Does anyone use a shop vac to vacuum their house? With 5 dogs in the house I am seriously considering it!!!:lol::lol:
I have a Bissel Powerforce, but it is woefully inadequate for the amount of hair on my floor. I spend most of the time when I am vacuuming(sp) emptying the dirt cup-- it fills with hair about every minute or two.
I work a lot outside the house (60-75 hours a week) so I don’t clean as much as I should. The DH would rather die before running the vaccuum-- there is a lot of house work he will do, but that isn’t one of them.
So I was just wondering of anyone else has loads of house dogs with carpet and would you use a Shop-Vac?
My dogs are all shedders— a border collie, a brittany spaniel/border collie mix, a blue heeler/doberman cross( the only one who doesn’t shed much), a red heeler with long hair ( he is deaf, was born that way-- so I think that has something to do with his long hair, as I haven’t ever seen a long haired heeler before) and a Welsh corgi puppy ( who is eight months old) and the hair is atrocious!!! I love my four legged kids, but the hair is out of hand!!
Yup, and then you take the top off, put the whole thing inside a 30 gal trash bag, and dump.
Have to do a little extra work to get a coating of hair off of the filter.
Yes. I use an upholstery brush to do the carpets. Tedious, but it seems to do an OK job.
At Arcadien’s house the vacuum day proceeds thus:
First, sweep with nasty broom all hair clumps, pieces of eaten sticks, dead mice & feathers from birds eaten by pride during week, to center pile.
Second, shovel pile into heavy duty trash bag.
Third, shop vac.
Fourth, bring out “real” vacuum (which heretofore has been hiding shuddering in closet) to do “normal” vacuuming.
My real vacuum would go on strike big time if I didn’t to steps 1-3 first.
But then I’m a crazy lady with two cat doors in the house, paddocks attached to the front porch, and this time of year doors mostly open on warm spring evenings, so you might have different (read, “normal” LOL) house cleaning standards…
I dont’ use a shopvac, although perhaps I should. I use a Dyson Animal that efficiently removes the, err, layers of dirt and german shepherd x2 doghair. The Dyson works great, no matter how long it has been since I vacuumed last. And that can be a long time.
Does the shop vac actually get hair out of carpet though? We have a Bissell pet hair eraser. Basically its the beefed up Bissell with a bigger hose, stiffer brissels, and better filters. It has this cool thing on the front that creates static and that attracts the hair and the vacuum picks it up.
[QUOTE=mjrtango93;4154347]
Does the shop vac actually get hair out of carpet though? We have a Bissell pet hair eraser. Basically its the beefed up Bissell with a bigger hose, stiffer brissels, and better filters. It has this cool thing on the front that creates static and that attracts the hair and the vacuum picks it up.[/QUOTE]
LOL, Carpet??? what is that? If you are considering a shop vac in the house, you should long ago have figured out that carpets are not conducive to crazy horse farm-hairy dog-barn cat-lady house cleaning.
Tear up those carpets, put down hardwood floor (or linoleum, or pergo… or heck plywood looks pretty nice if you put some throw rugs down (that would be washable & disposable throw rugs!) strategically… ;’)
The furniture should be mostly wooden or plastic too, btw - except for disposable futon cushions!
Cough, I think I should stay out of these theads, you guys might be talking about normal house keeping here…
TIC
Arcadien
We have a Shop Vac backpack vacuum for such duties. A Shop Vac on wheels is just too cumbersome to move around in our house. The Miele is still used for everything else though because a Shop Vac sucks, or rather doesn’t, on rugs. Miele has a specific model called the “Dog and Cat”.
We use a shop vac a lot, everywhere.
Re carpets, I seem to remember seeing a “carpet attachment” for shop vacs at Home Depot. Next time I’m in I’ll take a look at them! 
G.
Ever clean the filter in shop vacs?
Their filters are not any good, the dust goes right thru them back into your air and room.
I would not use one inside.
I second the idea to get rugs out of the house, not worth the dirt they accumulate, that you never get out.
My whole house is tan, lightly muckely looking tile and a dream to keep and look clean, even if I have not cleaned.:winkgrin:
You won’t have so much to clean and even when you don’t, any other than carpets will show and be much less dirty in a dirty environment.
I think that carpets are for town houses of people that don’t live in them, are there just for show.
