The Classic III Has Landed!

[human]

So my first purchase from Shopgoodwill.com has finally arrived. I bought it late Friday night a week ago and it didn't ship out until Wednesday. It was scheduled to be delivered yesterday but then it instead made a grand tour of three different FedEx facilities in this area. Apparently, the barcode label got partially torn off and had to be replaced. Delivery was rescheduled for next Tuesday but to my great surprise when I checked the tracking this morning, the progress bar showed green with the notation that it had been delivered. I wasn't expecting a Sunday delivery.

I found it under the edge of my carport, rather than at the front door, dragged it into the house, unboxed it and carried the packaging out back to be dealt with later today when I do trash cans and litter pans. That's about as far as I've gotten, other than to examine everything and ascertain it's all there. My first impression is it's just very dusty and needs a good polishing but is otherwise intact and in very nice condition for its age. I think it's just been sitting in (dry) storage for several years. I'll dig deeper into it in the next day or so and post some photos. For the sake of continuity, I've pasted a link below to the thread I semi-hijacked a week or so ago when I bought it.

https://www.vacuumland.org/cgi-bin/TD/TD-VIEWTHREAD.cgi?42226_16

 

[suckolux]

Cool , enjoy it friend. I have had possibly three of those they're quite nice. Not my favorite model, but hard to beat

 

[human]

First Run...

So after I'd finished some other household chores, I decided to take a closer look at the Classic III to see just what I'd gotten myself into. The first thing I did was to plug it in and turn it on. The motor sounds great, the height adjustment works smoothly and the headlight works but the belt was missing. Once I took the nozzle off to replace the belt, I was completely amazed at how clean it is, beyond a good coating of surface dust. Peeking into the fan casing, it is just pristine in there and the spindle looks brand new. I'm honestly beginning to wonder if the belt broke on this thing, the original owner didn't know how to change it and just put it away like a time capsule. The small assortment of tools that came with it also show minimal signs of wear. I think this thing sat unused in the back of "Aunt Millie's" hall closet for 15 or 20 years before it got donated. It just absolutely amazes me that this machine is about 45 years old.

The metal has some very mild oxidation and only a very few small scratches but no real battle scars. I know I can get it absolutely gleaming without a whole lot of effort. Of course, I've now got several weekends' worth of polishing ahead of me when the weather cools off with the Sentria and the G3 in addition to this Classic III. I definitely have no business accumulating any more vacuums at this point.

The machine came with an unopened two-pack of Hoover branded belts that the packaging says are for Kirby and Royal uprights, as well as Eureka power nozzles. The package had a 1985 copyright date and a $1.49 price tag from a True Value hardware store. I decided not to open it and went into my belt stash instead. I had one smooth belt and four with a knurled inner surface so since the Hoover belts were smooth, I decided to go with the smooth one.

I'll try to post some pictures tomorrow.

 

[huskyvacs]

Shopgoodwill was always my favorite place to get Kirbies. Their freight shipping always made shipping vacuums cheap. Many many vacuums I thought I'd never be able to get came from shopgoodwill for less than $30 grand total with delivery.

 

[fantomfan57]

Yeaaaa,

So glad your vacuum made it home. Also glad it is in great shape. I too found in my new acquisition, a package of Kirby/Royal belts. I forget the brand, but I know the package had red graphics.

Looking forward to your progress and pictures.

 

[human]

It's in the Bag...

I'm really liking this Classic III except for the dump bag arrangement. I've just never been fond of dump bags. That's why I retrofitted my Heritage 1HD, which had left the factory with a dump bag, with a Heritage II bag assembly so that I could not only use disposable filter bags but use the same bags across all of my Kirby vacuums. I eventually swapped out the gray H2 bag for a proper orange H1 bag and kept the proper charcoal gray topper and bag guard that had come on the dump bag so it looks all original except for the plastic mini emptor.

Since I had a full H2 bag assembly on the shelf, I thought to similarly retrofit the Classic III but nothing is ever completely simple and straightforward. First, the dump bag assembly was murder to get off of the Classic III. It took a good spritz of WD40 and a colorful assortment of curse words to finally get it loose but there didn't appear to be any undue corrosion holding it in place. I think it had just been on there for a very long time and didn't want to move.

The second challenge was putting the plastic Mini Emptor in the original Sani-Emptor's place. It fits but it doesn't want to completely snap into place. I guess it will take some persuasion similar to its metal counterpart but I'll get it. For the sake of my blood pressure, I decided that could wait and instead went on to the next challenge.

