A Clever Electrolux G User

[electrolux~137]

Here's an example of a consumer figuring out a vital improvement before the manufacturer did. In this case, understanding the great usefulness of being able to disconnect a power nozzle cord at the hose handle and devising their own makeshift way of doing so.

(The early Model G had one long cord going from the front of the motor to the handle of the power nozzle.)

See link.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Old-Vintage-ELE...cuum?hash=item5d26473a51&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

 

[aeoliandave]

Necessity is the Mother of Intervention. Well done without horribly butchering anything - I'd have done the same in the day. Makes a once piece long cord all the rarer - lovely for authentic display, a pain in the butt in use.

Not in this case, but I've often mused why the Electrolux extension power cords are so much longer than the hose; I figured so the cord could be spiraled evenly around the hose, which I do. No doubt the taping was done because those rubber cord clips tend to slide & rotate and cause 'floppy flacid cord syndrome'. Quite annoying getting tangled in the loopy cord or irritating the back of your hand when trying to vacuum comfortably and efficiently with a solid grip on the handle. I keep a wide rubber band on power nozzles so configured for exactly that reason - to keep the cord snugged up to the hose handle so my fingers wrap around the cord.

I wonder how many Sweeper Shops performed this PN cord surgery for customers before Electrolux made it factory standard?

Dave

 

[ohio_tuec]

I don't know, but finding an early PN with the plastic wand crack-free is a feat in and of itself. You would think Electrolux would have done this later on as a cost-cutting touch. Historically significant, terrible in practicality.

 

[aeoliandave]

Electrolux did abandon the one piece plastic PN wand introduced in 1959, flirted briefly with a telescopic wand (I'm told) but quickly settled on the non-telescopic two-section wand with a half length plastic sheath encapsulating the PN extension cord and socket. I always felt that was an awfully thick & ugly plastic sheath just to carry an embedded PN cord and they are a bastard to get apart with that overly engineered hidden latch arrangement - they were not meant for the housewife to take apart once assembled but they expected wifey or hubbypoo to assemble the damn thing...I have the manual that instructs how to assemble.

Up here in Canada Electrolux soldiered on with the marvelous telescopic electric wand in green right through 1973, then switched to the American-style sheathed version for the 1974 model AP-100.

The first Canadian telescopic wand from 1958 is a non-electric slim all aluminum construction for the early red 80 series. The USA never got this wand, I think.

 

[aeoliandave]

The very first Canadian PN in cream and red to match the 86 & 88 was borrowed from the USA and has the one piece plastic wand, as shown in this ad courtesy of compactelectra aka Fred Nelson.

I think Doug Smith has said that the Canadian electric telescopic was also made in red to match late 88s and these are extremely scarce.

 

[sireluxomatic]

Cords and wands and other things

What I've found, when using the G, is similar to what you've said above; the cord does tend to move around a bit and gets in the way of a comfortable grip on the handle. I have a gray hose cord for my Gs (which I don't think is original), and when spiraled around the hose, duly leaving enough slack at the machine end, the plug just sits at the beginning of the metal handle. This tends to leave a bit of slack at the handle end, causing the grip to be a bit irritating at times. I also have a slight crack at the base of the wand on the PN I, so I rarely, if ever, use it.

All that being said, I vacuum carefully and slowly, paying careful attention to the state of the hose cord, so it doesn't ruin my appreciation of using the Gs. Pity there was never a widely available, workable electric direct connect hose for those machines, like the green Canadian one.

Speaking of telescopic wands, I wonder whether there was ever a green metal one, to match the red. If the power nozzle was an option on the 89s, presumably there was a non-electric telescopic to match the standard hose, for customers who didn't buy the power nozzle. If memory serves, I've seen this wand before, but I can't be sure. However, I'm still on the hunt for a red hose cord, red/cream PN I, and the red electric telescopic wand, so I'll just have to add this "imaginary" green wand to the list.

If I get a chance later, I'll take some close-up pics of the red plastic (non-electric) telescopic wand.

