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★★★★☆
Nice Handheld Vacuum but here are some food for thought
I purchased the Shark Rocket (HV301) and my review is based on this model. Not sure what is the difference between the two. Looks the same. Let me know if you know the difference. Anyway here is my thoughts after about one month of use.
1) Small cup that collects the dust. It's small so you need to keep an eye as it fills up fast with dust and fine particles that this vacuum does pick up. The dust cup which I will call it is hinged to the vacuum. You can't take the dust cup completely off to dump its content. You have to understand how the vacuum cleaner is made up of three(3) disconnect able parts. 1-the vacuum head at the other end. 2-the long stick part of the vacuum. 3- the hand held vacuum motor part that your hand grasp. So....to clean out the dust cup which is part of no.3 above (the hand held vacuum motor prt that your hand grasp) which has the long cord also connected to it. You would have to disconnect that part from part 1&2, walk over to your trash container to empty it. Or walk with the whole vacuum to your trash container to empty it or bring along with you as you vacuum a small plastic trash bag/container to empty it in that. By the way this clear plastic dust container does get dirty so after many uses it will not be Clearly see thru unless you want to try to clean it from the inside. Remember it has a hinged lid so it would be ark ward.
2) there are three filters that you need to make sure to clean, 2 of which the compartment states and I quote from the sticker " IMPORTANT Loss of suction may occur if filters are not cleaned every month. Rinse and let dry completely. Also, tap loose dirt off filters between washes as needed. Filters may appear dirty after use -this is normal. " So be aware there are filters that you need to clean. Two filters are in the top part of the handheld motor unit. Easy to access. One is a white foam type filter and the other is like a felt cloth filter that sits one on top of the other. They do get dirty with fine particle dust and yes you do need to clean them. Definitely make sure they are completely air dried before putting them back or they will get mildew and if you the use your vacuum you will get smelly mildew exhaust into the room. Trust me this will happen from my experience. The other filter is white felt like filter that is at the exhaust end of the hand held motor component of the vacuum. Yes it is easy to gain access to clean too.
3) the long cord sorts of stay abit twisted instead of uncoiling properly. Yes it's a long cord but also it gets minor kinks as you are vacuuming. So there will be times that these kinks will get caught around your furniture abit and not fully uncoil itself. Here is what I think the problem is, is that either the thickness of the wire cord is too small or the plastic used is too rigid that the cord seems to have memory to stay abit coiled. It's similar to how garden hoses would kink.
4) the sticker that says "Never loses suction or power" on the vacuum head. Well...depending on how you read that, it's true that you will never lose suction or power, cause it will always have suction or power if plugged in and even if you neglect to clean the filters. So take that with a grain of salt and marketing.
5) Ever break open a paper vacuum bag to look at what is collected? Yes I have, has the same "type" of dust material collected, so some of the uniqueness of this Rocket vacuum and all other bag less vacuum is that you see in the clear plastic container the finer particles that are usually not seen when using a vacuum that uses vacuum bags. This also adds to the wow factor to the consumer when you see all that dust.
6) the agitator motorized head contributes to its ability to suck up more dust. As pictured in all photos of this vacuum is the motorized agitator head that works in two speeds via the switch at the hand led part. This agitator head works great on carpets that essentially spins and moves the carpet fibers so that it helps to loosen up the dust a bit so that the vacuum can suck it up. Keep in mind it works great but you need to know what type of carpet you have, is it hand tied or hand turfed carpet cause it will pull up a lot of your hand turfed carpet fibers. So be careful that you don't end up sucking up your carpet fibers to the point you may be thinning it out faster than normal from typical wear and tear usage. BTW if you use the hard floor attachment head that doesn't have any motorized rotating brushes on your hand turfed carpet i did notice it was not picking up as well in my opinion when it had the motorized head on it. It was a trade off of pulling up the carpet fiber and getting at dust. Overall the motorized head is quite strong that it will pull your vacuum forward so that will ease in having to move the vacuum forward but also remember after each major use of the vacuum to take the head off the vacuum turn it over and take out all the hairs strings etc that gets tangled around it, there are grooves along the spinning brush that can help you cut the c
Tangled hairs etc and then you manually have to pull them off that wraps around it and from each row of the brush fibers. This is typical of all motorized brush heads that you need to maintain.
Is it overall a good vacuum that will pick up dust? Yes.
Is it fun to use? Yes. I think part of that is the unique shape.
I hope thes comments help you understand the maintenance requirements of this vacuum.
January 2014 · Home and Kitchen