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New vacuum recommendations please, we've got a wee Vax thing that struggles on our cheap carpets. Need something better that actually picks up fluff and other small items.
Ta 🙂
Doesn't this get asked at least once a month?
Usual answers are Miele, Sebo, Dyson.
henry
Henry
Henry or George if you've got pets.
And the answer, again, is Sebo
Dyson cordless. Game changer.
Once more sebo
Sebo if you like uprights that work.
Bought a Miele last weekend which has silly amounts of suction, it lifts the carpets and I have to use both arms on the highest setting.
We havent long bought a Shark, mrs h thinks it great, that'll do for me.
carpet = rotating beating head if you want it clean and the carpet pile brushed.
Bagged cleaner with proper filters best.
Sebo X series ideal.
Sebo. Again.
Sebo's appear to be £300 and Henrys £120.
Mmm its a toughy.
For any kind of 'white goods' you must have a Miele apparently. Aren't we all so STW.
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Apologies if this does get asked loads, I should have checked first. I'll look into all brands suggested. Cheers
All brands? Miele and Miele then. The rest are drowned out by the Miele brothers.
Miele.
You can't do this with your fancy miele
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100% Henry....
When our Dyson broke (10 years, so a reasonable innings) my wife went leftfield, and ordered a G-Tech rechargeable.
Seems good so far. Came with an upright and a handheld, both cordless. Time will tell as to reliability...
James
Like a Henry but with less bells and whistles.
Henry every time, they just go on and on.
If you fancy a Dyson just nip into your local appliance repair shop and have a look at the herd of sorry-looking Dysons standing there like giraffes, waiting for spare parts and you'll drop the idea.
Not Henry! Top heavy, easily gets caught on corners/furniture etc, the cuff that connects to the metal pipe sections keeps slipping and eventually breaks. Our old Dyson was much better, had a motor replacement(ebay £20) after 5 years and is now the garage vacuum cleaner (probably been out there 3-4 years.
Former Dyson owner here, now 100% Henry. The AK47 of cleaners.
Henry and a James here 🙂
Henry. He's like the Orange Five of the hoover world.
Except not very expensive.
Aren't you supposed to use bags with a Henry, seems a bit of a faff? I think Dysons are way overpriced but good nonetheless. My previous Dyson upright lasted 10+ years (gave it away in the end, it was still working fine). Swapped to a cordless one which is great (but stupidly expensive), probably not so good if you have a large house and want to vacuum it all at once. For me though I have a small house + I find with the cordless rather than see vacuuming as a "once a week do the whole house" thing I do the living room/hall much more often as it's just so quick/convenient if you see dirt on the carpet.
OP "Vax thing that struggles on our cheap carpets"
Unless the cleaner has a moving beating head it will struggle,
an upright cleaner is usually required for carpets.
Our old Dyson was much better, had a motor replacement(ebay £20) after 5 years and is now the garage vacuum cleaner (probably been out there 3-4 years.
I'm the exact opposite - had 4 Dysons over the years from the dc4? To the animal, all have had issues, broken parts repeated, got blocked easily etc. Had a Henry for two years now, it cost less to buy than some of the Dyson parts and other than the bags (big box for less than £10), had nothing spent on it. The suction power is, IMO, much better than the Dyson. Yes it's cumbersome, doest have lots of accessories or look like a 1970s sifi robot, but it just works, 100% of the time.
Aren't you supposed to use bags with a Henry, seems a bit of a faff?
It takes less than a minute to swap the bag over. I've never thought of it as a faff.
Aren't you supposed to use bags with a Henry, seems a bit of a faff?
Yes, every 6 months or so I informed by Mrs. Jay that the 'hoover' has become very heavy and isn't sucking anymore - this is the point I must resist the urge to ask if it's gotten married.
Replacing the bag is a very unfafy 90 second job, sometimes I have to drag lumps of hair out of the bit that the hose connects too, which I don't like but as it'll be 6 months before I do it again, I get over it.
Obviously as this is the internet I'm going to be a bit of a dick and compare the Dyson unfavourably against it.
With it's 1.6l capacity you'll be emptying your Dyson a lot more than your 9l Henry / George (although that both come in various sizes the Numatic ones are much bigger as a rule) and yes the Dyson is very clever and you just have to aim it over the bin and pull the trigger - ours would usually need to have lumps dragged out of it by hand.
