Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I want to first start out by saying I would give this almost 5 star. Better than 4 but just a bit less than perfect. There is another reviewer that had some great tips, points, criticisms, and high praise as well. I concur with them all the way. I will try to add my points and tips that I hope Bissell reps might see. Our house is very well maintained. We were using with what we felt were ideal result but what we found after using the Bissell CrossWave was that extra step that we missed. Our previous method was a very good canister vacuum and a terry cloth mop 15x8 style. Our floors looked great. Friends always thought our house was just cleaned. The Bissell adds a step in the cleaning by introducing a buffing action to the cleaning. Our floors have a nicer just waxed appearance to them now. We have not used the cleaner supplied yet. The results we have noticed in two weeks use clearly shows. This does not come without costs though. First the vacuum is heavy and does not move gracefully. Point for Bissell. I haven't looked but you should develop a washable filter for it and not a paper filter if you want to save your customers some money. The screen is good but there will always be some clogging beyond that. If they make reusable air filters for cars someone can make a smaller version for this gem. Parts do need maintenance and that bring me to some tips. Cleaning is critical. Best time is right after use. Too bad it could not be hosed down. for cleaning. That would make it perfect. A small tip tool for anyone interested. Take a strip of terry cloth rag about 12 inches long and shaped as a point from 1.5 in wide to 0.5 in. poke a small hole in the pointy end and run a zip tie through it and lock it on to act like a needle to help you clean the throat of the cleaner. Another review mentioned it. The cord is shorter than I would like. Newer houses have more plugs and better spaced but older ones lack some. A longer power cord about 10 ft. more would have also better. The cord also comes out at a bad spot on the machine. It will get in the way and should have come out of the handle where your hands are. Tip here for now. Zip tie the cord to the storage loop. In fact there is a small plastic hook that looks ideal for this fix. See attached photo. Also the direction I have the wire going is better for a left handed person. It is very noisy. It has a high whine noise and it is something that can nearly leave you with ringing in your ears. It does not work for stairs. Bathrooms are always very small so you might not be able to get the head around the toilet as well as other unmovable objects. Does not go under the bed or very far under legged furniture like bureaus. It didn't save us more time but it did add a bit more shine to the floor. It could make you have some changes to your lifestyle by having lighter moving furniture and less clutter on the floor. I can say without a doubt that our floors are cleaner and shinier. Updated After a few months of using it I have some updates. At first we were using the unit with plain water. This week I decided to use the multi-surface solution. I didn't use as much as is suggested but I did put enough in that I have a better appreciation of the solution. I didn't want to have sticky floor surfaces as someone here said they had. After use my floors had a nicer shine to them. It still doesn't get into tighter places but the places it does get to gets clean. If you have an air compressor you will be cleaning the paper filter after each use, otherwise expect to be buying the filter every month or so. It would be nice if we could do stairs with it but that is impossible. It really could use a wand and hose to get behind and between stuff that the unit itself cannot go. Otherwise I do like the unit. It does save time and does a great job cleaning the floor. Using the solution also added a layer of shine not seen since it was new. All in all I think this has been a good investment. A Final update. I have had this unit for a year and I still love the machine. As someone mentioned I wasn't sure if it could be done you can use water to clean the filter. I have not gone to the same extent as they did with using a cleaning solution for the filter but I do run it under the faucet. I use hot water and run it in the stream both sides. I have two and alternate weekly. I clean my floors once a week but we are a no shoes in the house and no kids left to make a mess. I use the multi surface cleaner but will consider Mr Clean as someone also suggested. I like the shine it puts on the floor the cleaner puts on the floor but I am always looking to save a bit of money. It stays that way all week. It takes less time to clean my floors now that we are using this. I clean the unit after each use and I now use a 12inch square wash cloth with a long zip tie on one of the corners of the rag. This I use to pull the towel through the throat of the machine to clean it for the next use. It works great and my machine has stayed quite clean. Anyway if anyone is considering using this to clean their floors you will not go wrong. Update as someone added to my post the filters are washable.