Sanitaire EON Commercial Upright Vacuum SC5500A

I love my Sanitaire Eon vaccum. I was tired of purchasing vacuums that would not last a year whether it was a $50.00 dollar vacuum or a $100.00 vacuum, not to mention the suction was not great on those vacuums. So I decided to get an industrial vacuum. At first I thought it would be too loud and too heavy. But I was pleasantly surprised it is not any louder than the average vacuum and it does have a little weight to it. But it is light compared to other industrial vacuums. It is pricey but it is worth it. It is everything I wanted in a vacuum. I enjoy vacuuming more now. I have had it for a month and I'am content. Read more

Awful. I never even used it and when I assembled it, the end hose wouldn't even clasp into the inlet. Unless I physically held it it wouldn't lock, which means I was unable to even use as auction was lost because air was escaping. I contacted seller had NO help and instead was made to seem as if I was stupid and didn't know how to push a hose into a hole! They too even said that they are unable to help because they don't manufacturer the product that they are "tech support" yet they are the ones I was directed to under contact seller for the item. There is plenty good reviews for this vacuum and I am sure when the device isn't defective it works but it is cheaply made in the hosing department. If you are going to use the attachment then I'd advise to opt out of getting this vacuum. Read more

Excellent product Read more

We bought our first Sanitaire in 1985. It was a SC888 and I think we paid $199. We still have that vacuum today and it works fine after 36 years, though it's become a little noisy and rickety. And it burns through belts fairly regularly. One of the photos I posted shows that old vacuum and this new Sanitaire EON side by side. My wife and I both had the same impression when we opened the box and assembled it... This thing is all plastic. I'm not sure if there's a metal part on it anywhere. The SC888 is mostly metal and it's held up like a champ over the decades. I do not have similar expectations for this new Sanitaire EON, although that may be a slightly unfair comparison. That said, we both love this new vacuum. Above all... it's extremely quiet! According to the specs, it's rated at 68dBA compared to 79 for the SC888. With age, ours has become a lot noisier than that. Also, it's not as powerful as the SC888 by a long shot, with 30% less CFM. But it just seems to work better. It's a very efficient design that makes optimal use of the motor without wasting energy. It's also lighter and easier to maneuver. We also love the sealed HEPA filter system. It runs very clean. The old SC888 has a certain stale "smell" every time we ran it. It has the leaky old bag system, which ejects the finer dust back into the room. The new EON is a huge improvement in this regard. The disposable bags are fairly large and easy to change. The brushroll seems to be a much-improved design and actually seems to slightly propel the vacuum forward. Lots of other useful features like the indicators for bag full and brushroll check. No headlight though, which was a big disappointment. The hand held attachments are nice but we'll probably never use them. We have a really nice backback vac for that type of work. I would have been fine without those. It lays down almost flat, which is nice for getting under things. But it prevents you from temporarily lifting up the frontend. For example, when vacuuming small rugs, you can't just back up when you reach the edge or it will pull the edge of the rug back. With the old SC888, we would just slightly lift the frontend to back up, and then continue. Can't do that with this unit which is unfortunate. The power cord is one of the most heavy duty cords I've ever seen on a vacuum. We like that it is removable. Underneath, I was surprised to only find 3 wheels. At first, I thought it would be too unstable. But it seems to work just fine. This vacuum works really well on our wood floors. We can set the height very low and it sucks dirt right out of the cracks between the planks. The old SC888 was too rickety for this. If we set it too low for use on wood floors, it would actually damage the finish due to an imbalance in the brushroll. We also like the rubber on the wheels, which rolls very smoothly on wood floors. Overall, we're quite pleased with this vacuum. It's quiet, efficient, effective, and we love the cleanliness of the HEPA filter. I wish it had more metal construction for long-term durability. And a headlight. And a few other things we'll miss from the old SC888. But it just runs so smooth, so clean, and so quiet that it's a real pleasure to use. Read more

It’s good Read more

Plastic housing became brittle and just started to crumble, really wasted money on this one Read more

I am actually not a professional cleaner, I could use one, definitely, but I live with several very messy children that make me feel like I am fully employed as a maid. We really batter our vacuums and I am constantly worried they are just going to fall apart . The one I have been using, a shark with anti-hair wrap, the seals are coming off of the tubing because of my frequent use. because this vacuum is designed not to have those types of wear issues and with no fuss low cost replacement parts I felt like I am a perfect user of this vacuum because it will be much harder for me to run it into the ground. This vacuum came easy to put together. I did not even need the instructions. There were no screws. The vacuum may not be light weight but it is not heavy. The vacuum came with one bag already installed and one for good luck. I have already purchased a box of five. The extension cord is very cool, I love how you could actually just use it for an extension cord. Very utilitarian. It helps to read the instructions just a little bit and the instructions are pretty short. You should adjust the carpet number dial based on how hard or easy the vacuum is to push. I overestimated the length of my carpet and put it on a higher number but then I experimented and the lowered the number, it was actually much more effective and it was noticeable the vacuum had much more drive when I had it on the right setting. You should definitely watch the YouTube “vacuum wars” episode on this particular model because it is very helpful. A really huge thing to note about this vacuum and highlighted on that video was that this vacuum is not intended for hard floors. Vacuum Wars shows how there’s no seal for the floor so debris can get pushed around or even blown around. I am not debating their pretty scientific finding but I thought it did ok for light use on the tile floor . The wand would also work for light use on hard floors. Using the upholstery tool it did pretty well. The upholstery tool is very light weight and it’s bristles are sparse and it’s pretty small- I felt like was pretty good despite that. I didn’t expect it to take cat hair off of my fabric chair but it actually did. It did pretty well on the couch too It was very effective under the cushions. I really like how the tools are stored on the back much better than my shark where all the tools always fall off and I’m Always losing them and it’s actually such a pain. I sometimes lose them for weeks at a time if it gets mixed in with the wrong things. 😔 This is my first time owning a bagged vacuum although I’m sure I have them growing up. The bag seems to hold a lot and it is nice how the vacuum doesn’t get dirty and disgusting like the canister vacuums do. That can be a problem over time it can be harder and harder to clean the canister and eventually you are faced to decide if it’s worth replacing. Vacuum repair people that I’ve talked to have said that the bag vacuums are much more enduring and easier to fix. Overall I am very pleased with this vacuum I think it delivers on exactly what it promises and I’m excited to have a vacuum that I am expecting I will not be running into the ground within about a year. Read more