Bags are £7 for 10 in Supermarkets or Argos, about 5 years worth at the rate we use them - if you don't like the idea of ecological cost of brown paper and cardboard you can use an aftermarket reusable cloth bag.
every 6 months or so I informed by Mrs. Jay that the 'hoover' has become very heavy and isn't sucking anymore
Haha, my wife does exactly the same thing, bless her.
We have a dog. We have a Dyson.
Our cleaners (yeah, whatever, shoot me) bring a Henry, it's crap and doesn't pick up the dog hairs, so we've asked them to use our Dyson instead, which does.
And it's about eight years old and we've never had any problems with it.
P-Jay - Member
every 6 months or so I informed by Mrs. Jay that the 'hoover' has become very heavy and isn't sucking anymore - this is the point I must resist the urge to ask if it's gotten married.
😀
And it's about eight years old and we've never had any problems with it.
The cleaner or the vac?
We had one of those Vax with the pet hair filter. That was awesome and coped with a Newfoundland
That was awesome and coped with a Newfoundland
Must be pretty powerful to pick one of those up.
Dysons are an absolutely genius marketing trick; they are heavy, expensive, unreliable, ugly and ridiculously over-complicated yet people buy them for the simple reason that you see the dirt you've collected and feel good about it. Human nature loves a big effect for minimal effort and humans will even go as far as vacuuming the floor if rewarded enough.
Meanwhile Mr Dyson lives in his mansion in Gloucestershire with 50 permanent staff to look after the house and garden and ensure his and his family's security from kidnap.
I recently tried to hoover out my car with a friend's Dyson V6.
I gave up, it didn't have enough 'sook'
I have a Harry (Henry with a pet filter) that is good, but I do understand the issues about bulk/carting it about - as I live in a small flat.
I'd be quite keen on getting another battery powered one for convenience and quick day to day hoovering. I have laminate floors so don't need anything super duper - been eyeing up the Vax ones that they have on sale on their outlet site (often through a link on MSE) for about £50-60
But TBH, I just use a brush and a dustpan since I am too poor to own two vacuums
Can I add a question to this? Steam mops. Any recommendations? For a mix of tiled floors and wooden floorboards, with two small children constantly making a mess!
Dysons are an absolutely genius marketing trick; they are heavy
Ours is, granted, my parents have one of the smaller ones and it isn't, indeed that's why they bought it.
, expensive,
Cos Miele and Sebo are cheap.
unreliable,
Ours isn't
ugly
As opposed to all those other good-looking vacuunm cleaners. And anyway, who cares?
ridiculously over-complicated
I turn it on, it sucks dirt up, I turn it off when I'm finished. Emptying it involves pushing two buttons. What's complicated?
Late to the party again, but as I'm here then I'll just add that having owned a Dyson, & still an owner of a Henry & a Sebo I must say that the Henry stays in the garage & cleans that & the cars only, or gets to clean up mega mess in the house if minor or major demolition has occurred, usually followed by the Sebo to do the final clean of the fine dust the Henry leaves behind, they are industrial & virtually indestructible but they are a blunt tool & a really not that powerful if you use the bags.
They had the Dyson robot in Currys last weekend.Looked impressive but over £700
kenny smells spammy
Sebo if you want a proper upright, dyson hand held if you don't. We just bought the Dyson absolute and with 40 minute run time there's no need to use the sebo now for a full house clean.
We also have a Dyson V6 hand held with 20 minute charge but the absolute is better in lots of ways - emptying is easier, switching to 'turbo' mode is easier
I have a Bertie (bigger version of a Henry) and it’s ace for more agricultural uses, was ace when doing building work and cleaning the car and big spills etc but it can’t match a proper upright on piled carpets - you need a beater bar to sweep through the pile.
One thing I’ve noticed is that Dyson keep bringing out new stuff all the time, is this to get people buying them and upgrading? Sebo vacuums have looked the same for years and years and looo very traditional.
Our church is flipping huge and th congregation clean it - acres of carpets. We used to have some Dysons but they all broke quite quickly. Bought 10 Sebos - nothing fancy - and they still work just as well as the day they were purchased. Lightweight, efficient, simple but powerful. It’s what I am buying next.
we have a dyson V6 for light duties, though it's not really up to those anymore either, so are probably going to get a g-tech something or other for inetrim cleaning. However in a moment of sheer dyson induced frustration (and it was in the B&Q sale) we bought a vax commercial.
holy hell, i could use it to strip paint. needs to be used with teh air bleed open fully otherwise you can't move it on carpet, and forget about rugs, it's a two man job, one standing on the rug to hold it down, the other vacuuming.
