Terrific find. I've seen Hoover Convertibles with the this same shade of red in a hard bag cover with the 17.0 Cleaning Effectiveness Per Amp (CEA) rating and squared off Elite style hood. This is the first I believe that I've seen this particular one!! These machines are terrific cleaning machines, I love the energy efficient 7.2 Amp motors compared to todays 12 Amp machines.
Now, I don't think that Breathe Easy tag is for this machine. It does say 16.0 CEA rating but Hoover had a few uprights that were Breathe Easy series. That's the one thing I find peculiar about this, but you did mention that the shop owner used this machine as one to swap parts with.
I would love a camera shot of the agitator. I'm wondering if its an original series style agitator two breaks in the bristles-- one for belt and single in midddle for middle support bar. Or is this the revised Hoover agitator with 4 breaks in the bristles. Also is this machine a single or double row agitator. I'm thinking its a double. The single row brush is 48414079, double row brush is 48414081. Hoover didn't change model numbers when they revised the brush roll to have more gaps for agitator support bars in housing they just changed the brush roll to be univeral for Elite style uprights and PowerMax canisters, while decreasing cleaning efficiency.
Best of luck and I know you'll enjoy this vacuum.
