Henry?

[Mick F]

I'm fed up with our vacuum cleaner.
The thing needs a new filter, and new hose, it makes one heck of a noise, and now it seems to have lost most of its suck.

Bought it from B+Q some years ago, to use for cleaning the car out and the workshop detritus, and today I've been using it to clean up after sweeping the chimney .............. and I've given up with it. (the cleaner, not the chimney!)

We had a thread on here where people were discussing (amongst other things) vacuum cleaners and Henrys specifically.
Now I want a recommendation from you lovely people for a replacement for our B+Q monstrosity.

Wants:
Not too loud
Powerful
Long supply lead
Long hose
Easy-clean filter
Plenty suck and will cope with wood shavings, iron filings, fire ash, dog hairs from the car carpets, cobwebs, parrot seeds and droppings ..............

Will a Henry do all this with ease, or is there a better option?

[kwackers]

Most of your wants are subjective.

Henry's are a good cheap vacuum. I use one all the time in my workshop.

Definitely powerful. Sucks up wood dust and pieces, same with metal, dropped screws and other wanted parts all end up in the bag.
The power lead seems long enough and has the advantage of a built in cable winder.
Long hose - dunno, it's long enough for me.
Easy clean filter - well, it's a bagged vacuum. Open it up and throw them away. I 'bulk bought' a load online.
Noise, hard to say. Louder than my cordless Dyson but that's hardly a fair comparison.

TBH from what I've seen of vacuums it's well up there and a lot cheaper than most.

[Psamathe]

Avoid Miele. I purchased one thinking I was paying more for better quality/longer life. It's design is no better than any other (gets caught under everything just as I expect all the others do).

But it's bags burst, are expensive, and 3rd party ones not very good. It overheats (so do a lot of cleaning and it will auto cut-out and you have to wait a few hours for it to "recover") and, in my opinion, is nothing special and suffers a few shortcomings. And that means I'd expect to ay below premium price NOT above premium price (and they are above premium price).

My Mum has one of the Dyson ones (5+ years old version) and it's apparently heavy so is no longer used. She switched to one of those battery rechargeable ones which meets her needs but with a dog and a woodburner I'd wonder if it would be up to it (depending on how often you use it ...).

Ian

[Vorpal]

Our last purchase was a Miele, midrange vacuum cleaner. We did little research to check which model to buy, most of it on Which. I believe that some of their vacuum cleaners are made by subsupplier & tend not be as good quality. We bought the lowest price range built in a Miele factory.

So, far, it has outlasted both the Bosch it replaced, and the Dyson that that replaced.

Our purchase was prompted by borrowing a Miele from a neighbour when it's predecessor died.

[horizon]

Long hose - dunno, it's long enough for me.

TBH from what I've seen of vacuums it's well up there and a lot cheaper than most.

We have a hose extension on our Henry. Together with the standard hose it takes the nozzle from floor level to the top of the stairs. No more lugging Henry to the top or down again.

Best vacuum we have ever had and still putting in the years of service.

[peetee]

Been through a few vacuum cleaners over the years and now happy to stay with a Henry. Parts are cheap, supported by independent alternatives that are fine IME, plenty of power, hose allows you to reach up a flight of ten steps without moving the vacuum itself.
Mine is ten years old, spent 7 years of its life sucking up lots and lots of dog hairs and had the filter and hose replaced. When the first hose split it was at the end and it was just a case of undoing the socket, taking out the section of hose, trimming the remaining length square and fitting that in. a two minute job with a Stanley knife and screwdriver. You can do that as many times as you need - before it gets too short!

[rjb]

If I recall current vacuum cleaners are limited power wise by recent EU regs. We have a cleaner similar to this one which I use in the garage and man cave. It works well and as a bonus it sucks water. Uses a cartridge type filter similar to a car air cleaner. We have used it in the past to reduce the water level to enable me to wade into a garden pond to clean it out. https://www.latestdeals.co.uk/deals/par ... idl-offers
Why not take all the filters out of your current cleaner run it outdoors and use a looooooong hose to get to all your nooks and crannies to remove those spiders.
When we had a flat roof extension we had one of those cylinder vacuum cleaners where you could attach the hose at either end to suck or blow. It was very useful to blow loose fill insulation into the gap between the flat roof and ceiling.

[Paulatic]

We’ve had a Meile ( cat and dog) it’s outlived two successive Labradors and I think it will outlive me as well.
However when Mrs P worked in retail a domestic Henry was used on acres of floor and she fell in love with him. Used to come home upset if another department borrowed him and treated him rough. If we ever did need another cleaner I’m sure it would be a Henry. I like Henrietta myself

[kwackers]

If I recall current vacuum cleaners are limited power wise by recent EU regs:

Power, yes. Sucking, No.

Rather than make efficient cleaners the manufacturers where simply gobbling up more and more electricity so they could have a bigger number on the box.

My mum had a 2200w cleaner that was just dire.
Kept the room warm though.

[Tangled Metal]

We bought miele after several review sites had it as best buy including the British allergy charity. It's so powerful we have to use it on the lowest setting or it would pull our carpet up.