James Dyson, pro Brexit... wants to revitalise the UK economy by outsourcing manufacture overseas and pay less tax..
Henry are made in the UK and pay tax, and are better hoovers
(had a Dyson, it was overpriced meh)
James Dyson, pro Brexit... wants to revitalise the UK economy by outsourcing manufacture overseas and pay less tax..
Thought this usual stuff would come up eventually. He has massively helped UK manufacturing by his employment and training of graduate engineers plus his education centres, bursaries and prizes for design and engineering students. He just doesn't think it's a great location for mass production of his products (which he has very little to do with these days anyway).
Can't say I agree with his stance on brexit but at least he has a reasoned argument
As for taxes I'll leave this here:
[i]Among the 54 billionaires resident in 2006 (the most up-to-date figures) a total of £14.7m was paid in tax. Mr Dyson alone paid £9m of that. In 2010, Dyson's company paid 88 per cent of its total tax bill in Britain, giving the Exchequer £50m.[/i]
Henry are made in the UK and pay tax, and are better hoovers
They're not 'hoovers', and they're not better vacuum cleaners.
I'm not a fan of Dyson uprights or cylinders as sebo is where it's at but dyson hand helds are very good.
we have a dyson V6 for light duties, though it's not really up to those anymore either
why's that then - battery dieing or ?
needs to be used with teh air bleed open fully otherwise you can't move it on carpet
can't move my V8 on carpet when on max, with the wrong head.
can't move my V8 on carpet when on max, with the wrong head.
And even with the right head on max it's pretty sucky 🙂
Ooh, a spam-bump.
I just recently bought a Shark! Not seen that mentioned. I did read some reviews and ignored this thread cos people just vote for posh brand names (Meile? Those things don't even have wheels!)
The Shark is great. V powerful and a fraction of the price of a Dyson.
+1 for Shark. We've just got one and it's brilliant. Picks up so much dust and crap that other hoovers have missed.
When you absolutely definitely have to Vac everything in the room..there is no competition it has to be a Henry.
They are also a top notch British company.
The Dyson Animal we had finally died (was under extended warranty but it had just about everything replaced during this time). Went for a Vax Air Lift (two in fact - one for caravan). Long cable which will do upstairs as well just plugged in downstairs. Motor unit comes off so great for car and stairs. About £150 with 6 year warranty.
If you're into keeping your house clean the answer is actually v+1.
I have 4 vacuum cleaners. The Dyson V6 for quick duties and two mieles , one for filth and car, and one for house.
I also have a spare V6 that is back up for when the other V6 bin breaks. I don't think the Dyson HHs are quite good enough for all situations. Not so great on hard floors.
There is no one perfect vac like there is not one perfect bike.
Henry without doubt.
Simple but effective.
Design hasn't changed in decades. And there's a reason for that!!!
There are actually lots of different Henry's. They look pretty much the same but the switches, motors and top casings changed over the years. Mine is the really basic single speed, non-recoil cable version. The motor armature died at about ten years and I bodged a Panasonic motor into it as it was available for a fiver, tuned it up to 1400w yo! All of them can be fixed pretty cheaply though, there just isn't much in there to go wrong.
Having worked on many Dysons I'd not have one. Noisy, cheaply made crap in my opinion.
Saying that I wouldn't mind a Henry with the motor powered brush, they're pretty damn good.
Much like backpacking where you have a "system" of bikes/tyres/wheels/luggage/quilts/tents/tarps/sleeping bag/mat/torches/stove/pans
You need a vacuum system. Every "real" vaccumist has a cupboard under the stairs with at least 10 different styles of vacuum - uprights, handhelds, sticks, robot ones, carpet shampoo, shop vac and so on.
Come on people, lets take this seriously.
Dyson v6 hand held for an automated dustpan and brush and George for heavier duties. Best of both worlds.
Recently bought a Hoover Evolution Breeze as our ancient Panasonic died and Panasonic don't make vacuums any more.
The Hoover is great, low power consumption, quiet and picks up tons. £79 on Amazon.
The henry is the alpha male of the vacuum world. Does not faff about with silly gimmicks and just gets on with the job and gets it done with no fuss.
Ao.com has what I assume are old stock Miele C2s (as they are the high power motor) at a very good price £119
https://ao.com/product/compactc2extreme-miele-cylinder-vacuum-cleaner-blue-54027-59.aspx
Shark for steam mops