I’m glad I am not the only one to admit using a Shopvac in the house! :lol:
Between the five cats, seriously shedding chocolate lab (whom I have since clipped, and it has done WONDERS for the volume of hair…), the Jack, and me, dragging in ten pounds of mud, there is no vacuum that could handle it!
My mom got me this bagless something or other for Christmas one year. I tried using it, once, and it was very obvious it wasn’t gonna cut it. Since then it has been the Shopvac!
They do seriously suck :lol: when they blow all the dust out. Here lately I have not been using it, I do a broom sweep (we have NO carpet or rugs).
I seriously get a pile the size of the Jack Russell sometimes. :lol:
get one of the robotic vacuum cleaners. They have one designed for heavy pet hair households. Ours does the house every day while we are at work.
[QUOTE=wendy;4155370]
get one of the robotic vacuum cleaners. They have one designed for heavy pet hair households. Ours does the house every day while we are at work.[/QUOTE]
:eek::eek::eek:
!!
I have a Rapid Groom that I’ve used in my house since 1986! It is extremely powerful. It’s made in Wisconsin and although designed originally as a horse vac it does come with a beater brush and other floor accessories.
It’s a canister vac and quite heavy but does the trick with the dogs, cat, and birds that I have.
When I had two very sheddy cats in a small house the strategy was no carpet (washable cheap throw rugs only), remove shoes at door, and all furniture covered with throws (even old sheets, or cotton bedspreads) that could be thrown in the wash every three days.
The filters that come in them are indeed not good enough to last long. They work fine until the tiniest hole develops in them, usually from being too rough cleaning them. Gore makes replacements for some that are well worth their higher price. Before buying a shop vac, I check to see if Gore makes a filter that will fit it. The Gore filters will take many cleanings with a full force water hose. http://www.cleanstream.com/products/landing_shopvac_genie.html
I keep two guys busy doing Historic Building Restoration, which is about 50% cleaning, and they are using Gore filters that have probably been washed with a water hose 50 times and are still good. They keep extras so they have a clean dry one while another is drying.
We have 12 long haired dogs that live in the house with us and have Oriental rugs around in most rooms. They don’t shed like most dogs but there is still a call for good vacuum cleaners. Barn footwear stays on the porch.
It’s too bad you have to pay real money for stuff that works:
http://www.bestvacuum.com/miele-vacuum-cat-dog.html
I use it for the tile floors where the dogs area, especially in shedding seasons. I definitely would go broke using a bag type vacuum cleaner with multiple Bernese Mt Dogs
Anybody ever use one of those H2O Vaccs??? Or a Rainbow?? The dirt and crud is filtered through the water. I saw one in person and recently saw them advertised on TV. Anybody??? I have 4 HAIRY indoor dogs. DH is terrific at mowing…er vaccuming, but those leetle cups fill before he goes across the room and it takes eons to pry the hair out of the filter!!! Water sounds like a good thing!
I have a Kirby vaccuum, a Hoover Wind Tunnel, and Shop Vac.
I usually use the shop vac first (I have 12 dogs, plus the assorted stuff that gets tracked in on my feet), then the Kirby, then the Hoover for the up high stuff, baseboards etc.
I pretty much follow Arcadien’s procedure (loved that)
ONly the living room has carpet still everything else has laminate (well guest room has carpet but the door stays shut all the time unless we have company) the carpet gets the Kirby, the laminate gets the shopvac/wind tunnel.
I have a sunroom that has some crappy glued on carpet, but it’s also sort of a mudroom so it gets the shopvac
We do have leather furniture which is easy to clean and doesn’t hold smells, plus lots of throw rugs that are cheap and easy to wash. For the leather, I just sweep off the sand the dogs brought in before I vacuum, and then either wipe with a damp cloth or once in awhile some Murphys Oil or something.
Kenmore makes a canister vac with all the bells and whistles and it can suck a bowling ball through a garden hose…that’s what I use in my house. Has a power nozzle for vacuuming carpeted stairs, furniture, etc. LOVE it…and $200 cheaper than the Miele. 
Uprights just don’t have the right tools and suction for serious pet hair. :no: Tried pretty much all of them, some damned expensive ones too. None came close to the Sears model canister I use. When I kill one, they rebuild it. If I kill it too dead, I always get another new one. (I’m hard on vacuums, they vacuum the truck, the house, the dog, etc and they get worked almost every day)
Now I do use my small shop vac on the horses. :yes: It’s a wet/dry so if they come in covered with wet caked mud I just suction it right off again. :winkgrin:
