Holy Cow! Yeah, they look cool all lined up in a row like that, in a rainbow of colors. The oldschool headlights on some of those uprights bring back vague memories of helping clean up after big family get-togethers at relatives' houses. (I keep thinking that one of these days I'm going to get a Hoover Constellation, which is what we had when I was a little kid...)
Here's a question. Anyone with a sizeable vacuum collection want to help in a research project?
I'll send you a plug-in AC wattmeter if you'll check the power consumption of each of the main models in your collection. What I'm looking for is, for each model:
a) Watts while running, and if a 2-speed or similar, watts while running in each speed. This would be measured with an empty bag. Ideally it would also be measured with a half-full or full bag, but finding enough carpet dirt to fill up that many vacuums could be too much to ask.
b) Your informed-judgement rating of suction power or cleaning effectiveness, on a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is very below average, 3 is average, and 5 is very above average.
If you have a number of years or options within a model category. For example multiple Constellations or Dial-a-matics, the variations I'm interested in are the ones that would affect energy usage or cleaning effectiveness, for example if the manufacturer changed the motor or the brush head design. Though, some subtle changes might have relevant effects, so if in your judgment that is the case for a particular model, that would be interesting.
The results should be compiled either as a word-processor document in RTF or RTFD formats (e.g. WordPad in Windows, TextEdit in MacOSX, both of which come with the operating system), or as an Excel spreadsheet.
Anyone interested? If so post here and let's get in touch.