Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I purchased this vacuum as a replacement for an existing Bissell that had reached the end of its useful life. At first, everything seemed great. It was quiet, lightweight, and worked to get a lot of cruft out of our carpets that the old vacuum had missed in its old age. About a month after it arrived, I used it to clean the whole house (as opposed to individual rooms) for only the second time. After working intermittently for about an hour I finished up in the master bedroom and started to put the vacuum away when I noticed a mark on the carpet. Upon closer inspection I discovered it was a still smoldering burn, about the size of a silver dollar. Alarmed, I unplugged the vacuum and flipped it over. Yep, it was red hot, in one specific area that matched the burn pattern. Fifteen minutes later I could still feel heat radiating off. I then started tracing my steps backward through the house. Sure enough, there were perhaps a dozen of these holes charred through my home's carpeting on three separate flights, getting deeper (presumably as the machine's overheating worsened) as I went through the house. It wasn't just one type of carpet either; I found burns on three separate kinds of carpeting, of varying ages and types. On the surface nothing appeared to be wrong with the vacuum; it wasn't clogged or jammed and everything mechanical still moved properly, but it quickly gets hot enough, in one specific area, to ruin floors. Since it was out of the (surprisingly short) 30 day return period, Amazon ultimately only gave me half my money back. Which is better than nothing, but doesn't count for a lot compared to the hundreds of dollars it would cost to replace several rooms worth of ruined carpeting. Bissell's warranty, meanwhile, provides at best replacement with another machine of the same dangerous model. No thanks. Avoid this firetrap at all costs, and consider the limitations of buying appliances online.