Tell us your favourite vacuum memory- like that vac you grew up with etc...

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dysondestijl

Well-known member
Joined
Oct 23, 2012
Messages
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Location
east midlands, UK
I love hearing these, and I have many many stories.
I was born into a household where a Dyson DC01 was the main vacuum. It was replaced by a dyson DC07, along with a pro-action canister, they'd a dyson DC14 along with a sabichi canister.

I remember I was once at my grandmas huge house and I wandered off exploring. I went into the upstairs gallery, and I found, right at the end of the room, a what looked to be ancient hoover junior! I was fascinated so I ran downstairs and pestered my grandma to tell me about it. She plugged it in but I got scared. It didn't even work lol. But then I plugged it in one day and it worked! I wasn't expecting it to!!
Then I looked in the cupboard and found an ancient hitachi canister. Once again, I pestered my grandma to tell me about it. I really hate myself now as I watched her throw it into a skip when I was about 5... Come to think of it we were cleaning out that same cupboard last week and we found a pack of bags for the hitachi!!
Another story is that my auntie had an old Henry, from the 90's, and I used to use it EVERY time I went, then she got a DC01 but it was crap and made a strange noise, so I refused to use it and begged her to get Henry back out! She used to keep it just for the fact that she knew I loved to use it:)
Anyway I'll share more tomorrow,
George
 
Some of mine...

My mom's mother has a Rainbow, she has had it for years. I remember when I was so fascinated by it as I watch it "wash" the floor. Even though the carpet looked clean, the water was nearly black!

Another one would be our white Hoover from the late 80s or early 90s. I have very vague memories of it, though I played with it alot.

But my favorite was my grandma's Kirby Omega. We still have it in the basement, though I don't play with it anymore. Dad tried to throw it out and failed, though the trashman did get the attachments and case.
 
My Mum bought a Panasonic MC-E44 brand new in 1992. The following year, my parents were conned in to Kirby's "free carpet clean" and given a full demo and sales pitch of the G3. After MUCH bartering, my Dad and the salesman finally came to an agreement and my Dad bought an ex-demo Legend 2 with the full kit for £300. My Mum wasn't happy about it - she absolutely HATED using the Kirby. It was loud, heavy, impractical and far too big for our house. The Panasonic remained as the upstairs cleaner at my Mums insistance. She would always use that, but my Dad would nag and say "what are you using that for, use the good one!". Eventually, she just stopped vacuuming when he was in the house. I remember one day, Dad must've been out and Mum was bringing the Panasonic downstairs. She looked at me and said "Don't tell your Dad I did this!". 14 years after they split up, he still doesn't know about that.
 
Yesterday I was vacuuming my Auntie's old bedroom from before she got married and she & my uncle bought their own house :D, in the spare room she has sliding mirrors with a cupboard/ wardrobe inside! inside was carpeted, so I got the Dyson wand off and used the brush tool, it did a good job, then I saw some of her old university stuff, I was gonna remind her  that she had some of her stuff here, but she didnt need it, and I looked at the stuff with a smile, then I saw a photo album! It contained family photos, I flipped  pages, and there was... a Pic of me as a toddler standing next to my parents DC01! it had no bumper and had a little bit of dust in the empty bin, had no goodbye bag sticker and also had the cyclone handle Dyson logo missing I was amazed, I remember very well I was using it, it was YDK and there was a piece of fluff on the floor, then I had to go over it 3 times :P


 


PS what happened to your Auntie's Henry? and the DC01? what vac does she have now?  Thanks
 
My parents had so many vacuums when I was younger. I used to love following them around with my toy Dirt Devil while they used the Dirt Devil Deluxe.

When we were building one of our houses, we would have to go to our storage unit every once and a while, and inside was my mom's pink Eureka ESP that I had never seen before. I would always beg her to bring it to the car and let me look at it. I would always ask her to take it home but she would always say it was someone else's. The Eureka was one of the first things we brought into the house when we moved in since it was in the front of the storage unit. I asked my mom to let me use and she was hesitant since it didn't have a bag but she allowed it. That was the first and last time I was able to use it. After that it was her spare vacuum that was always kept in their bedroom closet. Every once a while she'd let me push it around, but I was forbidden to turn it on because it would blow dust everywhere. My dad and I later tore it apart a few years later.

When I was about 4 or 5 I was using my mom's Dirt Devil Ultra Hand Vac and I put it right on the top of my 3 year old sister's head and tore out a lot of her hair. That was the last time I was allowed to use that.

