At my new job, they had these two forlorn looking sweepers sitting in the corner. The other night everyone was gone so I decided to give 'em a whirl. One was a Sanitaire classic upright and the other was a Eureka Whirlwind plasic piece of junk. So of course both machines are broken. The Sanitaire has no belt and the Whirlwind is just all plugged up.

The next day I worked on these machines. I got the Whirlwind all unplugged and running. It is still a piece of junk as you take two strokes with it and the fine dust make it all plugged up again.

I took the Sanitaire to my house. I repaired the stripped out screw holding the bag in place and replaced the belt of course. I was sort of excited to try it out on my rugs because I wondered what sort of hidden dirt may be that after using an Oreck and straight suction Compact for quite a while now. The other thing that appealled to me was the fact that this machine reminded me of the Eureka 2010 my mom had when I was a kid. I was dissappointed when I tried it as instead of being like my Moms old cleaner on steriods, it was more like Moms old cleaner on methamphetamines. Its sucked on my rug so hard that the brushroll stopped and it was a b*tch to push.

Here are pics for your enjoyment.

the business end of things

Your Blue Line Sanitaire upright has the 7.0 amp ESP motor and VGI...That makes for excellent deep carpet cleaning!

are EXCELLENT vacuum cleaners! I am surprised to hear you are disappointed with yours. I had one for a while that I picked up at a thrift shop in Palm Desert for $20. (Marty is still cussing about that one!!) It was in beautiful condition and I thought the dark blue and chrome "décor" was very lovely. Alas, I have only one large rug - an oriental area rug in the living room, so "Miss Sannie" sat neglected. So I sold her at a pretty handsome profit to one of my website clients who is happy as a clam with it.

I only have two small area rugs in my small house, so the Sanitaire would be also neglected here. When I took the machine back to the office, it did a fantastic job on the glued down office carpet. It was very fun to vacuum the office as it had not been done since God was a baby. I filled half the bag there.

I actually bought one of the heavy-duty Eurekas that Sam's club sells for 140 bucks (7 amp, VG 2) and wasn't too happy with it for the same reason: I think that motor was too powerful, as the brushroll would stop and the motor strain due to the suction. Of course, I adjusted the height to compensate, but at that point the cleaner was off the floor. I think the older ones with smaller motors were better cleaners.

i agree, the airflow is too much at 7 amps. and the motor spins too fast for the vulnerable fan. and the belts wear too quickly. 5 amps would be ideal.

I have a Eureka self propelled with the 2 speed ESP 6.7 amp motor and VGII...It really deep cleans my carpets!
Even on the ESP speed, My machine does not suck the carpet so hard that the brushroll stops turning.
My other Eureka upright with the HP 5.5 amp motor and VGII cleans just as well.

I feel a problem with the Sanitaires is not really the motor is too strong-the nozzle height adjust doesn't allow the nozzle to be adjusted high enough if you have deep pile carpet-that is the proble I have-the sanitaire machines are USELESS on my carpets.The nozzle cannot be adjusted high enough.--so the belt wears-the motor stalls and the airflow is choked off.these cleaners do have STRONG airflow-they just aren't designed for deep carpets.The Sanitaires work fine on commercial shallow pile carpets.

Well said, I think the machine is just better suited to certain carpets. As someone mentioned a week or two ago, if Eureka could devise a way to use a cogged belt on this machine, enhance the dial-a-nap, and use a metal fan housing, these would be unbeatable. The main problem I have is the belt slipping/breaking and the brushroll stopping (causing motor strain) due to the beater bars.

im inclined to think that its the excessive suction that is causing the carpet to cling so firmly to the nozzle that is causing the problem. the dial a nap system has an excellent range. but if the machine engages the carpet too firmly, you have the problems mentioned. not only does the 7amp motor cause the cleaner to grab the carpet too firmly, it wears the belts very quickly too. bet if the folks who have problems with the sanitaires on thick carpets tried the same cleaner with a 5amp motor, it would be a different story.

I have an Electrolux/Sanataire ZC880 and from when it was new it never seemed to agitate the carpet and was hard to push. Jeff Parker told me to try a Convertible belt that had been slightly used on a Convertible and it now workd SUPERBLY!!!!

Seamus

I have a Koblentz upright that is similar to the Sanitaire-it has a 9A motor-and it works very well-no grabbing or bogging down.Its nozzle height adjust has a greater range than the Sanitaire.Like the koblentz machine better.Standard Sanitaire-Eureka belts fit the Koblentz-thats what koblentz recommeneds.I too would like to see Saintaire return to the metal fans and fan housings-the plastic fans and housings break to often.The metal fans are also more resistant to abrasion-common with the sandy soil that gets tracked onto carpets and rugs here.Another thing on Sanitaires "Serpentine" metal brush rolls the beater bars wear faster than the Hoover metal bars.

Of my ZC880- £40 NIB fron Ebay

General view

Handle switch setup

Wow, that is beautiful! And for 40 pounds! I would have bought it in an instant at that price, even if I had to pay an exorbitant amount to ship, except that I don't have 220V. That same Sanitaire here with the comfort handle in the blue line retails at about 350 bucks.

Hey Travis

It was indeed an fantastic bargain- the £40 ($72 odd) even included the shipping!.

HOWEVER....

It had come from the factory wired with 3 mains suppressors- in addition to one across the live and netural it was also fitted with one across the neutural/earth(ground) and one across the live/earth. If you connected it to a circuit with a earth leakage trip it tripped it straight away :(.

The Electrolux modification was simply to remove the additional suppressors- it now works fine :0)

Seamus