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I have both. All the different fantoms, and the Kenmore Dry Tech. I'm waiting for them to get even older, as the price keeps going up and up and up. Once the price is 'right', they'll all say "cheese girls" and go on the flea bay. The rarest to find is the Johnson Wax's "Vectron" which was the very first Fantom ever - predates the Thunder design by 2 years. I have two of them.
 
Amway vacuums were a disaster from the start. They use a GS single fan 7 amp motor (like a Dirt Devil that uses type C bags). Not enough airflow to make the cyclones work properly. There's no shroud, since Amway STOLE Dyson's design before he invented the shroud, went to Bissell who said they'd make it for Scamway, and built it without James' help at all. That's why it's a terrible cyclonic, fills the pre-motor filter with dirt AND hair/fluff, loses suction within minutes, and hasn't enough suction to deep clean well. The airflow through the vacuum is terrible. However, they are more rare than Fantoms since they cost almost $600 about 25 years ago. Finding a good one, undamaged, is difficult. And they are a pain to work on. I wish there was some redeeming quality to them, but there just isn't. The fact that James had to sue them, and took five years to collect anything, is proof that I don't want anything to do with that company. I won't even have a Scamway vacuum in the collection.
 
dysonman1....wow.....

The Amway vacuums used a Ametek 3.0 hp 8 amp motor. And Amway vacuums aren't a pain to work on. The vacuums use Phillip screws so you can easily take it apart in 15 minutes. Lot's of people still use Amway vacuums today and some say its even better than todays Dyson's! The Amway ClearTrak still does a great job for me at cleaning my carpets and its been with my family for over 20 years. Also don't use the word "scamway" as I find it offensive since my parents still work with Amway.
 
"Also don't use the word "scamway" as I find

AmwayClearTrak....If a company has to lie, cheat & steal another company's ideas just to come out with their own vacuum, that's EXACTLY what Amway should be called....Scamway. Leave Tom alone, all he is doing is telling the TRUTH about how Amway really is. It just so happens to be that you don't like it, since it's your favorite vacuum brand & your parents work for them. As for how easy it is to take apart & repair, or about the Amway's cleaning ability, your opinion is merely that....an opinion. And I would trust Tom's opinion over yours, he DID own a vacuum shop & has the museum, so he's seen everything out there & knows what works....and more importantly, what does NOT work.

Rob
 
The shroud is a very important part of the entire system. Since amway stole Dyson's design BEFORE he invented the shroud, this important feature was never incorporated. The motor in the amway is the same motor that Dirt Devil used in their first uprights that took the type C bag. It's true, I have ZERO respect for amway as a company. Having worked on a number of CMS and Clear Trak machines, and having both in the collection, I can see the tremendous number of flaws in the design. If you compare the amway cleaner to the very first production model Dyson, launched eight years after the THEFT of Mr. Dyson's patents by amway, you can see the machine that the amway was supposed to be. Mr. Dyson has continued to improve the cyclonic vacuum cleaner - yet the amway remains the same outdated machine it always was. To have no HEPA exhaust filter in 2015 is inexcusable. That's one reason amways belch dust - every single one of them I've ever seen have been filthy in the motor compartment. amway stole an incomplete design and never bothered to improve it. Typical of scam artists.
 
Looked on the Amway website--not a single vacuum cleaner in sight.They have air and water purifiers,personal care items and cleaning products other than vacuums.An 8A motor producing 3Hp???Only for a VERY short period of time before it is BLOWN!!-like a locked rotor test in a lab.That motor would only be good for about 1 hp.And--you can't run a real 3hp motor from a 120V 15A circuit.You would need a 20A line at minimum.I have worked on REAL 3hp universal motors-were in BD and Milwaukee core drills.You had to run those from a 20A line.An ampmeter was in the motors junction box-I could load it to 18A using a 4" diamond core drilling bit and drilling into scrap concrete to test the machine.The motors use two pairs of 1" wide brushes-double width communtator.Truely a high quality BEAST of a drill motor!Also these were used on magnetic drill presses for drilling steel and other metal-often holes in large pipes.
 
Fantoms seem to be somewhat uncommon but you still see a disproportionate amount here in Western NY, primarily because they were sold locally before the major national rollout and the inventory was auctioned here when they went bankrupt. Thunders are far and away the most common, though I did pick up a nice Fury recently and have several more in the shed I forgot even buying.

I used to buy them or garbage pick them years ago, unclog them, clean them up and sell them to coworkers. They're easy to work on for the most part once you're familiar with them.

The Drytech probably is not as uncommon as you'd believe. They had loads of them at Service Merchandise when they closed, enough to wall off an empty section of the store (and equally large numbers at a few others I visited). The thing is you don't use a carpet cleaner every day, most people use them sporadically. There are probably many sitting in closets out there (I'm starting to see lots of 1980s carpet cleaners at the rift stores).

All the others probably aren't terribly rare either. All the local Targets, Walmarts, Kmarts and Best Buys had Wildcats, there were loads of all the new models at the auction, and old ones as far back as 11amp Destiny models (I bought one, I'm guessing they probably had a few floating around as warranty replacements that were never used).

I spent a lot of time in 1997 in NYC there used to be a liquidation chain there called Odd Job Trading or something, I remember them having tons of refurbished Fantom Lightnings. While the power head on them had its share of issues, the canister body is pretty durable, there are probably quite a few floating around being used for quick clean ups.

Most of them were built fairly sturdy, especially Thunders, so they're not like other 1990s vacs where you seldom see them turning up working used and in good shape. I think there is more a fascination with them because they're somewhat unusual.
 
Better then todays vac's.

Thats what I like about these Amway vacuums. Since there made in the USA they are durable, last longer, and have better performance then some of todays "made in China" vacuums.
 
Well..

Just because they are made in the U.S. doesn't mean that they will last longer and are more durable and have better performance. I have seen plenty of vacuums that are made in the U.S. and are utter pieces of garbage. I have also seen plenty of "made in China" vacuums that are very well made and will last a long time, such as my Eureka Commercial.
 

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