I LOVED going to my aunt and uncle house because they'd always let me vacuum with their Hoover Legacy. And I absolutely loved staring at their Hoover Steam Vac. I had never seen one before so I always thought it was so cool. One of the times I was there I discovered a 1990's Kenmore Heavy Duty Plus Self Propelled buried in the foyer closet. I was allowed to use it once and then it was put back. They then allowed me to push it around while I was there, but I was never allowed to turn it on because it was "broken". One day we went over and I couldn't find it anywhere. I asked about it and my aunt said "Oh we threw it away." I was devastated. It turned out that the garbage was still in the garage and hadn't been picked up yet. My uncle let me use it in there and then they let me take it home that night. I used it all the time until I later tore it apart. It took me about 10 years to find another...

My mom also had a Fantom Thunder and a Fantom Fury that I loved using, although my mom hated them both with a passion. She bought the first Thunder and I sucked up a sock with it the first day and "burnt it up", so it was returned for another. At the the time she loved it and later bought the Fury for upstairs. It was after that when she started to despise them. I think she was actually happy when they finally broke a few years later. In the short 4 years we lived in that house we had gone through 5 vacuums...
 
Christmas Time and ....

Vacuum cleaner toys when I was young. I always asked Santa Clause for a toy vacuum cleaner when I was 4, 5, & 6. Could not sleep on Xmas Eve waiting for Santa. I never was disappointed. Very fond memories. Also going to Grandma's and running the Premier 21 when I was young.



Sincerely,

PR-21
 
When I was a kid

about 4 years old, my mom had a Kenmore straight suction canister, and I was always fascinated by it. One day it was out, and I picked up the wand and was pretending to vacuum the floor.  Mom snuck up behind me and turned the vacuum on and it scared the crap out of me.  Sadly, about a year later Mom died in a car accident, and Dad decided to move us to Florida.  I remember the day the movers came, I pulled the vacuum out of the closet and sat there and refused to move until I saw the movers pack up the vacuum and load it onto the truck.  I've searched high and low for a vacuum like the one we had back then, and have not been able to find one.  I did find one close to it, which I bought, and really like it, but it isn't the same.  Funny thing is I remember Mom's vacuum had a triangular shaped dusting brush.  Haven't seen another one like it since.  Here is a picture of the one I have now.  Very similar to what my Mom had.  All the tools are the same except for the dusting brush, and the tool caddy isn't removable.

jfalberti++5-22-2013-09-23-47.jpg
 
Vacuum Parade

My mom has always been a terrible housekeeper. Her first vacuum was a Universal tank vac from the late 40's. My brothers filled the exhaust with rocks which caused it's early demise. It was replaced with an orange and creme Montgomery Wards vacuum in 1955, a totally worthless performer. Next came a Turquoise and white Westinghouse that worked great but the latch for the bag compartment repeatedly punctured the bag filling the motor compartment with dirt. Next up, a Regina Electron Broom. It was a valiant performer but repeated objects wrapping the fan took out the bearings. In 1966,Consumer Reports check rated a Sunbeam hat box model for $39.00 and man alive did it have suction. Running it without a bag was the beginning of it's demise. It's successor was a Montgomery Ward Eureka knockoff with Vibra Groomer. It was faithful if not lack luster. In 1971, I bought mom a rebuilt G which stemmed the flow of dead soldiers but mom continued to buy vacuums in the hope one of them would clean by itself. I remember numerous stick vacs trying to find one as good as the old Regina, a Regina Housekeeper, Eureka Bravo, 2 Dirt Devils and a Shark. Around 1990 the rebuilt G was replaced with an Electrolux Marquis, still in use. Of them all the most exciting experience was the Sunbeam, cheap but mighty. I tend to be the same with a revolving door of vacuums with a fall back to Electrolux every time. A couple years ago I made a switch to Miele as the daily driver and the cost of Thrift Store vacuums has made sucking around with other brands too expensive.
 
Great stories!
Ps tayyab as for the Henry, my cousin ruined it by using it for building work bagless and the DC01 we gave to my other auntie who threw it out, I think.
 
Filter Queen Model 31!

The only vacuum I remember growing up was a Filter Queen model 31 purchased new in 1975. I grew up in a two story house with five sisters and two brothers. The enormous back yard had numerous trees, but no ground cover like grass or ivy, so you can imagine the dirt we tracked in. The Filter Queen was beyond busy, pulled out of the downstairs hall closet several times a week for one thing or another, up and down the stairs(it even tumbled down the stairs once) and out to the gravel driveway on weekends to vacuum out the family truckster. It just keeps on going and has needed very little in the way of maintenance. I was so impressed with the way it's held up over the years that in honor of this venerable little vacuum I recently put together a two tone model 31 for myself.