 

[electrolux~137]

Power nozzle cord slippage:

At some point, U.S. Electrolux provided a rigid plastic collar that you'd slip over the machine-end hose coupler. The collar has two little "feet" that slide into the top area of the indentation in the front cover where the ejection knob is located. With this collar in place, the hose cannot swivel around on that end, which prevents the power nozzle cord from getting pulled out.

I don't know when Electrolux introduced this, but the first printed reference I've seen to it is in the instruction sheet for the tan G power nozzle, showing how to attach the collar.

A couple of years ago one of my partner's office mates gave me a practically mint early turquoise G that came from their parents' summer cottage. The hose has the plastic locking collar on it. (The PN cord was in two sections, disconnecting at the hose handle, so this was not the earliest-earliest G, but it does have the PN port in the bottom of the front cover, and the hose handle has the older F-style bleed valve. (See next posting.)

btw such a collar would not have worked on the R, since the front cover did not have any indentations. If you look at the front cover of a Model L, you'll see a narrow, rectangular indentation under the suction hole where the plastic collar locks into place. The early 1205 that still used a pigtail hose also has a similar indentation.

One of my pet peeves with Electrolux electric hoses is that they do not swivel on the machine end, making it more difficult to move the cleaner around. Other manufacturers figured out how to do this; why couldn't Electrolux?

 

[electrolux~137]

A fellow collector emailed me to state that only the Model F had the long single power nozzle cord, but that's not correct. (Indeed, look at the subject auction listing again!)

The very first Model G also had the long single cord that clipped onto the hose with three hard plastic clips. And this was something that was not fixed right away -- I have seen these long power nozzle cords in both gray [earlier] and turquoise [later].

In fact, thinking about this caused me to look at the auction again, and now I wonder if that was truly the case here -- the power nozzle cord has the rubber straps to secure it (permanently) to the hose rather than the slip-off plastic clips. So maybe in this case the PN connector went bad and this was the way the owner "fixed" it.


---


Some other early G differences:

The PN port is in the front cover, inset into a cutout in the bottom hinge area, and the front wheels are right behind the front cover instead of set back to make room for the side-mounted PN port.

(Curiously, when Electrolux rebuilt these models they removed that PN port and put a new one on top of the machine, inset into the long strip of chrome trim. I guess it's easier to get to it there. And that's also where it was placed on the late Model F, the first American Electrolux with a power nozzle.)

The early G hose handle had the old-style (AE, F, R etc.) suction bleed valve, gray in color instead of the narrower, ribbed valve that would lock into place.

The power cord was gray rubber and had a Belden plug, with a rubber bumper behind the plug.

The crevice tool was turquoise plastic but the wider shape and size of the older fiber crevice tools instead of the new longer and narrower version that was provided thereafter.

The first G power nozzle did not have a safety reset switch.

The first G still had the F-style TurboTool power attachment. The new and larger "Rug Washer" came out with the newer G.

There may have been other differences as well, but these are the ones that come to mind.

See photos - early and late G instruction manual covers, note the differences; then the b/w photo of the nice lady pulling the cord out of the cord winder; note the plug.

 

[sireluxomatic]

That's a nice picture of the woman and the G. The rubber bulb stopper on the cord is one of my favorite things about Electrolux.

I agree about the non-swiveling electric hoses. With the more flexible vinyl ones, its not such a big problem, but I find when using the old ones that are a little stiff with age, you do tend to get in a bit of a snarl sometimes.

Here's a spontaneous picture of my turquoise G.

 

[sireluxomatic]

Hose cord slack

Here's a machine end view of the hose cord. Without that locking collar, the hose swivels, but the downside of this is that the cord wraps too tightly around the hose.

 

[sireluxomatic]

Handle end

A view of the handle end, with the "loop" hanging down.

 

[sireluxomatic]

Red telescopic wand pictures

The details of this wand exactly match the green one, save the lack of an electrical connection.

 

[sireluxomatic]

Pic #2

 

[sireluxomatic]

Here's the red telescopic wand with the 88...looks like the wand color has faded a bit to a more "orange-y" shade.