Hi,
 
Do you think your staff is more mindful of emptying the dust container because they can see it?
 
What I have seen so far are bagless machines that suffer from the owners' belief that constant sucton claims also mean little or no maintenance.
 
Venson

Quote from VacOMatic on 03/27/07 at 5:00pm:

 
If I'm not mistaken, both Euro-Pro Infinity bagless uprights (the teal and red models) have this feature (a light) to tell the user that the filter needs cleaning.  MSRP are about $200 and $250 respectively but both are discounted from these prices at all the big box retailers.
 
I have not used these long enough to see if the feature actually works well.  And the red model is on my list of wants to inspect and use.
 
Carmine D.

Hi Carmine,
 
Thanks.  As for health hazards, there are probably a million household tasks that bear possible health hazards.  Cleaning toilets, washing out garbage cans and litter boxes and even the manner by which we do the dishes, just as examples, expose us to all kinds of unfriendly microbes yet most of us survive.  In simpler times all that was required was plain soap, a bucket, a rag and a broom and life moved along just fine.
 
However, we've been "shocked awake" as it were by advertisers' hyperbole over the last several and are constatnly running straight out to stock our homes with products to make us safe.  The laugh here is that we hear even less about the safety margin in the use of those products.  So while I'm waging the war on germs with my rubber gloves, chlorine bleach or other chemicals, I'm still exposing myself to potential harm.  That doesn't mean we shouldn't clean but that we might be better served by reality checks now and then.
 
I'm all for lessening or removing health risks but realize that it is so far impossible to avoid a good many.  I think the more advertisements weave tales of potential woe the more we need to refresh ourselves regarding practical science before buying.
 
I like my bagless Iridium (which I think has been dropped by Sears) but have bagged machines I think as much of.  Though it is to my mind Best in Show in comparison to any other bagless non-Dyson originated canisters, it still requires my occsasionally having to remove the shroud to get out collected debris when emptying its dust container -- no simple dump and put it back.  The washing of the dust container may or may not be necessary but I like seeing it relatively clean.  All this does lead to some exposure to dust but the doing of it isn't significantly messier than thoroughly cleaning out a re-usable bag.  On the other hand, just removing and replacing a disposable bag or a pre- or after-filter now and then is awful nice though it comes with a cost.
 
Vacuum emissions and messy maintenance are surely worthy of our concern but sadly are not the greatest of them.  
 
Venson

Hi Carmine D.,
 
I'm awfully sorry to hear of your unfortunate experiences.  As I ended last time round, I maintain there are greater concerns for us than vacuum emissions.  The things you've spoken of just proved it.
 
In light of the things you've stated, I feel there is little to protect us beyond that which we may try to do to bolster our immune systems and/or maintain our bodies and health as best we can.  However, there are no miracle detergents, disinfectants to shield us from the kind of things you're talking about.  It is hard to know or understand why one individual exposed to the myriad bacterial and chemical encounters we experience daily comews to suffer and another under exactly the same exposure does not.
 
This is an issue quite close to my heart because someone very important to me died in a hospital after battling several infections having nothing to do with the reason he'd been brought in.  They were encountered and cropped up there during an eight month stay. If there'd been a vacuum cleaner that could have helped improve his condition, I'd have been there with two.  If there'd been a bathroom cleaner, an air spray, detergent, a gadget or anything that could have helped him stay alive in what I'd obviously mistook as the best and cleanest environment he could be in -- one of the best hospitals in New York City -- I and other friends would have had the stuff hauled there by the truckload.  Yet for all that hospital's access to drugs, germicides and devices, none saved him.  He is lost to us and sorely missed.
 
In light of that, when I get hit with adverts telling me that if I don't rush out to get Brand-X cleaner my bathroom will qualify as a swamp or that if my vacuum doesn't filter down to x-microns I'll be asphyxiated, I smirk and turn the other way.  Then I think of good old Aunt Lucy, 95 and still with us, who spent many a cleaning day sweeping with a broom and doing the john with nothing but a bucket of water a little ammonia.
 
Regarding the rise of new maladies, I think one, there are scenarios involved that are probably much the same as those applying to native Americans here -- strangers show up not only carrying wampum but  lots of bacteria and viruses they'd long developed a better tolerance for.  However their hosts had never been exposed to the like and that often unfortuantely proved deadly.  We are now living in a world in which you can move long distances from one part of it and back again in a matter of hours carrying and bringing who knows what.  
 
Two, there's the old example that if you have a room full of flies and you get out the sprayer to blast them away, not all will die. Some will live, breed and bring forth a more resistant strain.  There was a strain of veneral disease a good many years back that developed overseas by way of persons selling their services while under treatment for the same before treatment reached full course.  What did we end up with? Bacteria that penicillin couldn't kill.  And we' lived a long time thinking there was almost nothing penicillin couldn't do.
 
There are many, many awful things happening every day and everywhere that we can neither stop nor decrease.  For purveyors of goods to  imply that a machine, chemical or whatever can be the cure for our ills is oft times equally as awful.  We can only do what we reasonably can to survive in this world.  Beyond that, all that's left us is prayer.
 
Venson
 
 

Quote from guess_who on 03/28/07 at 1:58pm:

 
Venson:
 
Some SEARS stores, like the one in N. Las Vegas, carry a bagless Kenmore Progressive Cyclonic Bagless Canister Vacuum Models 26822/23.  It is no longer called the Iridium.  And the MSRP is $399.
 
Carmine D.