Here's the one I grew up with sitting in the downstairs hall closet at my folks house where it's been kept for the last thirty eight years. It still works and is used regularly. That's even the original hose.

d-jones++5-22-2013-21-34-8.jpg
 
For me a Kirby that was purchased in 1951 the year I was born-Was bought by my Mom and Dad during a Kirby "Van Campagn" in their area.My Dad used the vacuum to spray varnish on some wall panels in the basement of the house they in and Mom was angry that he got the new vacuum all messed up with the varnish-Dad took it right to the Kirby Co in Ohio-they lived there at the time-and had the machine refurbished.Dad then bought an air compressor from Sears to prevent messing the Kirby up again.
Later when my Dad remarried-my Stepmom had one of those "Wheelbarrow" Kenmore canistors that I liked.Both the old Kirby and the Kenmore were a good cleaning team-used them each week to vacuum my room.Both vacuums were lost in the Rapid City flood of '72.Dad bought a metal Royal upright-my Stepmom didn't like it-she went to Sears and bought a Panasonic style canister with powernozzle.They have now moved into an assited living home-don't know what happened to the vacuums.Don't know if they took them to the new place or gave them away.They gave away a lot of their things when they moved to the assisted living apartment.
 
Growing up out in the country , not a lot of homes around in the 60s, my brother and I had chores, his was outside mine inside, clean and cook, at like age 7? My Compact I used to use as a step ladder, so so many times, I bet I still could, that sucker is strong. I am still horrible outside with plants, I have a black thumb.I tell everyone he is the homo that does decorating and art, I am the cook, clean and repair model. yes, we both are.
 
.
.

I have an approximately 21,000-word story about my "sweeper memories." I can post it if anyone wants to slog through it!

(I also love reading other people's vacuum cleaner memories and hope more members will post them.)
 
Growing up we always had Kenmore Power Mate canisters and I was fascinated with them. My mother had a green one from the 1970s, and then a tan MOL one she bought in about 1982-83. We have a photo of me pulling it around the house. Since I liked vacuums so much, I got a few vacuum toys. One was blue and looked like a Hoover Convertible. I also had a Dirt Devil toy upright, but I sucked up a piece of cereal with the hose and broke the fan so we took it back to the store. I felt bad about it. The store was out of them and no other stores we called had them in stock, so we didn't get another. I also had a Dirt Devil toy hand vac for many years that I later sold at a yard sale. I think it may have been bought to replace the broken upright.

My grandmother had a Hoover Concept One self propelled from about 1981, and a Singer Silver Glide canister from the 1970s. When she moved again, she got a Hoover Elite Supreme in hunter green and kept the Singer in the coat closet. She gave my mom the Concept One. When I was visiting, I would get out the Singer and put it together and we would talk about vacuums. I remember being interested in all of the vacuums on the back page of the manual as well. One time I was explaining her Hoover Elite's attachments to family who were visiting. LOL
 
On top of my earlier post regarding my Mums Panasonic/Kirby drama, one of the strongest memories I have is of my grandma's Electrolux 610. Thankfully for me, my Dad has a pretty good memory and remembers both my Grandma's Hoover Constellation and Electroulx 502 prior to the 610. My Grandad was a bin man and used to find allsorts of treasures on his rounds - the Constellation was a bin find, or so I'm told.

My Grandma got her 610, in her own words, "when the first came out" being the first domestic upright in the UK with on board tools, so she must have bought this around 85/86. It was ALWAYS stood against the back wall behind the kitchen door and next to the coats and shoes in the utility room - it was the first thing you'd see when you walked in the back door. In the early 90's, it was accompanied by a Goblin Aquavac although I don't remember this ever being used for dry vacuuming in the house - mainly just for shampooing and vacuuming the car.

By the end of the 610's life in 1997, the bag door release had broken and was held together first with celotape and later with one of those elsatic bin lid thingys, the handle release had broken, the height adjuster was stuck on low making it almost impossible to use on thick carpet and meant that it went through belts like most people go through underwear, the top cord hook had snapped off and the hose was split in several places and secured with duct tape. It finally died a death in summer 97 and was replaced with a Dyson DC01, the first of 5 Dyson's that my Grandma has broken.
 
That story did make me chuckle Chris.

11-12 years isn't too bad I suppose, especially in comparison with the length of time the Dysons lasted.
 
Indeed. Bare in mind, Jamie, my grandma still does and always has vacuumed twice a day, everyday, just over a decade isn't bad. She's currently on her fifth Dyson, although this has now been superseded by a George as my Grandma now has a mixture of wood floors and carpets downstairs, meaning the Dyson is only used upstairs where the dogs don't go.

She bought a DC01 in 1997. That died about 99/2000 and was replaced with a DC04 Silver Lime that she had until 2005 and then got a DC07. This lasted just over a year and was replaced in late 2006 DC15 (the first "ball" cleaner). She never got on with The Ball and ended up snapping the thing in 2 (she's rather rough with them). It was replaced with the DC27 in 2010.
 
