1600 W maximum on vacuum cleaners from from Sept!

[TheAnimus]

So I have have both poor maths skills and refuse to accept climate change now, eh?

Sometimes he can be completely zealous, the classic example is the concept of a recession, apparently the textbooks, wikipedia et al are wrong on that.

I wouldn't bother getting into it.

[MrRockliffe]

What I mean is, since they're a British company I imagine they'd be more inclined to do something about it, especially since they're quite a wealthy company. If they have many machines below the wattage threshold, that's already good news. A good idea for them would be to try and get all of them below.

[Top_gun]

What I mean is, since they're a British company I imagine they'd be more inclined to do something about it, especially since they're quite a wealthy company. If they have many machines below the wattage threshold, that's already good news. A good idea for them would be to try and get all of them below.

I think quite a number of their models are safe enough even for the more stricter regulation which is due in 2017. Personally, I wouldn't buy a Dyson mainly because of their reliability and messy dust disposal. You may be pleased to know that Dyson himself is a supporter of the new regulation.

[watercooled]

Well Miele is a reputable manufacturer so I'd take their claim seriously plus the fact that Which magazine has awarded their lower power vacuum cleaner as a best buy is more than enough to counteract your hearsay evidence.

A reputable manufacturer, looking to persuade you to buy things. That's kind of what marketing is. And applied to the technology world, this is why people who know better, don't pay a great deal of attention to things like response time claims on monitors; they're kind of meaningless figures often produced under ideal circumstances, not comparable to the methods used by other manufacturers, and not repeatable by independent reviewers. This is after all why we have reviewers.

Have Which concluded that the performance of the eco model meets or exceeds that of the standard model? I did search for the article out of interest but was unable to find it, I guess it's only available for subscribers and/or in their printed magazine? If the did not conclude that, then that is not contrary to my point. And TBH even if they did, you're paying more for the privilege of lower power consumption, the savings of which may never offset the purchase cost difference.

[watercooled]

Sometimes he can be completely zealous, the classic example is the concept of a recession, apparently the textbooks, wikipedia et al are wrong on that.

I wouldn't bother getting into it.

I'll probably move on to something more productive now, I think I've pretty much said what I have to say and won't gain much by continuing to argue it.

[Top_gun]

Thanks, I've always been adverse to marketing since I was 16. I also made my views known on marketing on other threads.

I'm a fan of Miele products and are well worth their money.

[dux]

I admiy I hardly ever use my canister vacuum at full power for it would certainly suck the whole carpet but the 1600 W vacuums I've seen are petty stick vacuums. It's just too weak to be of any use.

[Noxvayl]

Repeat after me: "The main difference between something which probably won't go wrong, and something that absolutely can't go wrong, is that when the latter inevitably does go wrong, it is almost always completely impossible to fix"

True scaryjim, however I find that there are no absolutes in this world. There are however better ways of doing things and coal/gas power generators should not be in existence with our technological achievements. Put simply, leaving things as they are is worse, no matter how it is dressed up, than developing new and improved nuclear reactors to replace the current crop of power plants. That is undeniable despite my previous poor choice of words

The problem I find with this banning is that it isn't going to remove the bad cleaners from the market, which is not necessarily the goal but is what the problem identified is from this discussion. We have all got examples of cleaners currently being sold that are unaffected by the banning so it seems the ban is going to do little other than force manufacturers of vacuums using more power to adjust things slightly. That can easily be done without banning. If the problem is identified as being inefficient cleaners that consumers still buy due to their price being attractive and marketing being effective, then I would sooner support the control of marketing those numbers as a measure for the quality of the product than ban products using high power motors. Power supplies work well as an example with the 80 plus certificate scheme. At first 80 Plus was optional and not many PSUs had it but now, you are hard pressed to find a PSU without it as consumers understand that it is better to have the certification. Doing something like that for vacuums would be preferable because it gives consumers more useful information to make decisions with. PSUs can still be troublesome to choose with the varying levels of quality but 80 Plus offers a simple colour base distinction between PSUs with different levels of efficiency that has significantly changed the market from what I have seen since the start of the 80 Plus certificate.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____

