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Vacuum cleaners! (and more)

Gerontius

Gerontius

Well-Known Member
V.I.P Member
The other day I found a Kirby vacuum cleaner on the side of the road, and it's pretty nifty. It is the Generation 4 model and was definitely worth backhauling it across town on the handlebars of my bicycle some seven miles.

It does still run somehow, which is pretty good. Considering it's from the 1990s it's relatively new as far as Kirbys go.


I ended up going down a youtube rabbithole of vacuum cleaner content (which is apparently a thing) and it looks like there's a small stereotype of autistic people and vacuum cleaner enthusiasts. Which makes sense, I guess. I fixed up an Oreck XL for myself by making one good one out of two dead Orecks (cheapest way to get authentic service parts) and when I was little I put googly eyes on the family Bissel electric. I do not have an electric Bissell today, just an old manual carpet sweeper.

It's pretty cool though--The plan is to trick out the Kirby with some fresh parts & end up keeping it. No I did not grow up watching The Brave Little Toaster; I just think it's probably a good idea to keep decent appliances in working order.

Does anyone else here like appliances too? Share finds, collections, & pictures!
 
My only knowledge of appliances as I'M an expert at painting them and controlling the colour of them, plastic parts porcelain parts and the main body.
 
Mom had a large Kirby Classic upright when I was 10.
Man, it was heavy, but it sure cleaned.

Anyone remember these? (see photo.)
She had one when I was born.

electrolux.jpg


I like Shark brand models myself.
I'd like to try Oreck and Dyson just to see if they are superior.
Too expensive to buy though.
 
SusanLR said:
Mom had a large Kirby Classic upright when I was 10.
Man, it was heavy, but it sure cleaned.

Anyone remember these? (see photo.)
She had one when I was born.

View attachment 119780
Click to expand...

I remember seeing those when I was a kid. Electrolux, Swedish quality. If I remember right, you could put them in reverse so they blew instead of sucking. And if you accidentally did that when it had a full bag of dust and crap in it, mayhem ensued. :)
 
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Gerontius said:
Does anyone else here like appliances too? Share finds, collections, & pictures!
Click to expand...
My wife likes the look of old upright vacs, so have found a few Kirbys in thrift store. I think maybe a Heritage and a Gen 3? I don't have them handy or I'd take a picture. Been thinking about tinkering with one, setting it up with a reusable dust bag, and seeing if it does a better job with cat hair than the little Shark stick vac we currently have.

I have fixed up a couple older Singer sewing machines from between 1920-1940 that we found in the trash.

We both like vintage kitchen appliances pre-1990, so we have a few, like the West Bend electric wok, West Bend hot pot, a nearly brand new 80s GE food processor (from when everything was beige, faux wood grain, and fluorescent orange), 80s Hitachi rice cooker, Coffeematic percolator, and a Sunbeam T35 toaster.

I tend to gravitate to older appliances. They can usually be found on the cheap, are easily fixed, and do one thing very well. Modern appliances tend to be overly cluttered with keypads, timers, LEDs, wifi, and other little fiddly functions that don't make them work better but will brick the whole unit if any one of them fails. You'd think as a programmer I'd enjoy the modern stuff for the flexibility, but mostly I am annoyed by the UI bloat and needless complication. I like simple, efficient electronics, just how I like efficient program design.

(I also have kind of a thing for mechanical timers and fixing old chainsaws, but I don't think that's quiiiite in the same discussion)

20230902_165129.jpg
 
Reminds me of how I used to nickname one of my Yorkies as "Hoover".

Never thought of her as a "Kirby" though. :p
 
Now I get why Nintendo's Kirby is called Kirby. It's because he inhales things like a vacuum cleaner.
Nintendo Eating GIF

Every day, learn something new.:)
 
The best vacuum I ever used was a 2007 Royal Privledge. It had incredible power, and a top notch hepa filter. Great attachments too.
 
I’m by no means an “enthusiast,” but I did love my Kirby. It’s about 10 years old and unfortunately collecting dust in the basement because I somehow managed to blow the motor on it and can’t afford the US$500 to repair it.

Right now I have a Bissell bagless upright that is mediocre at best. It was like $125 at Walmart and it does a good enough job but I miss the deep clean feeling of the Kirby.
 
Momofboys said:
I’m by no means an “enthusiast,” but I did love my Kirby. It’s about 10 years old and unfortunately collecting dust in the basement because I somehow managed to blow the motor on it and can’t afford the US$500 to repair it.

Right now I have a Bissell bagless upright that is mediocre at best. It was like $125 at Walmart and it does a good enough job but I miss the deep clean feeling of the Kirby.
Click to expand...
Oh for heaven's sake don't pay $500 to repair old machinery. If you can take it apart and check the motor you might be able to revive it and I would bet the repair is probably going to run less than $35.

I think ten years ago would be the Sentria model? There are motors for those on eBay.
Screeching sounds might mean a motor bearing failed. They aren't too different from the alternators used in a car, and make the same noises when they break down. There's a large plastic fan on the front of a Kirby motor and it's sometimes going to break if it schnorks up some object that breaks the blades. Fans are quite cheap to replace--the part that holds them on is reverse threaded. It's having the right sizes of screwdriver to remove the front of the motor housing that's hard.

See if the shaft wobbles when you turn it by hand (with the vacuum unplugged and the brush head thingy removed.) If so, bearing's probably shot, and it's maybe an $8 or $20 part depending on where you look.