"She never got on with The Ball and ended up snapping the thing in 2 (she's rather rough with them)." Now, now Chris this is a family forum!!

As for the Lux, that is very good for the amount of use it got.

I never used to fully understand people vacuuming twice a day until we moved from a house with expencive carpets into our current one, with paper thin carpets which show up every bloody crumb. My poor TP1000 is being used 2-3 times a day now.
 
I've always found it excessive. My Grandma has ALWAYS had dogs and yet if there is so much as a spec of hair on the carpet, she feels the need to vacuum. If you're going to get a pet, you need to be prepared for the mess.

I have pretty cheap carpets and a lot haired cat, but I don't vacuum more than a few times a week. Infact, it's now Monday and I don't think I've vacuumed since Thursday.
 
My old house, the one I grew up in 15 years ago, saw many vacuums. When purchased by my then-married parents in 1990, my mom came to the house with a Hoover she says must have been an elite, and she bought a Dirt Devil can vac for the upstairs. My dad had a panasonic she said had to be thrown out because it stunk and didn't work. Around the time I was born her Hoover died and was replaced with a turquoise Hoover Runabout. Somewhere in there she bought a BOL Legacy for the basement area rugs. That was a machine I got to use when the machine became my dad's when they divorced in 97'. It lasted till 2001. In 1994 my mom bought a(now mine)Eureka Bravo 85th anniversary edition from a tv sale because she needed something stronger than the canister and something with a brushroll. Coincidentally, the canister stopped working around the time she wanted to replace it, and it became my toy. Shortly after, the Runabout burnt up and was replaced with a Singer poweramp, which was used up till 2000 in our current home when my mom decided she didn't need 2 vacuums. Not long after buying the Poweramp, my mom got tired of the Bravo and bought a rather expensive Panasonic, which she later came to hate too.I Still have that) The Eureka was sent to my dad's office where it sat barely used but non-the-less abused until he gave it to me in 2003.In 2002 the Panasonic was replaced with a Bissell, which lasted till 2010. At my dad's, when he moved into a bigger house in 2001, the Legacy came along, along with a new Dirt Devil Vision. The legacy died not long after, and was replaced by a Bissell Lift away which he still has and uses. The Vision died 3 years later and he bought a Windtunnel supreme, which he also still has but no one uses. When I was given the Bravo, it spent some time as a main vacuum at my dad's house probably until he got the windtunnel. The can vac mysteriously started working a couple years after it stopped, and we still use it today for heavy dusting every couple months. Same goes for the Eureka, I still have it, along with it's very very beat up twin my grandma bought at the same time. My dad also still has his craftsman shop vac he bought in the early 90's too.
 
Kirby Tradition--my childhood family vacuum

I grew up with a Kirby Tradition. One day, one of my older siblings answered the door--there was a Kirby salesman. He got in the door before Mom knew what hit her. He talked and sucked her into buying the whole Kirby Tradition kit and kaboodle--he even spread dirt on her floor and sucked it up! She remembers spending over $1000 on it (it was sometime between 1979 and 1981, the Tradition model run). I remember she had the Rug Renovator and everything else (I don't remember if we had the Handi-Butler though). She kept all the attachments in a big yellow vinyl carrier (with pockets on it) she had slung over the back of the rear foyer door, and the hose draped over that. I remember she always used the Tradition in upright mode; I never saw any of the attachments being used. In my junior high and high school and college years, I took over using the Kirby once every fortnight on house cleaning duty, to clean the entire 2-story, 14-room ex-funeral home we lived in in Garrett, IN, just north of Fort Wayne. It took all day to vacuum and dust the house. In its latter years of life, our Tradition was beginning to wear out, and always sounded like a jet engine. Looking back, I think I didn't use it with the rug nozzle all the way down (like it should be)--it was harder to push that way (I was just a sub-90-pound skeleton of a boy then, a weakling, even in my high school and university years). Plus, my dust allergy was aggravated every time I used it, to the point where I wore surgical masks. The Tradition was finally retired in 1998, traded in on a new green Sharp Twin Power upright with HEPA filtration (which greatly helped me with my dust allergy). The vacuum shop owner, in Auburn, IN, added it to his shop's antique vacuum cleaner display!

Recently, I have found a good used Kirby Tradition at Newby's Vacuums here in Calgary, Alberta. It works great, and I use it every Sunday to clean up the grotty Sunday school room carpet in my church's borrowed building. I am now hunting down as many accessories as I can find for it; I now have the blue plastic attachment box, with a Suds-O-Gun, an extra belt, and the air intake guard. There is much more for me to find out there somewhere--a hose, portable handle, attachments, etc, that I need to find that are correct for the model's period.

kirbytradition7
 

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