Perhaps I'm greenwash watercooled, but as far as I can tell your objections to renewable power generation in its many forms (wind energy in particular) can be supplemented by battery power in the form of cars being charged at home. Instead of having to produce power constantly you can simply resupply a ridiculous amount of batteries stored in electric cars which can serve as a store of energy for houses that require a little more than is available on the grid at any one time. Extending the idea further you could also install batteries to houses foundations as a store of energy for when little power is being generated thus giving a massive amount of potential energy to the grid that would otherwise not exist in our current system. Effectively the solution isn't only centralised power and it is not decentralised either, it would be a mixture of both to help make the system dynamic rather than static and slow to respond like it is today.

I felt obliged to make this post since your rant hit a nerve of mine by focusing on renewable energy generation which is helpful but not the complete solution. It is problematic but other technologies outside of power generation can ease your worries.

These are some sources of information I have taken on this subject giving me hope that the future is brighter than we may think:
http://www.ted.com/talks/amory_lovin...lan_for_energy
http://www.ted.com/talks/donald_sado...newable_energy

Greenwashed, maybe. But to say the technology of intermittent renewable energy is something not beneficial, through rants or otherwise, is disingenuous and doesn't help solve our problem. Much like the discussion about this banning of high power vacuums; it doesn't properly understand the problem and therefore can't solve it. Perhaps kalniel is right, the politics behind the decision is more of a problem than the decision itself. Either way the problem remains unsolved and the consequences of this attempt to address it are probably going to mean more problems to solve. I'd rather see us use renewables and then solve their problems than continue to rely on generating energy as and when we need it.

[scaryjim]

.... And again, without meaning to sound repetitive, even with the 'it probably won't be an issue' argument, where is there a solid reason for a blanket ban? That's what I'm getting at, and have been all along.

Because if you give manufacturers an inch they'll take a mile?

The EU want to encourage more efficient vacuums, and I don't think anyone can really argue that making tools more efficient - as long as they still do their designated job - is a bad thing. But I don't see any way they can actually encourage manufacturers to reduce the power draw of their vacuum cleaners without imposing a power cap on them. I suppose they could subsidise low power vacuums, or impose some penalty (a higher tax, perhaps?) on vacuums above a certain power limit, but that's complicated and impractical. A blanket power cap? That's dead easy to implement, and it'll work. Sure, it's a bit of a sledgehammer to crack a walnut, but sometimes you want a walnut and the only tool handy is a sledgehammer...

EDIT to catch:

... Power supplies work well as an example with the 80 plus certificate scheme. At first 80 Plus was optional and not many PSUs had it but now, you are hard pressed to find a PSU without it as consumers understand that it is better to have the certification. ...

While a certification scheme may work, it's a lot more complex to define the efficiency of a vacuum cleaner than a PSU. For a PSU it's a simple measurement of power out over power in, but for a vacuum - as my discussions over the merits and downfalls of a Henry have proved - it's a much more complex issue. I don't really see how a rating system could be devised to deal with every eventuality - for instance, would you have several ratings on each cleaner for different floor surfaces? Because the Henry's obviously great for the low-pile carpets I have, but apparently it's no good for watercooled's carpets....

[Top_gun]

And TBH even if they did, you're paying more for the privilege of lower power consumption, the savings of which may never offset the purchase cost difference.

Okay, let's put this argument to bed.

In 2007, I've paid £199 for my Miele Solution. Today, you can buy the lower powered eco friendly Miele S8340 (Which magazine recommended) for just £209.99 from the Co-op. Already, you're making a saving from inflation in real terms. Your claim that the lower power model will never generate enough savings to offset the purchase cost difference of a higher wattage model simply does not stack up.

[Noxvayl]

Nope, I wouldn't because you'd then confuse the consumer. I agree with you about the problem of the rating system scaryjim, but I find the sledgehammer approach to be lazy and avoidable. The rating system requiring more thinking and more complexity is no excuse to use the sledgehammer. A quick think for me brings up constraints you can put on the system, much like the limited scope of the 80 Plus certificate; you can say the rating is lab tested and not indicative of performance on carpets which are variable, this is no different to the current ratings of pure wattage; the other thing you could do is come up with as simple a rating as possible that takes into account suction and power use to generate a simple rating to give to vacuums.

