Hand held vacuum

Firstly, I recently replaced a Panasonic upright (admitedly an old one) with a Miele cylinder - what a difference!

But your question, have you considered just extending the hose? Our local market has a guy who sells hose "by the foot" so what I did was purchase an additional replacement Panasonic hose (which was short) plus a length of hose and put the "short hose" fittings on the end of the long hose and voila - leave the Panny at the bottom of the stairs whilst I cleaned away at the end of the long hose.

The Miele hose is just long enough to not need this trick, but I'd be tempted to take this route.

Paul DS.

I have the dyson DC35 and find it very good for the odd bit of cleaning. Previously I was very happy with my small portable dirt devil. The reason I brough the DC35 was when I nealry fell down the stairs tripping over the lead of my DD, and that I wanted a new toy :)

=A0 London SW

I have no complaints about the Panasonic - apart from noise - and don't go around replacing things for the sake of it. I'm not a Dyson type. ;-)

The existing hose is part of the device - it plugs into the base for normal upright carpet cleaning. A longer one would no longer achieve this. And it would need to be several times longer. High ceilings.

That is even more expensive than the hand held Dyson I mentioned. All I want is a small hand held device with good suction for the stairs. My Panasonic is just fine for all other tasks. Except for wet and workshop stuff - I have another for that. ;-)

One with a rotating brush is far more effective.

NT

Strange. My existing upright is just fine for this apart from being inconvenient. I really don't need anything fancy - just a hand held device which sucks well via a brush.

The DC35 *is* hand-held. We just got one and it gets quite a bit of use. I get sick and tired of dragging cables around.

If thats all you want, the old hoover dustettes go for peanuts, and are long lived, unlike almost all other handhelds.

NT

Me neither but my Panasonic was clearly not doing too well. To put it in context, I replaced the bag in the Panny and cleared one room after I'd got the new Meile - carpet looked OK. Then I cleaned the same carpet immediately with the Miele and filled the Miele's bad and the carpet looked MUCH cleaner.

..

Interesting. Mine had a short hose which plugged into the base OR plugged into an additional extension for cleaning the stairs etc. It was this extension which I hacked and extended - put about 12 feet on it - I imagine your ceilings can't be that much higher or you couldn't reach at all at present.

Paul DS

Don't care. It costs about 4 times it should for what I need. Like everything Dyson. Bought by those with more money than sense. ;-)

But poor suction and rather heavy. A modern version with more 'power' and lighter would be fine.

Right. But storing this long hose would be a pain compared to a small hand held device.

... and Dysons take the prize for the most ugly appliances ever.

Christ on a bicycle. This is an *appliance*. And when not in use, it's not in view.

Take a look at the Gtech; it is an excellent machine and with the handle off can cope with stairs no bother. Costs around £40.

I thought the same, and tried some modern ones, but none seem to last. So back to the dustette, it does the job ok.

NT

Mine is.

It lives in a corner of the kitchen.

No point in rummaging through cupboards for something I use every, erm, sometimes.

Owain

We recently purchased a Electrolux Z61A for doing the stairs.

It has a rotating brush which helps with picking up pet hairs. Makes a fair job of the stairs, has a decent length cable and is not too heavy. Can't comment on long term reliability as we haven't had it very long, but fine so far.

(My ceilings are 'standard' height). George can do all of the stairs from the bottom, with the standard hose. I've just ordered some spare tools for him and, as the hose is a bit broken at the vac. end, a new hose of 2.9m - there is a choice of a 3.9m hose which should do most stairs. George is overkill for your purpose but Henry or smaller with a 3.9m hose (check on fitting needed) might be OK. This company is very useful and cheap for parts (the parts are shipped direct from Numatic), although the vac. could be cheaper from Comet{shudder}.