New Kirby addition, at last!!!

[twocvbloke]

Oh, forgot to say the height adjuster's slipping, so falls straight down to the floor when I press the pedal...

 

[twocvbloke]

And it's now fitted with a metal fan, and sounds more like it should...

The Lexan fan that it was fitted with though is pristine, and as I'm guessing Kirby stopped making them in the early to mid 90's when they replaced them with the Kevlar fan, then this fan has seen little use, and the pulley is perfect too...

One interesting thing though was the motor case had this hand-written on it:

"Do not repair
89
Award"

I have no clue what that is about, I would have gotten a pic, but need to wait for my batteries still, they're taking their time to charge!! :S

Anyway, had a bit of "fun" trying to get the metal fan out of my gold Trad, it was stuck fast, so ended up ruining the armature from that (wasn't exactly the best armature I had anyway, so no loss, the motor was only meant to be temporary to show it working), but, either way the D80 has it now and sounds amazing, I just need a bigger transformer cos I don't want to burn out the one I have...

Oh, and the paper backing on the handle is re-attached, I got a bit lazy and used a glue-stick, which is usually used for paper anyway, but it's back in place...

And another bad point, the brushroll is on it's last legs, I've got it adjusted as far as it will go and the bristles only just poke out of the nozzle at a proper length, so, I'll have to get a new one (plus it's a sleeve-bearing one, so replacing with a Ball-bearing one would be a good idea), but it's working as it is...

Still, I'm just happy I have the small green cleaning machine, just need to give it a polish up and wash the bag & emtor, the latter two first though I think...

 

[twocvbloke]

And some pics at last, though I can't be bothered doing 7 posts for 7 pics, so I'm using my webspace...


http://www.recycleabicycle.co.uk/pics/KirbyD80/

 

[twocvbloke]

Well, that's the bag cleaned and washed, though I think it lost a rather unnerving amount of dye, so, I'm pretty concerned about how it's going to look once it's dried out... :S

And seeing as the bag is drying out, I thought I might aswell construct a conversion bag for it, and as the only spare bags I have are a pair of LegendII bags, I decided to use one of them...

Thinking back to school though and doing colour matching stuff in art classes, I do recall red & green being opposite colours, so, technically speaking, the maroon of the LII bag and the avocado green of the D80, they should match, but either way, here's the first pic, in my wonderfully tidy bedroom:

 

[twocvbloke]

And while it's running:

 

[rainbowjoel]

Awesome pictures.

 

[twocvbloke]

Thanks, I'm having a ball with this D80, it's light and easy to use, still needs a few bits sorting though...

I have swapped the height adjuster pedal using one borrowed from a LegendII, so it no longer falls straight to the floor when I go to lower it, plus it's easier to press than the small pedal in my opinion...

And the bag's clean, dry and ironed (using that mysterious "iron" device!!!), doesn't look like it has lost too much dye, infact it actually matches the cable...

 

[craig_1982]

That looks a really nice machine David well done on your find I hope to have one myself some day lol

 

[twocvbloke]

Thanks, it was a stroke of luck that I found it really, I was just doing a general search for "Kirby" on ebay, and saw that and a ClassicIII, and I had to have the D80...

If I get a moment's peace this weekend I may try and get a video of it (aswell as a couple other vacs I've been meaning to video), but no guarantee of that though...

 

[kirbylover]

That LII bag looks interesting, I assume you are keeping the original in storage for if you decide to change it back? (how did it come out anyways?) Nice to see that you intend on using it anyways! I hate shakeout bags.

The Tradition in the background you have the 2 sexiest Kirbys ever made.

 

[twocvbloke]

The LII bag was just for playing while I washed the original bag, it's not my best LII bag that I have (seeing as one of my charming young moggies used it as a scratching post when it was attached to my CIII), the original bag is now all dry and refitted where it belongs...

And the bag has come out looking okay, I think it was stored for a while in a sunny position, as it's faded where it was exposed, so has light patches and dark patches that match it's position behind the handle and whatnot... :S

And the Trad, that was my 2nd ever Kirby, cost £30 total (£15 Buy it now, £15 postage) about 5 years ago, needs a good polish though, and I just recently converted it to 2-speed (as the UK Omega, CIII and Trad models were single speed), it also has a metal fan too to complete it, and bag fitted there is a modern replacement I was recently given (kind generosity!!), I just fitted that to see how I liked the look of a modern style bag...

 

[craig_1982]

Tradition bag set up

David do you run the Tradition with the mini-emptor or it's original sani-emptor?

 

[twocvbloke]

I've been going between the two actually, the Sani-emtor is set up for shake-out though and the filltube assembly from that is in my Golden Trophy Tradition, I just do it as a money saving exercise cos Kirby bags are a little on the expensive side!!!

I now actually have three bags for my Trad, the original Long-zip it came with, the shakeout bag (and metal fan) I bought from "kirbykid63" via his ebay shop a few years ago, and the new modern style bag in the picture came recently (but not saying who from cos I respect his privacy), so plenty bags to choose from...

I bought a 12-pack of Kirby Poly. bags yesterday (see link below), so once they get here I'll be on the disposable setup again for all my Kirbys with such setups, I like the Polypropylene bags a lot, mainly cos they filter superbly, and cos they're easier to work with compared to the paper based varieties...

Though, I just realised, as the bags I bought are coming from the states, I'm probably going to have to pay import tax on the things, plus Royal Fail's handling fee (I never asked them to handle my items, so why should I pay them to???), d'oh!!! :S



http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=380246322363

 

[twocvbloke]

Here's a side view of the D80's bag (there's another two pics via the link to my photo collection of the D80 above), I had to alter the image to exaggerate the colour difference to make it more obvious, basically it's suffered from the effects of sun exposure, and the unexposed parts have stayed near the original colour, and the exposed parts faded like an old photograph, it is an impressively large bag though...