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Hoover U8311-900 WindTunnel 2 Bagged Upright Vacuum Cleaner | 
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| Brand: Hoover
Category: Kitchen
List Price: $299.99
Buy New: $172.49
You Save: $127.50 (43%)
New (42)
Rating:  56 reviews
Sales Rank: 26357
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 32
Dimensions (in): 35.2 x 17.5 x 13
Legal Disclaimer: Warranty does not cover misuse of product.
Warranty: 1
MPN: U8311900
Model: U8311-900
UPC: 719881177144
EAN: 0719881177144
ASIN: B000HZEOS2
Release Date: September 9, 2006
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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| Features:
| | 12-amp upright vacuum cleaner with WindTunnel 2 technology | | | DirtFinder system; automatic brush-roll shutoff for above-floor cleaning | | | Telescoping quick-release wand and super-stretch hose; 28-foot cord | | | Dusting brush, furniture nozzle, crevice tool, and pet-hair tool included | | | Measures approximately 14 by 15 by 43 inches; 1-year warranty |
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Product Description
By design, many conventional vacuum cleaners scatter dirt back into the carpeting because the rotating brushes and airflow don't work in harmony. But Hoover engineers discovered a way to make the rotating brushes and airflow work in harmony with the power of the wind. It's called WindTunnel technology. Located in the floor nozzle, Hoover WindTunnel technology actually lifts and traps the dirt, so it won't scatter back into your carpet, which means the dirt ends up in the cleaner, not on your floor. The Self-Cleaning HEPA Filter cleans itself every 6 seconds to maintain cleaning power. You never have to touch or replace the main filter. It Traps 100% of dust mites, ragweed and common grass pollen under normal household conditions. Pet hair cleaning turbo hand tool / Upholstery tool / Dusting brush / Crevice tool Telescoping handle with built-in metal wand / 14-inch cleaning path / 6 foot super-stretch hose / Weight - 20 lbs. Manufacturer's US Warranty - 1 year parts, 90 days labor on defects in materials and workmanship
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| Customer Reviews: Read 51 more reviews...
 Tried Everything -- This is a Good Vacuum November 29, 2007
Just Anonymous (Georgia, USA)
143 out of 150 found this review helpful
First of all thank you to all the reviewers of not just Hoover but Eureka, Electrolux, Dyson, Hoover, Orek, and all the other brands out there --- especially the critical reviews, they're the most helpful in my mind although - I'm writing a positive review. Its a tall order to the people who build vacuums though to build a perfect vac: a tool to help us do something that we inherently hate to do.
I guess you're getting old in life when you can say you've owned 6 vacuum cleaners in your life and having owned 6, I've been through it all: bagged, bagless, canister, upright etc....and I've used every single one of them until they dropped (I never buy to replace a working vac - run it into the ground). This is what my school of hard knocks has taught me and why I bought this one and what I like dislike about this vacuum.
Canister vs Upright
My last vacuum was a Hoover canister and I bought it because I erroneously thought it had more suction than an upright -- actually most uprights are more powerful and better for carpets where canister vacs are more maneuverable and better for hardwood floors. I have about 50% hardwood and 50% carpet but I mostly use the vac on the carpet and use a broom, mop as needed on hardwood so for me carpet cleaning power was the requirement.
Bagged vs Bagless
Bagged vacuums tend to lose suction as the bag fills up -- so your first vacuuming on a clean bag is great and then things go downhill as the bag fills the dirt and mess gets compressed in the bag and you lose suction. Bagless vacuums retain suction throughout the filling of the container but and here's a very important but, you have to empty the container very very regularly, almost a container per room sometimes and emptying the container is always always a dirty affair --- not as bad as empting a shopvac but definitely not what the commercials/informercials show or fail to show and you cannot cheat on NOT emptying the container regularly as the penalty is a time consuming and messy affair to clean gobs of gunk out of your new and sometimes $700 expensive vac that looked so pretty on that commercial --- so if you go bagless empty the container regularly or spend most of your time unclogging your vacuum vs vacuuming your house. Sealing and seating the container is also very important or you can wind up with lost suction or a mess. Also, if you don't empty your container after you finish with a bagless, you create an environment from which dustmites etc can escape etc....and lookes very ugly. Other than that, bagless vacs tend to look prettier (is that possible) no, it must be the marketing talking there but in my experience they're as reliable as bag vacs but no more. All that said, bagged vacs don't need changing as regularly -- you vacuum multiple times (sometimes I change a bag every several months when I notice I'm not cleaning as good as before) so at least to me, bagged works best. I'm not messy and my place stays fairly clean but enough that I'd change a container a couple of times during an average housecleaning.
