Hey guys, I'm new here!

[hooverman21]

Hey guys, I just wanted to introduce myself. My name's Rich, I'm in my third year of college, come from Upstate NY and (like everyone else here) I love vacuum cleaners!

I don't really have a favorite brand. I've been lucky with Miele and Hoover. I actually just bought a new Miele S4780 Orion which I LOVE, so stylish and so small. Although a dedicated powernozzle would have been a plus, but it's still a pretty machine!

I know my family has been a Hoover family ever since I remember, we had a great Dimension 1000 which I absolutely loved, until my idiot cousin decided to pick up wet dog hair and water, and killed the motor. We've also had a bunch of Hoover Elites, my sister has the 430 now but I still have the 300, and that thing cleans carpets better than anything else I've seen lately.

Anyway, just wanted to introduce myself!

Rich

 

[hooverman21]

Oh yeah, I forgot to add, I think my absolute favorite vacuum that I have right now is my Hoover Anniversary WindTunnel canister. I'm so glad Hoover has updated the looks of their canister vacs, the old PowerMax design was kind of outdated and kind of ugly in my opinion.

 

[xraytech]

Hi Rich,

Hope you enjoy yourself here.
My collection mostly consists of Hoovers and re-badged Hoovers for Penneys. I also have some Kirbys and Eurekas. I am from S.W. Pennsylvaina

Sam

 

[hooverman21]

Sam, what do you think about the old but reliable Elites?

I have a 300 which has gone through hell and yet it works just fine, and seems to clean carpets really well. I need to get some parts for it, ie. the top bag clip broke and is hung on that spring loaded tongue with a screw, and a brace for the motor mount but other than that it's a great run-around vac.

No tools, just one roll of brushes, the bare-bones model that my mom bought when she needed a vacuum for our camp.

 

[aeoliandave]

Welcome Rich, to the best ever Vacuum Zone.

And thank you so much for taking the time to complete your profile - we get to know us more through that. I regularly reference folk's profiles while reading the 3 forums every day.

Newer, younger & recent members please take note. Perhaps updating our profiles for 2010 could be a New Years resolution for us all...gonna take a crack at mine over the weekend.

Dave

 

[hooverman21]

Haha, I've been to this site a lot before, but never joined. So I'm used to it!

 

[xraytech]

Rich,
I think the Elites are a decent vacuum, we used to have the BOL Elite 200, I have only one Elite in my collection, which is the Elite 5.2(made for K-Mart), this is one of my unused Hoover Vault machines, it was born in March 1988 and was the 15th machine off the assembly line

I much prefer the Convertibles and the Concepts though.

I included a pic with my Elite. It is in back right corner, the gray convertible in front of it is also a vault machine, as is the concept
Sam

 

[hooverman21]

Nice machines, my aunt had one (or maybe still has) one similar to the one on the left, the bluish one, it almost looks like (in that picture) to be the same color as our dearly departed Dimension 1000.

If I can remember correctly, I think it was loud as hell, but it may have been a different model.

 

[a007kirbyman]

Welcome Rich...

I too would like to welcome you to the forum/club.

There are a lot of nice people in the club & a lot of helpful info.

I am somewhat limited on any assistance w/ other brands (don't repair or rebuild others); however, with KIRBYs, if there is any way I may be of help, feel free to contact me. And again, welcome.

Bill

 

[hooverman21]

Thanks Bill, I actually worked on a G4 a couple days ago. The owner had the bag fill hose duct taped at the boot and I managed to get it attached again. Those machines are HEAVY but I've heard good things about them. I wasn't able to try it out on different surfaces but it seemed to have decent suction for a dirty-fan vac.

 

[hooverman21]

Here's some random pics of some of my vacs... the ones I use mainly, the steam cleaners and the shopvacs aren't that interesting!

I'll try to get newer pictures later!

Here's our Kenmore canisters... we still have the red one, makes a good daily driver where I don't really care if I smash it into a table leg, can't do that with the Hoover or the Miele!

The blue one is now in the hands of our cleaning lady, I gave it to her because she didn't want to use her good one everywhere she went, and this was a good daily driver.

Some problems with these included that ever-present powernozzle ghost who loves to cut off the power everytime you vacuum. I think it has something to do with the hose connection at that main part of the vacuum. I pulled it apart and one of the three copper prongs had worn down.

Overall they're okay vacs, great suction, and ease of use is their star quality... not sure about down-the-road durability, especially with all the plastics! And the powernozzle issue is not new so yeah.

 

[hooverman21]

Another picture, this time of the Red Kenmore (Kenny) and my (then) new Hoover WindTunnel Anniversary Canister (Hoovie - yeah you know I'm gay when I have names for my vacs)... love it, I still have the original packaging for it. And quite honestly, I've only used it once on rugs since I got it this past September. The clear brush cover is kind of annoying because it'll show all the scratches and crap that you pick up. Oh well!

I still like it... not as easy to use as the Kenmore, where all the tools are stored directly on the vacuum. The floor tool and the turbine brush have no place to attach so I have to hunt them down every time. Plus the dusting brush and crevice tool are sorta pathetic... kinda small, and the dusting brush has those nylon (or whatever) bristles which'll curl after awhile. I ordered a horsehair version of it from Simplicity. The power button is on the body which is kind of annoying BUT I can take the hose out and use my extra long extension hose, it fits in the hose socket just fine, and it's about 16 feet long. Obviously that wouldn't work with Kenny. The hose seems to be crushproof like that of the Miele, but I'm not going to try to find out! The overall design is strikingly similar to the Miele, with the same type of castors on the bottom, although the Miele only has three in a triangle formation.

