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Not quite as much fun as spending months researching new bikes, but it does need done. Our vacuum has died on us (certainly not through over use!) so time for a new one. Any recommendations? Main criteria are that it has to be good on carpets and has to be bagless. Have also been thinking about cordless so any advice there would be welcome.
MrsKenny doubts the ability of blokes to pick a decent vacuum so would like to prove her wrong, and as STW is generally a fount of wisdom thought I'd try here first.
Cheers.
Mrs Wombat works at a High St seller of vaccuum cleaners (amongst other things) she recommends G-Tech for cordless or Miele (albeit a bagged version) for corded.
FWIW we have a Miele which has been going strong for 12 years now and it still sucks as hard as you like.....
Very impressed with our new Dyson cordless. Spendy though.
Ideal world:
Cheap Henry off eBay for heavy duty stuff
Dyson cordless for day to day use.
Good on carpets = upright with a beater brush
Bagless = really why?
Suggest Sebo X series , reliable, repairable and will clean carpets properly.
We've got a Dyson V8 Animal that's used daily (we've got dogs). Brillaint little thing. Light, effective and battery lasts ages. Baggless too. We then have a Miele Classic for once a month duties to get the bits the Dyson can't reach, mainly small gabs and carpet edges.
Porbably not the cheapest solutions, but it works so well.
look up the Shark range. not cordless, but they do have LED lights on them... 🙂
Miele cat & dog ..similar story to above 12 + years still great suction ..
Henry's are crap ..
Cheers, will check out those recommendations. And thanks for the link to the other thread; hadn't spotted that.
We only buy a new vacuum every six or seven years roughly, so happy to pay a wee bit more for something quite decent.
in the tradition of recommending what you have and ignoring the specifics of the question:
Dyson cordless thing, its great on the solid floor we have downstairs, very quick and easy so do it more often. upstairs with carpets we have an old upright corded dyson which does well enough (dog does not go upstairs very much though)
Bought a dyson cordless recently (the new V10 is very spendy but that means the older V8 is cheaper)
It really is great, its so light and quick to use that hoovering really is no effort so I tend to do it a lot more than i did when it involved dragging the ton weight corded hoover out of the cupboard
I'm a Henry fan. We had a (pet friendly) Dyson for a while, but the missus (a long hair) kept jamming it up, and eventually it burnt out (they use the suction air to cool the motor. No air flow because its jammed again = hot motor)
The Henry doesn't match your spec, but its done at least 10 years now, including me using it as a powertool dust extractor and some other industrial type stuff and it hasn't missed a beat. True, it doesn't work as well as a new Dyson, but it works way better than a half-****ed one.
The cable is also pretty damn long - I can do an entire floor of our (not small) house from any one socket, which kinda reduces the need for cordless, as you don't have to constantly unplug/replug room to room.
Whatever miele fits budget and needs.
+1 Dyson cordless. Happy without our V6. Was 130 quid off Dyson outlet, with long beater brush thing and some other heads. Charger is mounted on the wall under the stairs, super convenient. Never use the Henry.
There's another 10% off everything on eBay (PERKS) which will be useful at that Dyson eBay outlet btw
I asked my mum a while ago & she said 'get a dyson, i've had 6 now & i really like them'.
Henry’s are crap ..
I never understood the love for Henrys. They're great in industrial environments because they're indestructible, but they've got the suction power of a 12-year old with a McDonald's milk shake. Why you'd buy one for home I can't fathom.
We only buy a new vacuum every six or seven years roughly, so happy to pay a wee bit more for something quite decent.
Much as I'm loathe to send praise the way of an arch-Brexiter, my Dyson's easily 15 years old and probably nearer 20, and is still going strong. DC07 IIRC.
I got the V8 cordless a couple of years back and it's been great too. The upright outperforms it but the little one is a lot more convenient.
This seems to be a regular topic on the forum and my answer - as always - is get a Sebo.
Ideal world:
Cheap Henry off eBay for heavy duty stuff
Dyson cordless for day to day use.
Totally agree. That's what we have. The Dyson cordless is great for a quick run round or just grabbing when you accidentally spill something, walk mud in, service the bike while the wife is out, etc. The Henry is nice and indestructible for building waste (actually we have the bigger pneumatic industrial one as I managed to pick it up well used but working fine)
I’m a Henry fan. We had a (pet friendly) Dyson for a while, but the missus (a long hair) kept jamming it up, and eventually it burnt out (they use the suction air to cool the motor. No air flow because its jammed again = hot motor)
There should be a bleed valve that allows air flow when the suction end is blocked. Dyson's certainly all used to have that. Our new cordless does as well. I suspect the problem was more down the jamming than the air flow
As an alternative view. Dysons are crap!
2x Cordless V8 Animal Dysons in our house they can't pick up grit/rice/dishwasher salt type stuff, no filter on the intake means it bounces around in the dust receptacle and then flies back down and out of the nozzle again. Brushes spin round so fast that most stuff gets picked up, spun around and then fired out and across the room.
1 battery has died and is only just over a year old
They're great at picking up hair though, shame the thing fills up after only doing 2 rooms, although we do have 3 dogs and 2 cats all of whom seem to delight in spreading their hair far and wide (I'm only jealous).
Best vacuum we ever had was a Miele, that died after about 5 years. Big heavy sod though.
After some research, much on here, I got the Shark IF250 UK twin battery from Amazon for £300. It's just right. Money well spent. Seems to be a price drop from time to time on Amazon, next day it was £100 more. Today it's £350. This reminds me to cancel Prime, I got a trial and had it delivered next day for free (Sunday).
i'm a two vacuum guy.
