Ultravac. This was a normal 4.5 hp Whispertone canister that used what was called the Powermate II. The Powermate II was a weird device that was a power nozzle with a direct air suction motor very much like you would find in an Oreck, but instead of a wand it had a dirt chamber. You could use it like a regular power nozzle attached to the vacuum hose, or you could detach it from the hose, attach a separate cord to the same three pin socket the vacuum hose attaches to when it is on the hose, plug it into a wall outlet and use it for quick clean ups. Afterwards you could empty the dust bin by attaching it to the vacuum hose and turning the vacuum on. There was a seal where the hose attaches so dust didn't blow out the top when using it as a stand alone upright vacuum. I have one. They are kind of rickety because Kenmore made it so the handle could turn 90 degrees so you could get the Powermate II under furniture when using it with the vacuum hose. The swivel is loosey-goosey and makes it feel really cheap. Kenmore only made them for a few months. I have never seen one in a catalog. Jimmy Martin tells me they only sold them in a few markets as a test, a test that apparently failed. The nozzle base however was used to create a series of lightweight direct air uprights for Kenmore and the Panasonic MC-V100 Innkeeper.
Click to expand...
It was called the Kenmore ultra vac. When I retired, I sold mine to a man in Utah. IMG_0559.jpegSears sold them in the catalog. But it was the fall and winter sale catalog, not the big book. It was on the back cover. Also, the Regina canister with the brush and beat upright for a power nozzle had a fan.
 
dysonman1 said:
There is no advantage to tandem. It was a marketing gimmick invented by Tacony. The circuit boards in all of them were a huge problem. I know, I used to work at the factory for 10 years. I saw them throw a flaming radiance down the concrete stairs. I was standing right there. They hauled it outside and threw water on it. The Chinese motors that power the tandem air vacuums are garbage. Cheap to make. Constant broken fans in the direct air motor because the plastic they make the fan out of it so cheap. Again, ask me how I know. I guess the moral of the story is to never hire a vacuum cleaner collector to work in a vacuum cleaner factory, because he sees everything. The good, the bad, and the ugly. The engineers at the company were complete assholes.
Click to expand...
I find it intriguing from an engineering aspect and would like to have at least one in my collection as a piece of vacuum history. But from all the test I've seen people do I don't find it to be a big enough jump in airflow/suction power to justify the complexity. A single motor clean air machine (especially with a twin motor) seems to get 80-90% of the power whilst being much more simple internally. For everyday use I'd rather use something like a 7850 or my R20UP or my Simplicity S38.

Hell my Simplicity S38 has almost as much air flow while getting far more water lift. It's a shame Tacony got rid of that body style of canister, they we're far better than their successor
 
Ant_Tenna said:
I find it intriguing from an engineering aspect and would like to have at least one in my collection as a piece of vacuum history. But from all the test I've seen people do I don't find it to be a big enough jump in airflow/suction power to justify the complexity. A single motor clean air machine (especially with a twin motor) seems to get 80-90% of the power whilst being much more simple internally. For everyday use I'd rather use something like a 7850 or my R20UP or my Simplicity S38.

Hell my Simplicity S38 has almost as much air flow while getting far more water lift. It's a shame Tacony got rid of that body style of canister, they we're far better than their successor
Click to expand...
On Ametek's old website years ago you could pull up and read their many technical papers. The new site is different and I have not been able to figure out if they have them still and, if so, how to find them.
I recall one in particular paper comparing tandem air to a single through flow motor both drawing the maximum allowed 12 amps. Their paper claimed a lot of problems for tandem air especially for the downstream through flow motor that is breathing hot air from the direct air motor. Hot air is less dense so the through flow motor's efficiency was reduced. Also, getting a diet of already really hot air the through flow motor ran much too hot, reducing it's service life. There was no advantage in cleaning power for tandem air compared to a single full power through flow motor.
 
dysonman1 said:
It was called the Kenmore ultra vac. When I retired, I sold mine to a man in Utah. View attachment 169762Sears sold them in the catalog. But it was the fall and winter sale catalog, not the big book. It was on the back cover. Also, the Regina canister with the brush and beat upright for a power nozzle had a fan.
Click to expand...
Ah, I did not know about the Regina. Something research.
 
The only Tandem Air I'd have no problem with using is connecting a Volt power nozzle to a Riccar central vac. Personally, I'd rather just use a Riccar RPB-F nozzle and convert to a three brushroll instead of two so I can have a Radiance/Synergy style machine but with more power and no worries about breaking a fan. One of the vacuum shops I worked for before swore by the Tandem Air machines, they even claimed any can out clean a central vac. I don't agree. I mean I loved the older Tandem Air uprights like the Simplicity Synchronys, but I've simply used better. Even one of my old neighbors bought a Simplicity Synchrony but wasn't impressed with the suction so she came in the store one day asking about putting in a central vac just like her parents' house, my buddy then boss at the time tried to convince her that she already had a great vacuum and didn't needed it. Still unconvinced, he then recommended a Sanitaire Mighty Mite because it was WAY cheaper than putting in a central vac. Which honestly, why buy a Tandem Air upright when you can just simply buy a Sanitaire upright and a Sanitaire canister instead for alot less. That's what my other buddy at his old vacuum store recommended, he never cared about Tandem Air. Both of those not only make a great team but also have more power than any Tandem Air upright. But if it was up to me, I would've recommended her a central vac over both the Simplicity and Sanitaire combined in the first place.
 
I haven't visited my thread for some time. The Vacuum that I sold was the Teal Blue Radiance R40P.2. I believe the headlight on it went all the way across and later ones didn't. Wish I had another one to sell. Since it looked new, zero scratches on original Bag, the People who bought it were pleased since it now costs $1600.
 

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