I had the best time putting together this awesome machine with my friend Tom (Gasko). This is the coolest looking Rainbow so far and it works AWESOME. I love the PE powerhead and the spaceship looks. This will most likely be my new daily vacuum due to the fact that the water washed air coming through the hepa filter smells SOOOOOOO clean and add some D&A to the water and it really smells great. I highly recommend one of these to anyone! Thanks for helping me Tom and I hope you enjoy your new 75th Anniversary Electrolux Epic that i traded you ... :~

i have a similar Rainbow-I DON"T like the powernozzle---not a good design.It chokes off the airflow of Rainbows new SR "Hurricane Force" motor.I used an older TriStar "TurboBrush" on mine and it dug up MORE dirt.the Rainbow is messy-but its kinda cool to see how much "mud" you make in the water container after vacuuming the house.the water washed air does kinda smell pleasent.

I have a new Rainbow E2 the only thing I don't like about it is it is so noisy... but much more suction then the old Rainbows I also have a SE Performance edition and have only used it 6 times in all these years and it doesn't have as much suction as the E series. The other thing I hate about the E2 (year Old) is the lower speed doesnt work anymore and no where around here to fix it......

Derreck:
You are very welcome. I always have a GREAT time with you, working on vacuums and testing them out. Your new E series is excellent. Don't forget that you have an 8 year warranty on the thing. Of course, if it ever needs ANYTHING, I'll fix it for you

I LOVE my 75 anniversary edition Electrolux upright. It cleans so much better than my old, grey Epic 3500 that you built for me. I am displaying the 75 anniversary model in my dining room for everyone to see. It's an awesome machine.

You should put a picture of your blue Constellation on the forum. It's the nicest looking one I've ever seen. It looks brand new. Also, your Miele Capricorn is fabulous. What a nice looking sweeper. Too bad it has a filthy old bag (LOL). I kid, I kid. The Miele is too cool for words. Hope everyone in the club gets a chance to meet you at the next convention. You are a fantastic friend and so much fun to be around. St. Louis Vacuum Collector's Rule!

KirbyKid:
Your Rainbow has an 8 year warranty. Go to the the www.rainbowsystem.com website and see where the local repair shop is that does warranty work. The computer control module is the problem. Also, the brand new E-2 has the sound reduction package. You can get that added to your old machine and it quiets it down immensely.

What's that silver machine you can just barely see to the right field?

thanks Dysonman for the info, I already checked with Rainbow and they said the closest repair place is about 200 miles away and the machine has that nice hepa filter on the exhaust and it still is noisy i think.. not as quite as the old se edition...

kirbykid:
Bring your Rainbow E2 to the next meeting, and I'll fix it for your for free, under warranty.

By the way, that's a DC07 Carpet model Dyson in Derreck's living room, you can barely see it in the picture.

Have you ever tried essential oils? They're all natural and highly concentrated. Every health food store sells them. Just remember that you only need one to four drops of the oil in your water and they will not harm your Rainbow. They're not oil, per se, So don't worry about using them in your machine. I used to put a mix of lavender and sandalwood in my SE (4 drops total) before I went to sleep. Talk about aromatherapy! The citrus oils are nice to use on "housecleaning day", though I never got around to doing anything other than the vacuuming!

If used properly, one of the biggest advantages of the e2 is that it eliminates the hassle of having to drag out the machine and set it up. It is AHAM certified as an air cleaner, and intended to be run 24/7 on low speed. When you want to vacuum, just connect the hose, and turn the switch to high speed. When finished, pour the dirty water down the toilet and flush it away. Refill the basin with clean water, put the machine back together (an easy task), turn it back on in low speed mode, and let it run. The separator, which used to need to be cleaned after each use, now needs to be cleaned only once every six months. The switched reluctance "Hurricane" motor, which eliminates carbon brushes, is designed to run continuously for many years, and puts out no carbon emissions. I have customers who have run their e2's continuously for the whole two and a half years since this model came out. Incidentally a couple of weeks ago I had a woman who had the orignal e-Series, about five years old, who wanted the new low speed air cleaning feature, and traded the e-Series in on a new e2.

