need some advice...

[Sarlon]

this year I'm getting nearly a $1700 tax refund. I won't have any major bills to catch up and most everything in my house is the way I want it.

my vacuum cleaner of nearly 10 years is finally dying, I pull it apart and do normal maintance on it, but its kicking the bucket and I don't know if I can keep it alive much longer.

Also, when I bought the thing so many years ago, I had many many many more carpets then I do now including wall to wall carpets. I now live in a house with ONE area rug, and hard wood floors.

I need to replace my vaccum and I know technology has changed alot in 10 years.

Can anyone put in their 2cents on a vacuum? needs to go easily from rug to floors, and be heavy duty enough to pick up cat litter that my child kicks out of her litter box. My house is only about 900 square feet so its not that big.

[Tama]

I've heard good things about dysons, but I haven't had the responsibility of buying one myself yet.

[fma_fanatic]

Dysons - pricey but worth it. We've owned the DC07for 7 years and it runs like a charm. I think it was about $500 new.

[Sapphire Silk]

If you only have one rug, I'm not sure I'd bother with an expensive vacuum.

I have an inexpensive Hoover I bought at Wally World 10 years ago. Still works great. I only have carpet in 2 rooms (master bedroom and guest bedroom), the rest is hardwood, laminate, or linoleum. I swiffer the hard floors, dry then wet, and occasionally follow up with a Shark. I vaccuum the carpets only.

Easier, use less electricity. The swiffer pads are cheap and I buy them in bulk.

[fireheart]

Another one for the Dyson. You can even get ones that vaguely resemble balls...so they REALLY suck.

I would avoid the "stick" ones though (has the "bag" on top and then the stiff hose on the bottom), as they don't have good suction. Also anything that's cordless...same reason.

[Seshat]

If your rug is small enough to hang on the clothesline and whack with a broomstick, that's actually a very efficient way to remove dirt - and doesn't risk leaving any dirt in the house.
Some area rugs can actually be tossed in a washing machine, which is even easier.

Failing those, I also recommend the cyclonic type of cleaner. We have one by Hoover, not Dyson, and it's damn good.

The key factor with vacuum cleaners is the airflow: filters of all sorts get clogged, and gradually diminish airflow. The cyclone type doesn't clog until it gets too much dirt; but emptying the cyclone chamber frequently deals with that.
Of course, even cyclonic cleaners have SOME filters, usually fine filters that deal with microscopic dirt that escapes the cyclone. So you do need to clean those to keep up your airflow; but that applies to all types of cleaner.

For an effective cleaner, I recommend the barrel-on-the-floor, hose-to-the-floor-tool sort. Because they don't have to keep the motor weight down, the barrels can have more oomph for the airflow than the single-unit vacuums.


The other thing that matters a lot is the floor tool you get. The types of brushes and beaters determine whether or not it's useful for picking up pet hair, whether it's good for area rugs or wall-to-wall shag or cut-and-loop or smooth floors....


Honestly, I'd recommend finding someplace where there's an honest salesman who enjoys matching the person to the cleaner. If you can find that, you'll do better than any advice I can offer.

The above, btw, is the results of our research into our own cleaner.