Why Your Vacuum Stopped Picking Up (5 Free Fixes)

You push it over the same piece of carpet three times and the bit of fluff is still sitting there, so you push harder, and you start thinking about what a new one costs. Put your purse away. It is almost never the motor, and there are five things to check that are all free. I'm Alma. I cleaned other people's houses for twenty five years, and I've watched a lot of people throw away a machine that needed twenty minutes and a pair of scissors. THE ONE THING TO UNDERSTAND A vacuum cleaner is a fan. It's a motor spinning a fan that pulls air through a tube, and the dirt only comes along because the air is moving fast enough to carry it. So when people say they've lost suction, what they've actually lost is airflow — and anything that narrows that path takes it away. Everything below follows from that. CHAPTERS 00:00 Pushing it over the same bit three times 00:19 A vacuum is a fan, and suction is airflow 00:50 Who I am 01:03 First: the filter, and how often to clean it 01:27 Why you must not use detergent on it 01:53 The mistake that costs you the machine 02:02 It has to be bone dry before it goes back 02:32 Your machine may want a different schedule 03:02 Second: the bin, and that line on the side 03:09 Why the MAX line is not a suggestion 03:39 If yours takes a bag, it's worse 03:59 Third: turn it over and look at the roller 04:09 Hair, and how to cut it off properly 04:39 The end bearings everybody misses 05:03 Fourth: the free one, in four seconds 05:11 The height setting and the seal 05:41 Fifth: not a fix, a test 05:54 The hand-over-the-inlet test 06:20 Finding the blockage with a coin 06:44 Filter, bin, roller, height, hose WHAT YOU NEED A pair of scissors, or a seam ripper Tweezers for the bearings Cold water for the filter — and nothing else A coin Patience for 24 hours while the filter dries THE ONE THAT BREAKS MACHINES Dyson say it on their own support pages: wash the filter with cold tap water, gently rubbing it with your hands, and "don't use detergents." Then leave it at least 24 hours somewhere with plenty of airflow, because "your filter(s) must be completely dry before you put it back into the machine, or it could damage the motor." They also say don't dry it in a tumble dryer, a microwave, or near a naked flame. Wash it in the morning, use the machine the day after. SOURCES Filter cleaning frequency, cold water, no detergents, the 24-hour drying rule and the motor-damage warning: Dyson vacuum filter care guidance. Different intervals for pre-motor foam and felt filters versus the sealed post-motor filter: Shark published filter care for their own lines. The bin fill line, brush roll and end-bearing hair wrap, floor head height setting and hose blockage isolation are standard published repair guidance. No percentage for how many suction complaints turn out to be the filter, no figure for how much a full bin costs you, and no price for a filter appear in this video, because I couldn't source any of them. #cleaningtips #homemaintenance #vacuum #housekeeping