Cheap vs Expensive
Price seems to be somewhat overrated with vacuums (although $200 is pretty steep in my mind)...Consumer Reports had some great ratings and rated this vacuum 2nd place just under a Kenmore on a variety of tests and much more expensive vacuums were rated less favorably. That said, different people have different tastes and if getting a premium brand vacuum makes you happy - by all means. But in my experience (crosscorrelated with Consumer Reports) price does not correlate well with quality, dependability, or cleaning ability in the vacuum industry. Salesmanship, Marketing, Advertising and cost dictate price in my experience. If you just got an $11million condo, you probably have help and probably aren't shopping for a vac so that particular issue is moot - the rich don't buy vacuums (really) and vacuums are not a class statement in my mind -- so to me, buy something that works, is reliable, and is easy to clean empty.
What was I looking for:
-I've come to realize in life that the honeymoon period for a vacuum is extremely short, much shorter than the 6mos with me and a new car or the 2years with my average house....its more like 5 minutes so knowing that my love affair would be limited to reading the reviews on Amazon after my old vac broke and a brief consumation of the first vacuuming, I settled on looking for these qualities:
1) Something that worked well
2) Reliability & Dependability (works well for years)
3) Clean (not have to empty the bucket every 3 minutes)
4) HEPA
5) Carpet cleaning Power
6) Low Hassle
What made me buy this:
1) Bag (in my experience, they're less hassle overall and neater for me)
2) Carpet cleaning power
3) Autorewind of power cord (I know I'm lazy)
4) Dependability and Reliability
5) Consumer Reports
6) The 10 gazillion reviews on all vacuums here on Amazon (yes I read them and some of them are amazingly insightful and there are some people here who must be paid to write reviews and thankfully they are easy to spot. I found some of the more critical honest reviews useful and sometimes comical....especially the electric shock defect on one major and highly advertised brands...I was laughing at your pain fellow reviewer but seriously thank you for bringing it to light and steering me from some a $600 mistake...as a disclaimer, I'm not paid and I am an owner of the U8311-900....btw, one easy way to tell most fake reviewers is to look at a reviewer's other reviews and if they only have one or review 6 vacuums ask yourself the question....the real reviewer will have a healthy body of reviews on different products they buy for our homes and personal use after all, we're just living our lives out here)
How I've fared with the Wind Tunnel 2 Bag vacuum;
1) Setup was very easy - two screws to attach the handle
2) Came with 3 HEPA bags (1 installed, 2 new)
3) Was vacuuming in 5 minutes
4) Has a clean dirty indicator (its more of a gadget...small optical eye...in reality, you can hear if you're picking up dirt or not usually but it looks neat)
5) The wand and accessories are right there (it makes it easier for me since with the canister vac, changing from floor to accessories was a chore)....granted, the only real accessory I use is the edge cleaning wand so I can get my edges clean....overall very happy to be able to use it readily
6) Not too loud -- quieter than manhy of my other vacuums
7) Wide -- its not a small beast, you can tell this is a vacuum for a 2+ bedroom abode with carpet but not too heavy - average for a large upright.
8) HEPA bag - I am not a clean freak but knowing I'm not putting dust back into my air is good to know
9) Self Sealing Bags -- again not a total clean freak but good to know I don't have to stick my fingers into the mess or breath the dust when I change the bag.
10) Easier to store over a canister vac -- put in upright position and roll into closet vs bending over to pick up canister dragging huge hose and then pushing the whole thing into laundry room and 5 minutes later hear the clack as the vacuum falls over if I don't secure it right.
11) Manual heigh adjustment for my type of carpet
Pet Peaves:
1) The cord's position makes it so that you run over it with the left back wheel if you don't clip it to a provided clip (very minor and the engineers thought enough to put the clip) but if it breaks, I can see myself vacuuming with one hand and holding the cord with my left.
2) The cleaning wand is the handle and it telescopes with a little pin (kindof like the type that modern aluminum crutches have) you push the little pin and it telescopes out but the result is that there's just a little bit of play as you push and pull the vacuum (almost unnoticable) but its there, I noticed it when I first assembled the vac and then forgot about it once I started vacuuming but if you're overly obsessive compulsive, I can see how if you fixate on that, it could drive you nuts
3) Its not self propelled but then again, that's a whole other mess of things to break that sometimes works and sometimes don't work.
