Blasts away grime

The title calls this a vacuum, but it isn't. It's a light weight steam cleaner designed for light to heavy household tasks. My steamer came with several attachments: a small brush, a hose, a window squeegee, and a wall paper or upholstery attachment. It also included a plastic cup and funnel. The box was easy to open, and the instructions (in English, French, and Spanish) easy to read. It is important to read the instructions before starting, otherwise you may overfill the tank or not use the machine properly.

Immediately, I tried this on several tasks: the bathroom tile, the gas grill rack, the splash wall behind the stove, and the toilet base. I was astonished at how easy it was to use. After attaching the small brush to the nozzle, I overfilled the tank, and started using it before the machine had worked itself up to full steam. Since the tank was overfilled, what came out was boiling hot water. This did a pretty good job on my tile, but it wasn't what I expected, so I resorted to the directions, and realized that I had put too much water in the tank. By this time, the amount of water had been reduced, I was sure, but probably not enough, so without finishing the instructions, I opened the screw down lid, which immediately blew off; steam and boiling water spilled out, scalding my left hand and lower arm. So, at this point, I sat down to read ALL the instructions. Probably something I should have done to start with.

Once I had the instructions mastered, I refilled the tank with the proper amount of water, waited about 3 minutes, and then started to clean the tiles again. This time, steam blasted out of the nozzle. The scrub brush was effective at loosening lime scale and other crud from the tile and the fixtures. When I was finished, about 10 minutes later, I had cleaned all the tile around the bath tub/shower, plus the grout. I spent another 5-8 minutes doing the tub, which had quite a bit of grime scrubbed into the porcelain, which is now shiny and white. While there, I also cleaned the tile floor, paying particular attention to the dirty bits behind the toilet. In total, about 20 minutes, and the entire bathroom had been blasted with steam. My hair was curly, and the room was hot, but it was clean. It was important to use a dry cloth to wipe up the steam and loosened dirt promptly. If it dried, I simply ran the steamer over it again. I had to refill it once to finish the room.

The grate from the gas grill was another success story. I had tried numerous cleaning methods, none of which worked. But my handy little steamer ripped through the caked on grime like it was butter. In no time, the grill looked almost new. I did not do the rest of the grill, just the grate. The rest will wait until the weather is nicer.

I had bought it for a major cleaning project at a friend's house. This involved cleaning pantry shelves, and basement steps with lino. There was also a significant layer of grime, smoke, and dusty on the walls. Fortunately, the walls had been painted (years ago) with a high sheen paint. The steamer tackled the walls and the shelves easily, without stripping the paint off or causing it to bubble or crack, but loosening years of grime so that they could be easily wiped with a cloth. The dirt on the lino on the landing and stairs also surrendered quickly to the task. I had to refill the tank 3 times to get everything clean, but I estimate it cut the task time by about 2/3 over the time I had done it previously. I brought the whole thing into the basement and cleaned the washer and dryer and the basement sink in about 10 minutes as well.

The final task I used to test this machine was the grime on the splash wall behind the stove. This is the only area where it ran into trouble, and even then, the trouble was more in my patience than in the machine's undeniable capabilities. Baked on cooking splatter is hard to remove under any circumstance, and some of this had been there a long time -- since before I owned the house, actually, and uncovered when I replaced the stove a few months ago. Using the brush attachment, and a sponge with a grit scrubber, however, I was able to free most of the grime and grease from the wall. There are streaks, but I think those are due to the discoloring of the wall material over time. I didn't worry about them because that wall was once again covered by the stove.

Overall, this is a handy little machine. It's relatively light weight (about 6 pounds, perhaps). This makes it too heavy for my elderly mother to hold in one hand, but I didn't have any trouble with it. The steam is controlled by a button on the handle, so the operator has to hold it in one hand, push down the button with the thumb. That gives only one other hand with which to wipe or scrub as needed. If the nozzle attachment is in use this isn't difficult, but if the hose is attached, that requires the use of the second hand, making it necessary for a second person to be involved in the project, or for me to put down the steamer when I want to wipe up the water and dirt.