Henry I got off ebay for £25 for the garage. car cleaning and decorating clean ups.
Dyson upright for around the house, will probably go cordless for this when it dies as we have a cleaner who comes every other week with their own vacuum.
I never wanted the dyson and I still don't tbh a Henry is easily the best design for vacuuming. Easy to clean out, follow you about, loads of attachments and serviceable at home.
Another 2 vacuum guy. a henry that's over 10 years old has just been relegated to garage duty, and we've replaced it with a Miele Complete something or other. It's nice, but only wants to go in one direction on most carpets, can't hoover with a back and forth motion very easily without dialling the suck way back. Pain in the backside.
You can now get a new head for the Henry, the Turbo Airo which looks like it might solve the old Henry problem of not removing hair etc too well, kind of wish Id bought one of those to try it out before lashing out on the Miele.
We've got a Henry and it's spot on (I know it's not cordless but I'm sick of recharging every sodding thing in the house) and there are bagless options. I've never noticed a lack of suction and kick the overdrive button if you really need it, not expensive, made in the UK.
Just had to do a warranty claim on our Dyson v6 as the battery wouldn't hold charge. Shockingly good service. A couple of emails, and a new battery was in the post to us, with an onsite engineer visit booked too just in case the new battery didn't fix it.
We have little kids, and having a cordless vacuum on hand for quick whizz round when they've distributed their dinner around the kitchen floor *again* really does improve things.
miele is 9 years old still going strong, decorated 2 houses & have 4kids since we got it!
had to replace the switch once when it got wet
my parents have killed 2 dysons in that time, I told my dad to get a miele, but hes just gone & bought another dyson (off ebay outlet fwiw)
A well maintained Henry with a bag is great. Some folk don’t use the bag then the filter gets wrecked.
A lightweight Oreck with a bag is great. No mess, no fuss, user serviceable spares, My folks have one that lasted 30 years, and mind lasted about 20.
got a used one from eBay for £50 and it looks like it will last another 20 easily.
dysons are colourful waste electrical equipment with a huge carbon footprint. They need banned.
I found the Karcher ones to be better than Henrys. No HEPA filtration though so I only use it for DIY, cars, workshop etc.
Miele
As above, we had a Miele (drag along thing with hose) for about 14yrs then it got broken by removers, tried replacements of all sorts, found them all crap in comparison. Went back to Miele.
not tried the Dyson cordless upright doo-dah, but the cost is... 😳
I never understood the love for Henrys
Life is a compromise, I agree with you in that there are much better vacuums on the market, but the Henry is indestructible, mines been going for 10 years + and shows no signs of stopping anytime soon, it cost me £100 quid, and I've used it week in week out since then with no spares, emptying the bag once the (admittedly poor) suction gets even worse and that's it. My house has the appearance of being hoovered (which is all I can muster the enthusiasm for anyway) and I don't ever ever have to start a thread about what vacuum should I buy...Plus of course it has a cute smiley face, so I can talk to it and it doesn't answer me back when I bemoan the state of my lonely ultimately fruitless life, why why why must I carry on....
ahem...so: buy a Henry.
+1 Henry
My brother is a domestic appliance engineer. We bought a Miele on his advice and it is still going strong 15 years later.
Thanks for all the advice folks, much appreciated. Just home from the fun part of my Saturday (been out on the cross bike); now for the un-fun part of trying to decide which vacuum we go for, and buying it.
Miele owner here, it works well and has plenty of functions that are worth having and is well designed and built. Only thing is that it's a bit of a lump for carrying up and down stairs (same as all the others of this type), so often wish for a small hand held for many small jobs which it mostly gets used for. In hindsight might have been more useful to buy a cheap Henry and a decent handheld
Is it sad that I'm excited about a cordless Henry!
https://www.numatic.co.uk/product-view.aspx?id=456&r=4&sr=1
We've got an expensive retro looking sebo upright. Sucks like a demon and ok to use in upright rolling mode. Leaves carpets with their nap all fluffed beautifully.
Absolute nightmare in 'hoovering the stairs or the car' mode, completely unwieldy and far too heavy.
I have a Makita backpack vacuum for round the house. Hoovered up the gerbil once poor little thing. Don't worry he survived.
I'm impressed with my Vax. 17m reach from plug and plenty of grunt. Cost £100 from Curry's
Miele. Buy Dyson, buy twice. All my family bought Dysons. We bought a Miele. They all now have Miele. Fabulous customer service with back to base refurbishment to as new for any minor fault.
A little bulky on the stairs, but the car attachment comes with a double length hose, so the vacuum stays on the ground floor.
We got a sebo which is very good but a bit cumbersome above ground floor, and a dyson for the stairs and keeping on top through the week.
Neither is on a backpack, I've been robbed!
Have tried a few ‘house’ hovers/vacuums over the years, a Miele pet one being the best of these by far, the Dyson the worst. But for the last twenty years a Henry has lived with us and still going strong, had a few new attachments but no internals and that’s after a couple of house rebuilds.
He doesn’t look so smart now and that’s why we had a Dyson, lasted two years along side Henry, a Miele, lasted 5 years (really effective) alongside Henry. Have given up trying to replace him now...
And as for weak suck, we have to open they access to air vent with lots of carpets overwised he pulls them up.
I’m sure there are other good vacuums but we have not found any other serious competition to a Henry for a house with dogs, cats, and people with Bikes and a horse.