I’ve been restoring a Hoover Elite which I found in the trade-in pile at a local vac shop and decided to try something I often thought of doing but never actually attempted. Using the leftover sandpaper, foam buffing “ball,” and polish from my headlight polishing kit, I attacked the hood of this vacuum with the aim of seeing whether or not I could restore the finish on a plastic vacuum.
Man, did it work! 800 grit wet sanding, followed by 1500 grit wet sanding, 3000 grit dry sanding, and buffing with the polishing compound sure put a shine on this Elite. Despite its trashed “before” appearance, did it turn out shinier than it would have been new? Possibly. What’s crazy is that this took only about 20 minutes to accomplish.
The rest of the resto went as expected. As this vac was made in 1995, before Hoover updated the materials used for the motor housing and fan chamber, I was expecting cracks in both—specifically, cracks around the belt-side bearing holder of the housing and cracks on the “eyelets” of the fan chamber. And yes, both pieces were cracked. However, I was able to track down a decent bagless twin chamber from 2002 and put it out of its misery so that I could have those parts—now in the updated, robust, crack-free, glass-fiber reinforced plastic—so that I could set this Elite back to working order.
All other parts of this Elite, including the bag, checked out a-okay. Although, just for good measure, I also swapped the plastic “small” belt-side motor mount for the twin chamber’s steel one, because why not. I’ll save the original one in my parts stash as these are getting hard to find.
Pics below, and more on the way. Once my belt arrives, I’ll reattach the hood and share some final shots of the machine.
Man, did it work! 800 grit wet sanding, followed by 1500 grit wet sanding, 3000 grit dry sanding, and buffing with the polishing compound sure put a shine on this Elite. Despite its trashed “before” appearance, did it turn out shinier than it would have been new? Possibly. What’s crazy is that this took only about 20 minutes to accomplish.
The rest of the resto went as expected. As this vac was made in 1995, before Hoover updated the materials used for the motor housing and fan chamber, I was expecting cracks in both—specifically, cracks around the belt-side bearing holder of the housing and cracks on the “eyelets” of the fan chamber. And yes, both pieces were cracked. However, I was able to track down a decent bagless twin chamber from 2002 and put it out of its misery so that I could have those parts—now in the updated, robust, crack-free, glass-fiber reinforced plastic—so that I could set this Elite back to working order.
All other parts of this Elite, including the bag, checked out a-okay. Although, just for good measure, I also swapped the plastic “small” belt-side motor mount for the twin chamber’s steel one, because why not. I’ll save the original one in my parts stash as these are getting hard to find.
Pics below, and more on the way. Once my belt arrives, I’ll reattach the hood and share some final shots of the machine.
