70's Nutone Central System

That is cool Andy,,thank you for posting that pic,brings back good memories.
We lived in a neighborhood back in the early 70s, where alot of the homes had Central Vac, i remember the next door neighbors having a Beam system with this exact same tool set up with the same wire/vinyl hose, and the same brown tool caddy. They also had a Preco Power Brush for the deep shag carpet, along with the rake attachment. I remember loving to use that Preco Powerhead,,thought that was really neat!
Of course this was 1972 probablly, and i was little, so to me Central Vac was something like the Jetson's would have!
(and something my parents would never have!)

I remember one very large home down the block that had a huge Beam Central vac motor in the garage. Whenever they opened an inlet in the house, even with their garage door shut, you could easily hear that motor whinning,,even a block away. They were VERY loud.
Evidently not having some kind of muffler,fliter, or outside vent hooked up to the exhaust made the noise even louder.


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Post# 61674 3/4/2009 at 21:09 (5,525 days old) by andy (Boston, MA)
Checkrate/Likes I'm housesitting for a friend right now. The house was built in the 70's and still has the Nutone. No powerhead, but it did come with the shag rug tool!

Post# 61675 , Reply# 1 3/4/2009 at 21:10 (5,525 days old) by andy (Boston, MA)
Checkrate/Likes *Power Unit* For some reason, whoever installed it didn't vent it outside. It's REALLY loud.

Post# 61680 , Reply# 2 3/4/2009 at 21:44 (5,525 days old) by normvac (COLUMBUS, OHIO)
Checkrate/Likes I have a friend who has a late 70's tri level and the Eureka Power nozzle had the brush roll seize up. So rather then spend money on replacing the brush roll, after I had already gone over it and replaced the belt and replaced the light bulb. I found a fairly recent sears power nozzle (panasonic) which was actually the same type of replacement Nutone was selling. It works great, expecially since he had bought a new Electric hose with the sock cover over it, along with the handle switch. Which is really nice. The extra tools were not the Eureka like your showing. Don't know where they went. As there were miscellaneous black tools. Not very nice ! Norm

Post# 61683 , Reply# 3 3/4/2009 at 22:27 (5,525 days old) by briankirbyclass (Eudora Kansas)
Checkrate/Likes That is cool Andy,,thank you for posting that pic,brings back good memories. We lived in a neighborhood back in the early 70s, where alot of the homes had Central Vac, i remember the next door neighbors having a Beam system with this exact same tool set up with the same wire/vinyl hose, and the same brown tool caddy. They also had a Preco Power Brush for the deep shag carpet, along with the rake attachment. I remember loving to use that Preco Powerhead,,thought that was really neat! Of course this was 1972 probablly, and i was little, so to me Central Vac was something like the Jetson's would have! (and something my parents would never have!) I remember one very large home down the block that had a huge Beam Central vac motor in the garage. Whenever they opened an inlet in the house, even with their garage door shut, you could easily hear that motor whinning,,even a block away. They were VERY loud. Evidently not having some kind of muffler,fliter, or outside vent hooked up to the exhaust made the noise even louder.

Post# 61698 , Reply# 4 3/5/2009 at 04:07 (5,525 days old) by arh1953 ( River Park, in Port St. Lucie, Florida)
Checkrate/Likes We looked at a house the other day that was built in 1979, my housemate found this in the closet. I only found one outlet, I didn't see what was in the garage though.

Post# 61699 , Reply# 5 3/5/2009 at 04:10 (5,525 days old) by arh1953 ( River Park, in Port St. Lucie, Florida)
Checkrate/Likes *Here's a fuzzy pic of the outlet* This was at the end of the hall near the bedrooms. The house has thick sculpted plush in the living room and dining room, who knows how old, but it's still beautiful.

Post# 61706 , Reply# 6 3/5/2009 at 06:59 (5,524 days old) by magic-clean (FL-GA)
Checkrate/Likes *Hey* Andy, my folks had the same NuTone vacuum system in their early 70's built home. However, theirs was exhausted to the outside with a 'muffler'. So it was not too noisy. The power nozzle for the carpet was the clone of a Eureka Roto-matic. It did a good job. My mom really loved the system, so much so, when the parents retired to Florida, their new place there was outfitted with another. However, with advancing age & another move, they find a Miele canister easier to handle. Leslie

Post# 61827 , Reply# 7 3/6/2009 at 20:46 (5,523 days old) by centralvacs1928 (Chicagoland)
Checkrate/Likes Andy - Really cool, thanks for posting it! The tools look to be in great shape for being 30 years old. I always really liked how that carpet tool cleaned; I use one with my central vac from time to tome. Hard to find a good straight-suction rug tool. The most popular central vacuum system in the Chicago area for years and years was a two-motor Modern Day unit, inlet valves that turned on when you opened them, and the same toolset that came with your friends' NuTone, except without the brown plastic carrier, and with a 1 3/8" hose instead of 1 1/4". They were put in by one particular company and they're EVERYWHERE. The owner of the company (now retired) says they probably did close to 100,000 installations.

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