I don't think the ratings need to be so rigorously tested that they have real world value, to me the 80 Plus certificate has no real world value, in and of itself, other than indicating that the PSU wastes less energy during use and is likely to be of better service in my system; I still need to check reviews and warranty the manufacturer offers, among other things, before I make a purchasing decision. I do find that even though 80 Plus is simple it makes a difference to the market in a way that is more appealing to me than a ban and achievable for vacuum cleaners.

[DanceswithUnix]

Well Miele is a reputable manufacturer so I'd take their claim seriously plus the fact that Which magazine has awarded their lower power vacuum cleaner as a best buy is more than enough to counteract your hearsay evidence.

In my younger days Which magazine said the best home computer available was the Atari 800 because it had a wipe clean keyboard. Idiots. I haven't seen their standard improve since unfortunately.

[Top_gun]

In my younger days Which magazine said the best home computer available was the Atari 800 because it had a wipe clean keyboard. Idiots. I haven't seen their standard improve since unfortunately.

Yeah I wouldn't trust Which magazine on things like computers, HiFi speakers or jeans. But they haven't let me down on fridge-freezers, insurances, washing machines and many others. Miele vacuum cleaners are widely regarded so whatever your views you have on Which magazine because of an old computer review is immaterial.

[DanceswithUnix]

Yeah I wouldn't trust Which magazine on things like computers, HiFi speakers or jeans. But they haven't let me down on fridge-freezers, insurances, washing machines and many others. Miele vacuum cleaners are widely regarded so whatever your views you have on Which magazine because of an old computer review is immaterial.

The old review was just what made me skeptical, they could have earned respect back, but the point is that they haven't.

Personally, I wouldn't buy a Dyson mainly because of their reliability and messy dust disposal. You may be pleased to know that Dyson himself is a supporter of the new regulation.

I find that odd, their reliability seems pretty good from the people I know who have them. My parents have been through a few cleaners, total cost way over the top compared to my initial slighty higher cost. It did break once, a belt went. Couldn't buy a replacement to fit myself, so grudgingly called Dyson for a repair. I think it was £60 fixed cost, which horrified me but was cheaper than buying a new one so figured I would reluctantly pay. Guy turned up on time, stripped the unit right down, replaced the belt and then went on to replace loads of other parts that he thought looked a bit worn. By the time he left I thought it was damned good value.

As for dust disposal, my unit is old so you do have to be careful. I think they have improved that. But for me, my son has asthma, and I wouldn't want to go back to a traditional cleaner. Why? The exhaust filters that stop the thing from lifting dust and just chucking it back into the air, and the fact that it just lifts so much dust out of the carpet. If I were you, I would be using a bagless cleaner and one of the cheap DIY face masks to empty the container. It is a big container, but you do have to empty it a hell of a lot, but I want the best tool for getting the crud out of the carpet.

And no Dyson isn't a supporter of the new regulation. He is complaining like hell that the suction rating is given for a cleaner with a brand new bag, putting his range at a disadvantage. Remember he tried to sell his original design to the existing manufacturers, and was only forced to go alone when they all turned the idea down. He is the one doing the disruptive technology that drives up energy efficiency, and he is getting a slap for it by making the old tech look better than it is.

As a background, I do also have a bagged vacuum cleaner. It is a Vax, so I occasionally use it to wet clean a carpet. Never, ever use the bag though.

[peterb]

Of course, if you want to be really green, get one of these





(from here http://www.gloves4less.co.uk/hoky-ro...Fc7HtAodygQAHg )

[DanceswithUnix]

Of course, if you want to be really green, get one of these





(from here http://www.gloves4less.co.uk/hoky-ro...Fc7HtAodygQAHg )

lol, I have one of those somewhere. Or at least I used to. Wife kept threatening to throw it out, but I found it useful for a quick whiz around.