The final challenge was connecting the top of the bag to the handle. The Classic and Heritage series machine use entirely different systems so for this, so a couple of different possibilities came to mind, ranging from just putting a zip tie between the H2 bag topper and the dangling hook on the handle to actually swapping the original handle out for a Heritage I handle I've got in the barn. In the end, I just swapped the Classic III bag topper over to the H2 bag. This took just a couple of minutes and had a number of advantages ranging from keeping the Classic III name on the machine to not having to wash the Classic III bag anytime soon. I think the gray bag looks very nice on the machine and the red topper makes the red Kirby word marks on the gray bag really pop out. Right now, it still has the black H2 bag guard band on it, which doesn't look bad, but the red one on from the original bag really needs to be on there. I wanted to get some photos to go with this post but I ran out of daylight. I'll get some tomorrow afternoon.

As a side note, handling the metal parts with WD40 on my hands actually shined it up a little more. It's going to look great when I hit it with some Mother's. Also, looking into the vents on the motor housing, there is no sign at all of rug fuzz or other cruddy build-up inside there. This thing is just too clean. Since this weekend is supposed to be cooler with highs in the low 80s, I'm thinking a polishing session might be in the offing. The G3 and the Sentria will just have to wait a little longer.

 

[human]

I love it when a plan comes together...

So I got a little excited and went ahead and put the red bag guard on the Classic III. I think the gray H2 bag really looks at home on the machine but you take a look at the photos below and judge for yourself. I love the look of the original red plaid bag (makes me think it should have a bagpipe attachment) but the dump bag setup is just a non-starter for me. If I had any sort of sewing skills, which I don't, modifying the dump bag with a larger zipper and rig up something to hold the fill tube at the top might have been a possibility but under the circumstances, it really isn't. All in all, I really feel like this was the best option from both a functional and aesthetic standpoint as. Some folks might think I've bastardized this vacuum but to me, this feels like less of a 'frankenkirby' than my G5 and everything I've done is completely un-doable. For me, having disposable filter bags makes it arguably better than new. All it needs now is a good polishing and I can call it done.

 

[hoover300]

I have a spare Legend II bag somewhere that would match the rest of the unit more fittingly, $5 + shipping if you want it. Great find!

 

[human]

I just sent you an email. Look for "Legend Bag" in the subject line.

 

[suckolux]

Sweet!!

 

[fantomfan57]

Human, (I pronounce it like the Star Trek Ferengi used to)

Mine will end up looking just like yours, except, I do not have a red bag guard. In fact, I don't have any spare bag guards of any color.

I will want it to be red.

Hats Off on your progress!

 

[human]

I just reused the plastics off of the original dump bag. They're in good shape and I like that they're original to the machine. Brand new bag guard bands are available on eBay and are not expensive (well under $10) and can be had in every color, including red. The topper is a little harder to find, but not impossible.

 

[fantomfan57]

I checked....

on Ebay, the one ad was out of red. I have one other place to check.

 

[human]

45 minutes...

That's about how long it took me to get a pretty decent shine on the Classic III, using my two-step method of alternating between Never Dull wadding and Mothers, scrubbing with a softer version of a Scotch Brite pad from the Dollar Tree. There's still a little freckling but I'm very pleased, considering the little bit of time I put in on the project. I know my G3 'Dirty Kirby' will take much more work and I may or may not achieve comparable results. This is the potential I saw in the machine when I first saw it listed online. I may go over it again later but I'm pretty pleased with what I'm seeing.

As I look at the photos, I'm realizing the sun was so bright, I probably would have done well to put a polarizing filter on the lens to kill some of that glare. Photo #3 really shows up the shine the best.

 

[human]

One quick question...

Does anybody know a good way to restore the color to faded plastics? The cord hooks on this machine have that chalky look, which occurs from prolonged exposure to the sun's UV light. The top hook is especially bad. I put some Armor-All on them before I took the photos in the post above and they looked great—for literally about a minute until it dried/soaked in. I'm tempted to try a light coating of olive oil, which is what I use to bring back the handles on my Revere Ware cookware. It's a different type of material but who knows? It just might help.

 

[human]

Shortly after posting the above, I decided I had nothing to lose, so I went ahead and put a drop of olive oil on a paper towel and rubbed that over the hooks. As expected, the color reappeared instantly. After letting it sit a minute to give the oil a chance to soak in, I wiped the excess off with a clean, dry part of the same towel. The hooks look great and do not feel oily. It will be interesting to see how long the color lasts. Down the road, I can always clean them with alcohol and re-apply the oil, if needed.

 

[fantomfan57]

Very nice,

I am going to have to try the olive oil out. I also will be posting pictures when I finish my Classic III.
I have both Mother's and Never dull wadding. Maybe at some point I will do some high polishing.

Keep up the good work, Human.

 

[suckolux]

Olive oil will get rancid and sticky so keep an eye please

 

[rivstg1]

human. did you ever consider this way so that you can keep the stylish and cool Sani-emptor? I posted many pics of it 3 years ago. HEPA bag....pain to change it...but if you're a collector....one doesn't use it all the time so its usefulness will last a good while.