Air-Way P/N
David,
I'll give you the short version of it. First, yes, that is a correct original power head that was available from Air-Way for use with the later Mark II 88's.
When all the canister vacuums started getting power nozzles/heads, (the first may have been Whirlpool and/or Sears followed by Lux, I think), Air-Way was not very quick to join the change. Air-Way had had a very good reputation as a "straight suction" canister sold door to door.
Don Clark of Milwaukee, was fairly high in the corporate and sales world with Air-Way. He could not get the higher powers to get onboard with a power nozzle so without their sanction, he had Hamilton Beech private label a power nozzle. That type can be seen in vintage Air-Way literature. The HB was short lived for unknown reasons. Then, he tapped Eureka to do the same thing. Hence the tourquoise Eureka, (model 1250), and it was even used with the Mark V in yellow, which is a predecessor to the Mark II 88. Air-Way retrofitted a lot of older vacs to take power heads.
The sales folks would call on customers that had a suction only Mark V and explain the wonders of the power nozzle. They would take the machine back to their local Air-Way office where an outlet was added and an exterior power cord was added to provide electricity to the "new" powerhead.
When the really high powers at Air-Way learned what Don had done, they were ready to draw and quarter him! He temporarily lost his jost at Air-Way but he had made his point. In reasonably short order Air-Way had Royal make their power nozzles in a private label arrangement. You see those most frequently with Mark II 88 in matching tourquoise just like the Eureka.
Air-Way "recalled" all the HM and Eureka power heads they could get their hands on and replaced them with the new Royal units. Eventually, due to the changing vacuum environment and changing customers needs as well as cost, Douglas was selected to private label their power nozzles until Tom Gasko convinced them to upgrade to the Hayden/Centec type currently used now on ALL models.
So.............yes, that tourquoise Eureka is correct and a wonderful bit of vacuum history. It makes for a terribly cumbersome arrangement unless you are vacuuming a ballroom. That Mark II 88 was my grandmother's, (she owned 3 Air-Way's in 98 years), and the power nozzle came from Fred Stachnik of Milwaukee. Coincidentially, my Grandmother's vacuum came wired with the power outlet but she vehemently did NOT want a power nozzle as the Air-Way salesman in the past had convinced her a revolving brush of ANY kind would ruin her carpet!
I may bring it to St. Louis for the historical value. Many members have seen a few of these floating around in the club but we have so many new people that they would probably get a kick out it.
It was not effective since the fan in the Eureka was blowing the dirt into the Air-Way bag faster than the Air-Way's 7 amp motor could accept it. So the dirt was most likely leaking out of the bag to some degree. Putting the Eureka on the current model with an empty bag makes quite a cleaning machine but still awkward to use. If you took the fan off the Eureka and used it that way with the brushroll still revolving, it would be far more effective but then the possibility exists that the brushroll would turn to fast and ruin the bearings, (all or any of them, motor or brushroll), as it would be spinning faster then designed.
Sorry to be so lengthly but I hope this answers some questions.
Jeff and other vacuum enthusiasts what am I leaving out? (There is a lot of technical stuff but kind of boring)