4) Its no where near as maneuverable as a canister vac but I knew this going in -- have to move the coffee table vs going under it with the old canister vac. I traded the maneuverability for the benefit of better carpet cleaning and the forgotten benefit of having attachments onboard.
5) Not a Pro or a Con - but this is not a small vac - so if you're looking for a small vacuum for small abode, might want to look at another option.
Overall
- Very happy with this vacuum. I can say its the best vacuum I've ever owned and I've owned expensive, cheap, bagless, canister etc as I mentioned above.
- In my experience, the honeymoon is entirely over
- I wanted to give something back to the Amazon community (both paid and honest reviewers)
- I bought from Amazon, Great Store
- Avoided most of the marketing I thought
- Good luck out there and happy vacuuming (if there is such a thing)....mine is happily in the closet now and will get pulled out everytime I have to do penance.
Best Vacuum I've ever owned! January 9, 2007
K. Koch (Northern , CT)
16 out of 16 found this review helpful
I do most of the vacuuming. My wife's only request when I went looking for a new model was that it use a bag. She absolutely hates the bagless models and doesn't want to see what we're pulling up. We have two dogs (an Akita and a Golden Retriever) to contend with and during shedding season the vacuum is running at the very least once a day. So after searching I find this model. I researched it to death and just as my wife was ready to kill me I take the plunge and order it from Amazon. Now the order status said it would take 12 days to get here and I was shocked when it arrived in 4. The big thing I like about this unit is that the bags it uses (although a little hard to find)have a handle on the top that seals up the dirt as you remove it from the machine so you never have to see or touch the dirt. The unit is a little heavy but moves around quite well. And boy does it clean! Our rugs look fantastic!
One complaint I have about it is that when you bring the unit into the full upright position the beater bar shuts off. Another would be that you cannot turn the vacuum on unless its in the full upright position..I know its a safety feature..I just don't like it. The pickup tube is built into the handle and when fully extended is great for cleaning the blinds and ceiling fan blades. The little power head unit was great for getting the dog hair off of the curtains and the side of the sofas.
Overall I would buy this unit again and my experience with buying a high ticket item from Amazon was so positive that I've purchased other items and make it my first place to look now.
AWESOME VACUUM October 11, 2006
Adrian A. Moralez
10 out of 10 found this review helpful
THIS IS A GREAT VACUUM, YOU CAN ACTUALLY FEEL IT SUCKING THE DIRT OUT OF THE CARPET, THE ONLY BAD THING IS THE BAGS ARE HARD TO FIND, AND ARE A LITTLE PRICEY.
Hoover Vacs are the BEST!! -- Not So. See 6/4/07 Update below March 8, 2007
Michele C. Kobran (las vegas, nv)
10 out of 11 found this review helpful
I recently purchased a new Hoover Wind Tunnel vacuum when my old Hoover died after almost 14 years of flawless service. My new vacuum even outperforms my older vacuum. I am amazed at all the wonderful features it has (automatic cord rewind, extensions so I can clean my ceiling fans, pet hair attachment etc. etc.). I am a firm believer in Hoover vacuums and wouldn't own any other brand. I even check out the Orecks, but this Hoover is superior to all other vacuums on the market today.
One Satisfied Customer!!!!
UPDATE 6/4/07 -- Not so satisfied anymore. Right after I reviewed the vacuum, it completely died on me. That was on April 27, 2007. The vacuum has been in the 'Authorized Hoover Repair Shop' since that time (5 weeks and running) and I can't get anyone at Hoover (or Techtronics Floorcare - Hoover's new parent company) to tell me what's going on other than the fact that they're waiting on a part. Everyone just keeps passing the buck. I spoke to other repair shops and it's the same everywhere. Bottom Line: When Hoover vacuums work, they are phenomenal. When they need repairs, don't expect them back any time soon.
One 'Not So Satisfied' Customer.
It's a good one! March 21, 2007
Tammy Owens (Columbus, OH)
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
About the only improvements I can think of would be to make the hose longer for greater reach, and to increase the strength of the cord winder that is weak. The replacement bags are more expensive because of the convenient design, but hopefully the cost will come down when more of them are sold.
Overall it's a good machine, good design, great suction! If you buy it, you'll be happy.
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| | Subcategories | Kitchen & Dining (284507) |
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