I have run into a plumber that DOES NOT recommend dumping your Rainbow dirt-water container into your potty.He got thru "roto-Rooting" a womans plumbing that did for a period of years-that dirt combined with other wastes hardened to be like concrete.Wore the teeth off three Rooter blades.Those blades are pretty tough.I dump mine outside.

If your house is on a septic system then you definitely cannot dump the Rainbow dirt water down the drain - it has to be emptied outdoors. I have a Rainbow D but I would not vacuum my entire house with it (since the water has to be changed frequently) in the middle of winter when the outside temperature can be -20 F! Making frequent trips outdoors at that temperature is not my idea of a fun time! :-)

Gary

Yes,my home has a septic tank-another good reason to dump the Rainbow container outside-I could see the problem of dumping the container outside on very cold days.

I found that the older D series did a terrible job of cleaning! The way they say they work is that "wet dirt can't fly." But, what if it doesn't get wet? What happens if it just flies just out the exhaust? I placed a filter in front of the exhaust and found a lot of dirt coming out of it. Thus, in theory the charges of the dirt and water are said to attract. But what if they don't get close enough??? A Rainbow shouldn't have to have a filter just to catch dirt. The water alone should take care of that. But it doesn't. So I will stick with my Kirby's and my Air-Way. My Air-Way 88 Mk. II ROCKS!! I can't say the same for my Rainbow...

I also prefer my Kirby and other machines to the Rainbows-the Rainbow "E" series vacuums have a pleated "HEPA"filter on the exhaust to catch debris that isn't wetted by the watertrap.the E Rainbows have better filtration.The filter is washable for a few times-then has to be replaced.It also depends on what you pick up -debris like fireplace ash ,plaster dust will clog the Rainbow filter-these are not water wettable-so they may not get filtered in the main water filter pan.In fact the Rainbow owners manual tells you not to pick up those items.

vacuumkid:
The whole thing about positive and negative charges to water and dirt is hooey.

Want to know the truth?

The rainbow is bringing air from the room into the water bath, where the air mixes with water. The air is separated from the water by the separator, allowing only a certain amount of 'humidity' to the stream of air getting through. What happens is VERY SIMPLE. Even kids understand it.

The air in the room is DRIER than the water in the pan. As the dry room air mixes with the water, and is then separated, the level of water in the pan DECREASES. The rainbow EVAPORATES about 2 1/2 cups of water per hour on High speed.

While the water is CLEAN, that's fine. It's clean water evaporating.

BUT, when the water is DIRTY, it's dirty water being evaporated. AND, this is FORCED EVAPORATION of the water, like pointing a fan at a bowl of water. NOT, natural evaporation. Do the dirt, which IS in the water, comes through the separator with the humidity. A certain percentage of the total dirt in solution, is ALWAYS leaving the pan. On the old models (pre E Series), this dust triumphantly escaped the machine. The fact that this amount was SO MUCH LESS than what escaped through cloth vacuum bags gave the rexair (and rainbow) machines their 'supposed' air cleaning ability - since MUCH LESS dirt escaped the Rexair than the Hoover 150.

Fill the rainbow with a MEASURED amount of water. Leave the hose OFF and run the machine for 1 hour. Measure the remaining water. The variation will come with how dry the room air is. In winter, rainbows evaporate much MORE water (dirty water, remember) than they do in the humid summer time.

The real problem is that people clean WAY, WAY too long with one filling of water. The water should be changed once every ten minutes or so, when using the power nozzle. After that time, the saturation of the water is such that a LOT of dust is being evaporated with the water.

While I personally like the Rainbow and use one (sometimes - when the mood takes me) to clean my home, I DO take care of my machine, and the motor is still clean and bright like new.

BUT, the customers of my store bring in their Rainbows which are used as their ONLY vacuum cleaner, and the motors are always full of mud and dirt, the bearings bag, etc. I make a good living fixing Rainbows, as I run an authorized service center and I buy my parts directly from the manufacturer. The average service ticket on a Rainbow 'clean and service' is $150.

I just hate using a Rainbow. They are just too much to take care of! I will still stick with my Air-Way! Right, Tom? Right??

AIR-WAY ALL THE WAY!!