My Dirt Devil

[moderneezer]

Ever since I moved to my youngest brother's house, we didn't have any vacuum cleaners, although my father sometimes lends me his bagless upright Bissell. But then, earlier this year, I received my grandmother's vacuum cleaner when she moved to a retirement home.

It's cheap Dirt Devil canister like the ones that could be found at Walmart. It does a poor job at cleaning the carpets since it's a straight-suction canister. I went to the Vac Shack store in Ottawa and when I asked the shop owner about getting a turbo brush for my product, he told me that I would need a vacuum with a motorized nozzle to properly clean carpets.

Although the model I got is not my favorite, I decided to keep it until the canister malfunctions. I plan is that when I'll have enough money, I'll get better attachments to replace the useless ones and also get a Simplicity Freedom (or a similar kind of product from Riccar or Fuller Brush) for the carpets. Would that be a good plan?

 

[sebo_fan]

I hazard a guess that the dealer said that for securing a sale but on the other hand PN's are great for deep down dirt removal in my experience.

If your Dirt Devil has a small bag capacity and concentrated suction flow, it will do a great job with an air driven turbo brush fitted to it. Don’t expect deep down grit removal, but rather basic top soil removal, better than suction only in my experience.

Just depends on what brand you get based on the measurement of the actual tube - if it is 3.2cm/32mm then a lot of tools already exist on the market, if it s 3.5cm or 35mm, Bosch friction fit style turbo brush might do, if you can get one in Canada. By the looks of your close up photo I may be correct that it looks like 3.5cm/35mm fittings but my eyes might be deceiving me. Check Amazon in your country. There are a few main sized turbo brushes you could buy for this model.

 

[moderneezer]

Here's the canister's underside (with the tag). I wanted something made in a country other than China, but like I said earlier, I'll keep this thing until it malfunctions.

 

[moderneezer]

Thank you, Sebo Fan, for your advice. Now I'll say more things about the vacuum.

Here's the canister with the open lid, the bag with a part attached to it and the bags' container bag. I had a hard time finding more bags that are compatible with the machine, but eventually, my father went to the Chapman Boutique store to order the bags. Some days later, I got them and they fit.

I'll be posting a link to the website about the store, but it's in French only.

http://www.boutiquechapman.com/

 

[sebo_fan]

Ah those bags fit the Hoover Studio which is basically a Morphy Richards vac in Europe as well as one made by Electrolux. They're all made in China - but they are actually robust and were common in the 1990s.

They should have 32mm tubes, but it might be different being a Dirt Devil - take a ruler and measure the end of one of the tubes opening diameter.

 

[moderneezer]

Here's the hose handle and the valve. The connection diameter is 1.25 inch (3.175 cm).

And Sebo Fan, do you think a lot of the vacuum cleaners in the British market use bags that are similar to the ones in my pictures?

 

[moderneezer]

Here's the telescopic wand. It connects to the hose by friction fit and it looks durable. I might keep it when the canister gets defective.

 

[turbo500]

cleaners in the British market use bags that are similar

Not so much now, but certainly a few years ago, there were a lot of cleaners of the same design but with different branding.

Hoover Studio
Morphy Richard Jazz
Goblin Ace
Dirt Devil Compact
Electrolux "The Boss" Compact
JMB 1300

Those are just the ones I can think of off the top of my head that were all, pretty much, the same cleaner using the same bags.

 

[moderneezer]

I used the floor brush to clean the kitchen floor and look at all the hair that sticks to the bristles. Can any of you give me a suggestion about which floor brush I should get that doesn't get stuck to the bristles?

 

[moderneezer]

I mean which floor brush doesn't get hair stuck to the bristles.

 

[moderneezer]

Here's the upholstery nozzle. In the last of the four pictures, the nozzle is attached to the hose while the canister's turned on. Look what it's capable of doing.

Out of all the attachments I got with the canister, the upholstery nozzle is the only one I consider keeping. The others are all junk.

 

[vac-o-matic]

Raymond, if you have the funds and want to clean carpet with it, I'd look on ebay for a reasonably priced turbo rug nozzle. Unless you have frieze or the new sofstrand type carpet, I think it would do a decent job. That vac shop owner just was looking for a sale I think, sadly. I have one that I put on straight suction wands from time to time, and it does a pretty good job. That vacuum has more than enough suction (air flow), to power a turbo nozzle.

 

[sebo_fan]

The connection diameter is 1.25 inch (3.175 cm).

The hard floor tool you've shown is effectively the same ones that even German brands like Bosch, Miele and SEBO produce, even though SEBO also have their own design. The castle cut always gets clogged with dust regardless of the brand; so its not just Dirt Devil that has this issue.

Regarding the connection fitting, then the size of tools and floor heads you can use will be 32mm.

I already looked at Amazon.canada website but there's a lot of cheap Chinese copies of Wessel Werk main sized floor heads, an issue that has already caused a few comments in the other thread "Hopeless Accessories." Link given below.

Amazon.com *U.S have better floor heads but there are a few models that are still cheap Wessel Werk copies.

One particularly good brush is the "Numatic First4Spares Air-brush." It is NOT the original Airobrush but a copy brush that is actually quite good. I've used one ( I also own an original Airobrush) and it is still as effective. 


 


It is mid priced.



http://www.amazon.com/Qualtex-Vacuu...=1436458628&sr=8-1&keywords=numatic+air+brush

 

[moderneezer]

Here's the dusting brush. It's useless as it doesn't even fit with the hose. It's most likely for a different vacuum cleaner. I recently got different dusting brushes from different stores but I'll discuss them in another thread.

And by the way, thank you for the advice on turbo and floor nozzles, Sebo fan and Vac-O-Matic!

 

[sebo_fan]

Glad I could help

Dusting brushes are a constant pain in the backside in my experience; so many brands copy each other and do short stubby bristles. Even my Miele dust brush has a wonderful wavy rubber inner central coated hole that can "scrub" the bristles clean when dust gets clogged on the outer bristles but I end up having to pull the stuff off the bristles in order to get the brush clean again.

This is one reason to why the SEBO brand don't include dust brushes as standard. The company offer them mainly as an optional cost extra tools bar on the D series canisters because owners wanted a dust brush as standard, worldwide. SEBO's cost optional ones have longer bristles and always built around a triangular shape which I don't tend to clean that much of. That's not to say they're perfect though - they also need constant cleaning when the bristles get caught up in the suction hole! But it depends largely on the owner - they're not supposed to use the high suction setting - if applicable - where dust tool usage is concerned.

A lot of owners on here have slated the German/European vacs for dust brushes in general. I know in the U.S many vacs have better bristles, but even I tried an American dust brush not so long ago and found that it clogged up just as badly as the European ones. Dyson do a flat brush tool - its a good design but it is far too big to me, to be of any use.

The one you've shown doesn't look like it belongs there. It is possible that the crevice tool you should have got should have had a snap down brush over the crevice opening but the supplier of the vac probably discovered that no dust brush was standard, and put in that other "lighter grey" one as a freebie. Certainly if it was part of the tool kit, it wouldn't be a different colour.

 

[moderneezer]

It's true that the bristles of all or almost all dusting brushes do need cleaning once in a while.

Now here's the crevice tool. The attachment does fit with the Dirt Devil hose, but I'll leave you all to guess why I consider it junk. I got more crevice tools but that too, I'll make a separate thread about that.

 

[tolivac]

Just use the hose end to clean the bristles of dust brushes and floor tools-works OK for me.

 

[moderneezer]

I might try that, Tolivac.

Here's the tool caddy. I don't have much to say about this.

 

[moderneezer]

Here's the back filter.