Old electric motors rarely ever blow out. I have motors on electric fans from the 1910s and 1920s and it's always the coil wires in the base or the headwire to the stator that goes; on a vacuum (like a table saw or a Singer sewing machine) there are carbon brushes that contact the commutator on the shaft of the motor. Clean the commutator well with a bunch of Q-tips and toothpicks dipped in denatured alcohol to get all the carbon crud out of the slots, and replace the brushes. For a Kirby motor those brushes are like $10 on Amazon for genuine replacement parts.

Taking apart one of these involves removing screws and unfortunately those are going to be a six-pointed star or Torx bit. Try to get a good bit-driver and don't cheap out on the screws. If you mess up an auto mechanic can drill out the dead screws with a left-hand drill, then rethread the holes with a bottom tap, but you don't want to do that. This vacuum is only 10 years old so it'll probably not be stuck too badly.

Maybe it's the fan, maybe the bearings, if it was me doing it I'd service the brushes and commutator to at least see if it would turn on.
 
Gerontius said:
Oh for heaven's sake don't pay $500 to repair old machinery. If you can take it apart and check the motor you might be able to revive it and I would bet the repair is probably going to run less than $35.

I think ten years ago would be the Sentria model? There are motors for those on eBay.
Screeching sounds might mean a motor bearing failed. They aren't too different from the alternators used in a car, and make the same noises when they break down. There's a large plastic fan on the front of a Kirby motor and it's sometimes going to break if it schnorks up some object that breaks the blades. Fans are quite cheap to replace--the part that holds them on is reverse threaded. It's having the right sizes of screwdriver to remove the front of the motor housing that's hard.

See if the shaft wobbles when you turn it by hand (with the vacuum unplugged and the brush head thingy removed.) If so, bearing's probably shot, and it's maybe an $8 or $20 part depending on where you look.

Old electric motors rarely ever blow out. I have motors on electric fans from the 1910s and 1920s and it's always the coil wires in the base or the headwire to the stator that goes; on a vacuum (like a table saw or a Singer sewing machine) there are carbon brushes that contact the commutator on the shaft of the motor. Clean the commutator well with a bunch of Q-tips and toothpicks dipped in denatured alcohol to get all the carbon crud out of the slots, and replace the brushes. For a Kirby motor those brushes are like $10 on Amazon for genuine replacement parts.

Taking apart one of these involves removing screws and unfortunately those are going to be a six-pointed star or Torx bit. Try to get a good bit-driver and don't cheap out on the screws. If you mess up an auto mechanic can drill out the dead screws with a left-hand drill, then rethread the holes with a bottom tap, but you don't want to do that. This vacuum is only 10 years old so it'll probably not be stuck too badly.

Maybe it's the fan, maybe the bearings, if it was me doing it I'd service the brushes and commutator to at least see if it would turn on.
Click to expand...
lol yeah it’s a Sentria 2. I appreciate the time you put into your response, but I do know it’s the motor. I took it to the Kirby rep nearby and they did the diagnostic. I probably could do it myself if I actually had the energy and motivation to figure it out.

Fun fact: I broke it trying to vacuum seal a memory foam mattress 2 years ago when we had to turn our guest room into a baby’s room. It ended up going reeeaaaallllyyy slowly and that much force for that long just shattered the motor of a $3000 vacuum.
 
Burning it out is--yep, if that's so, probably the coils on the motor. You don't want to force an electric motor to run too long, because it'll use that energy that it takes up one way or another. Instead of converting it to kinetic energy it'll convert it to a little bit of energy & a whole lot of heat, which fries the insulation on the windings.

You might have cooked the field coil. Which is a $29 part. I'd swap that out along with the aforementioned brushes & bearings. You might have also destroyed the armature which I believe costs around $50 or so, and it's basically the driveshaft with all the cool motor guts on it as well as the commutator. Try not to pay full price for an armature. Also, try not to pay full price for a Kirby.

I have a junker Kirby motor around here from a Generation 3 which is the same as the one in a Sentria 2 or in my "new" Generation 4. It came out of a Kirby that I literally found in a dumpster--it's not a saveable machine because of flood damage, but it's still cool, and the motor works fine. It's still stuck in the bottom half of the aluminum housing so unfortunately I can't mail it to you.

Sorry to hear that it couldn't handle vacuum-sealing the mattress. You'd think a vacuum that cost as much as a used car would be able to handle a kid crib.
 
Gerontius said:
Burning it out is--yep, if that's so, probably the coils on the motor. You don't want to force an electric motor to run too long, because it'll use that energy that it takes up one way or another. Instead of converting it to kinetic energy it'll convert it to a little bit of energy & a whole lot of heat, which fries the insulation on the windings.

You might have cooked the field coil. Which is a $29 part. I'd swap that out along with the aforementioned brushes & bearings. You might have also destroyed the armature which I believe costs around $50 or so, and it's basically the driveshaft with all the cool motor guts on it as well as the commutator. Try not to pay full price for an armature. Also, try not to pay full price for a Kirby.

I have a junker Kirby motor around here from a Generation 3 which is the same as the one in a Sentria 2 or in my "new" Generation 4. It came out of a Kirby that I literally found in a dumpster--it's not a saveable machine because of flood damage, but it's still cool, and the motor works fine. It's still stuck in the bottom half of the aluminum housing so unfortunately I can't mail it to you.

Sorry to hear that it couldn't handle vacuum-sealing the mattress. You'd think a vacuum that cost as much as a used car would be able to handle a kid crib.
Click to expand...
I will say I thankfully didn’t pay full price. I very briefly dabbled in being a Kirby sales rep, but my only sale was my mother who purchased it out of pity with the employee discount. It’s too heavy for her so after awhile she gave it to me.
 
I love the design of many old hoovers, especially the upright Kirbys...I have fought against starting a collection of them.
 
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