I like it but my partner doesn't. She bought herself a Dyson v57 hand held. It's battery started failing within a year and now you get 5 minutes use. OE batteries are pricey but Amazon has loads from China if you want to.

Btw the real reason I like the miele one is I can use it without breaking it. Seriously I've bought good non Dyson ones for years and they fail very quickly. Best buy or budget buy every time and they fail. Record was 20 minutes vacuuming then it died. Took it back and got it repaired under warranty. It failed first time I used it. I took it back and hit served by the same guy who'd fished it out after the repair. He was not expecting me back within 2 hours like that. I got a refund.

I once killed a work Henry. Think that was first use too. I have only failed to finish 3 vacuum cleaners. The v57 Dyson, the miele and a Hoover junior but that's been on life support after my use. At least Hoover junior is fully repairable. There's still places doing repairs and you can still get parts. Think hoover still support them.

Btw I really should get a job testing new models with Dyson. I'm really pretty good at unintentionally breaking vacuum cleaners. If any lasts a few days vacuuming with me it'll probably be so reliable it'll bankrupt Dyson as it'll be the last vacuum cleaner anyone buys!!!

[rotavator]

Yes buy a Henry. I bought one after seeing how one stood up to being used by the builder while converting my loft; if a vacuum cleaner can withstand that sort of ab/use then it is good enough for me. It has lasted 10 years so far. The one downside is that it is a bit bulky for doing the stairs.

I wouldn't waste my money on a Miele again. I took the advice of Which magazine and bought their "best buy"and it only lasted a few months before it went to the dump.

[Mick F]

Interesting comments guys!
Keep 'em coming.

More info:

We live in a bungalow. No stairs.
We have an excellent Bosch battery upright that does the whole place - carpets, rugs quarry tiles, Lino. Three cats, a dog and a parrot, and Mrs Mick F has long hair too. The Bosch does it all quite well and has a three-stage filter that cleans easily and can even be washed.

Except it's no good for the muck and grime or the car or the workshop or the fire or the spilt parrot seed.

[PDQ Mobile]

I have been very happy with two Tesco own brand bagless vacuums. And the place is rural!
Washable filters. Chinese of course.

I took the first to the workshop because the little front roller broke- on stone floors after about 3 or 4 years. Still works fine.

The replacement is similar but a bit smaller and lighter. No variable speed.
Works ok.

[[XAP]Bob]

Interesting comments guys!
Keep 'em coming.

More info:

We live in a bungalow. No stairs.
We have an excellent Bosch battery upright that does the whole place - carpets, rugs quarry tiles, Lino. Three cats, a dog and a parrot, and Mrs Mick F has long hair too. The Bosch does it all quite well and has a three-stage filter that cleans easily and can even be washed.

Except it's no good for the muck and grime or the car or the workshop or the fire or the spilt parrot seed.

Hoovering the parrot can't be good.

For a workshop you need a shop vac... Henry is probably a decent *dry* option for a domestic 'shop.

[simonineaston]

Donkey's ears ago, I bought a James (a Henry without the cable tidy...). It was by my side, throughout the years it took me to reonovate my turn-of-the-century mid-terrace town house, in inner-city Bristol, a very dirty undertaking! Other stalwart items that between them, did most of the work, are a DeWalt cordless drill, a hide mallet and a (now very worn) 1" chisel, but that's by-the-by...
The - I'll call it Henry for simplicity's sake - sucked up Lord-knows-how-much rubble, dust, shavings, spills, yaddayadda and emerged unscathed. Used with or without bags. It appeared unbreakeable. I bought it 'cos as a student, I'd done a number of cleaning jobs and the large number of Henry vacuums I encountered always worked - nothing fancy - they just carried on regardless. Long long cable, metal parts, unbreakable brushes / nozzles. Job done. But...
I know a bloke who's in the vacuum cleaner maintanence trade. He hasn't got a good thing to say about a certain Wiltshire-based multi-millionaire's product range, and while I own 2 which suit my needs down to the ground (see what I did there?), I get what he's saying... and secondly, he warns against thinking that a Jam... sorry, a Henry, is as good a buy as they used to be. Apparently, the motor units are not what they used to be. I pass this on for what it's worth.
Thirdly, a couple of comments re power, suck and noise. Physics being what it is, if you want good suck (and I'll carry on with this discussion, keeping a completely straight face...), you have to put up with a lot of noise, however, not long ago, the reg.s changed and now vacuum cleaners are limited to a low level of power consumption (around 600w, down from double that, I think). The idea, apart from over-all power savings, obs, was to encourage makers to offer quieter units. But inevitably, the suck's diminished along with the power consumption. Dyson's going the cordless route, producing all battery-powered units that have a very small stepless moter (initially encountered in their whistling pub hand-dryers) and where he goes, it maybe that others follow - uncertain times, for vacuum cleaner afficianados!
If I were you, MickF, I might be tempted to look out for a good, clean, second-hand ex-domestic as opposed to company owned, Henry....