Pristine Sears Best Powermate on Ebay

[silvermoon49]

Just in case anyone is interested---
https://www.ebay.com/itm/324475813846
https://www.ebay.com/itm/324475813846

 

[gregvacs28]

Super nice condition. The bumper and tools looks so white and clean. It all looks great.

 

[dysonman1]

It IS in amazing condition. I have that same model in my collection, on display in the Vacuum Museum on the "Wall of Fame". I got mine almost 40 years ago, it was a trade-in on a Rainbow, which I was selling door to door at the time. I kept it because I loved the power nozzle.

 

[fan-of-fans]

That's in beautiful condition! I would replace the crumbling foam with HEPA cloth material.

The green and yellow version of that is one of my most wanted vacuums!

 

[huskyvacs]

Filter can be replaced with aquarium foam, just take what's in there to a pet store or Walmart and compare the pores, there is different densities of airflow.

Love that the owners put "Used 1st time, Jan. 3 '80" on the manual.

 

[fan-of-fans]

That would work too, I would just cut a HEPA bag and glue that to the filter frame. You'll get better airflow and more filtration, as these don't have the best filtration with those old 5033 bags. Although in their time they were probably about as good as it got, since it was considered "triple" filtration - bag, foam premotor filter, and foam exhaust filter.

Sears did make 5033/E allergen micro bags for these more recently, but they seem very uncommon - I've only ever seen one pack of them on eBay and I never saw any in Sears.

 

[bnsd60m9200]

it may be pristine except for one flaw mentioned in the description that everyone glosses over that makes the powerhead virtually useless. the height adjuster is broken (likely shattered or flat out sheared off) and makes the PN sit too low even on low pile carpets to do anything but burn up belts.

the remedy isnt easy or straight foward to get it functional and involves scracth building parts to make the height adjuster cam work again. i developed a repair for this, but unless whoever wins this asks about it, they will likely ask for a refund stating the powerhead doesnt work right, not knowing the fix is out there.

however its not one you can get from a"parts machine" or vacuum shop. this was a terrible design in these powerheads, and nearly every 1973-81 sears pn i've worked on has a heighter adjuster cam "tit" non fuctional. it was cheap abs plastic that got brittle from the PN motor heat cooking the plastic to the fragility of glass

 

[gregvacs28]

I think one can still buy that 4 position adjuster from Sears or other parts stores.


I've seen them on Ebay sometimes.


 


But yeah, that PN was typical 70s design.  This was the first design that incorporated some type of edge cleaning and it was wider than their previous pn.  It also had replaceable beater and brush strips.


It's 40+ years old.

 

[bnsd60m9200]

gregvacs28

sears parts direct has NLA'd everything for that machine about 2017. the cam with the numbers was still available, but the part that breaks hasnt been available for 30 years. thats why i scratch built it

 

[gregvacs28]

This where 3D printing would be helpful, isn't?

 

[fan-of-fans]

That reminds me, the height adjuster in my own 8 year old Kenmore Progressive Powermate broke last year. I keep meaning to order a new mechanism but forgetting, since it still works fine on the low setting. I guess I'd better do it before parts are NLA - hopefully Cleva still uses the same one.

 

[fan-of-fans]

Wow, it went for $465 plus $65 shipping (at least to me). Hopefully whoever gets it can fix the PN, it really is probably the nicest one around anywhere.

 

[mark40511]

I saw a 1979 , I think

commercial for this on Youtube. The PN looks like a beast. I bet it did a good job. Too bad about the filtration and the height adjustment.