Overall it's much quieter, and I like the adjustable power control, even if it's on the body of the vac. Plus the filtration seems to be better, my friend who suffers from every type of allergy brought his micron scanner thing and held it to the back of both machines, the Kenmore was the highest, and the Hoover was much lower, although both couldn't match that of the Miele!

 

[hooverman21]

Another shot of the "boys." Kenny gets jealous if I use Hoovie too much, but like I said, I wanna keep that powernozzle in good condition so I don't use it!

 

[eurekaprince]

Rich! That's so funny that you name your vacs like me!

I also called my Kenmore Progressive ("Elegance" in Canada - works in both French and English) canister "Kenny" - gave it to my parents many years ago. Great performer, but after 3 years of steady, dependable service, the motor blew on me! But since I liked the vac so much, I just got the motor replaced with a Panasonic motor for CAD150.00.

I also like the fact that all the tools store on board the Kenmore, including the floor brush. This is one of my big complaints with all the new canisters - cheap, useless attachments that are not stored in the main unit like years ago.

When I had my Hoover Self-Propelled WindTunnel Ultra Upright, I called him "Herbie"! (For Herbert Hoover....)

I guess I call my new Constellation "Connie" like everyone else....but I need a name for my old Eureka...hmmm.....what about "Ricky"?

 

[hooverman21]

A shot of Kenny.

Some things I like about him:

Easy to use, the wands and attachments go on without even thinking (well the user not having to think, not the machine!)

Pretty good performance, carpet cleaning is a big priority because in our living room and our family room we have large berber carpets and two dogs and two cats. Same goes for bare floor cleaning, although the bare floor nozzle could be a bit wider!

He's pretty easy to maintain, powernozzle comes apart with two screws and four of those release latch things (not really latches but whatever).

Belts and filters are pretty much available at any Sears... although I know that Sears is notorious for discontinuing parts for their older models and all that.

Somethings I don't like:

Cheap construction. The body feels all creaky and flimsy. The second day we had it, I had the tool cover open too far and near the hinge it cracked. The newer versions of this have solid plastic covers which seem even MORE flimsy!

The powernozzle doesn't have a dedicated brush cover, take the cover off of it and that's it. The older blue one we had, had a white cover over the brush so the junk wouldn't fly into the internal workings of the powernozzle and gum up the belt and all that. I usually have to clean out the interior of the PN to get rid of all the hair and dust every couple times I use it.

The ever-ongoning powernozzle problem... push it forward it's on, pull it backwards it's off. I think it's a problem with the connection right at the base of the hose connection to the main part of the vac.

Filtration could be somewhat better, if my aunt is coming, we can't vacuum with this we have to use either the Miele or the Hoover because emissions-wise they're a lot better.

 

[hooverman21]

Haha, glad to know it's not just me who names their vacuums! All my friends think I'm crazy when I start yelling at them going, "NO NO NO, DON'T USE HOOVIE, USE KENNY INSTEAD, I DON'T WANT HOOVIE TO GET ALL SCRATCHED UP!"

 

[hooverman21]

A shot of Hoovie:

Things I like about him:

First of all, aesthetically, he's a winner. Hoover's older WindTunnel vacs based on the old PowerMax design were just I dunno... ugly and cheap? I had one, the blue 3639 or whatever model that was and things kept breaking!

Suction-wise he's a winner as well. He outscores the Kenmore, especially in the carpet cleaning category. In some ways I think the PN is too wide but what do I know.

Attachment-wise he's easy to use, glad Hoover changed over to the easy one step (literally and figuratively) way of changing attachments like the Kenmore. I know on our Dimension 1000, you had to unplug the cord and undo it from two cord clips on the wands, and all that, it was so annoying! These are so much easier.

The canister and PN are pretty quiet, I love the hum of the PN, even our cleaning lady was like, WHOA!

The HEPA filter actually works, much more effectively than that of Kenny, plus the exhaust is on the top, so you're not blowing around crap on the floor like you are with the Kenmore.

Things I'm not crazy about:

The tools are pretty much useless. The nylon-bristled dusting brush is more like a grill brush, it's so hard and unyielding... like I said before, I ordered a horsehair brush from Simplicity and it fits perfectly. The crevice tool is all but 5 inches long and well, isn't that great for cleaning out those deep crevices... yeah that didn't sound right.

Other thing I don't like is the PN brush cover is clear, so you can see all that you pick up BUT you can also see the battle scars from all the cat litter and crap that you've vacuumed up, and have left little scratches. That's why I don't really use this for carpet cleaning... call me crazy but I really like this vac, and wanna keep this one in good condition!

 

[hooverman21]

A shot of Kenny's tool storage area. As you can see, the battle scars are evident! Also, behind this compartment is the separate compartment for the mini powernozzle. Kenmore did a more efficient job of packaging the tools for their canisters than did Hoover.

The combo brush is nylon as well and has gotten a lot of use!

 

[hooverman21]

A shot of Hoovie's "tool" compartment... if you can call it that.

As said before, the tools are pretty small and useless, and not all of them are stored in the body.