Carpet Cleaner Reviews

Carpet cleaner reviews is brought to you because I needed a good cleaner for the carpets and had to do some research.  As long as I was compiling all this info I figured I might as well share it with you!

One of the first places online that I visited was the folks at Consumer Reports.org.  They are famous for all their in-depth testing and really putting a product through the paces.  That’s the good news.

The bad news I’ve discovered, although CR might highly rate a given product after thorough testing the feedback from actual owners and users may have a completely different opinion on it!  Go figure.

But at least CR has done their due diligence and that’s alone is helpful and provides a great place to start when weeding out the carpet cleaner competition.

What Carpet Cleaners Do

Vacuum cleaners do a pretty good job of sucking up the loose dirt and debris found on the surface of the carpet.   But they aren’t all that great at removing that deep-down junk that accumulates and sticks to the carpet fibers.  We need another tool in our arsenal to tackle the oils, gunk, and grime that’s hidden way down within the carpet itself.  We need a deep cleaner.

So the common method of getting to this unseen mess is to spray some kind of soap or detergent on the carpet.  Then brushes help work the cleaning solution down below the surface to do work its magic on the hidden nasty grime.  And then, an extractor of sorts sucks the dirt-ridden shampoo out of the carpet leaving it rather damp.  You let it dry and then run a vacuum over the area to complete the job.

So it all comes down to how effective a particular carpet cleaning machine is at working the cleaning solution down into the fibers and then how it performs at sucking the mess back up!  (Yes, a very scientific explanation!)

But it’s not all about ‘more power’ though. Although the suction itself won’t hurt the carpet, the brushes could.  And these are some of the things that CR evaluated when testing various cleaning machines.

What they found out was that most units they tested really didn’t get the dirt that’s way down into the carpet.  They did a pretty good job of cleaning the surface, but not the deep-cleaning we hoped to get with our carpet cleaning machine.

They also remind us that these commercial machines aren’t designed for stain cleaning.  It’s always best to tackle a stain right after it happens and to use a cleaner that’s specifically made for stain-cleaning.

Types Of Carpet Cleaning Machines

There are basically three different styles of carpet cleaners.  They are:

  • Rental Carpet Cleaners
  • Vacuum Cleaner Sized Carpet Cleaners
  • Scrubbing Machines

You most likely have seen rental units at the grocery store.  For about twenty bucks, you can take home one of these babies for the day.  They are relatively big and bulky and not all that maneuverable.

The cleaners that look similar to vacuum cleaners are a much lighter and easier to move about the house.  Theses types of carpet cleaners work by scrubbing in water and cleaning solution (requiring the specific brands specially made cleaner of course!) and then removing the wet mess via a vacuuming system.

Scrubbing machines distribute the cleaning solution, or powder, into the carpet fibers.  Since they don’t have a built in method (a.k.a. vacuum) for removing the now grimy mess, you need to go over the carpet with a vacuum cleaner to complete the job.   So you need a good vacuum cleaner if you want to go the scrubbing machine route otherwise you’ve got a leftover mess to contend with.

Brands Of Carpet Cleaners

Bissell is a common and very popular maker of carpet cleaning machine.  They make a wide variety of models and are available on most department stores.

Dirt Devil is owned by the same company that produces Hoover machines.   Dirt Devil makes many different styles of cleaners and you can find their products at stores like Kmart, Wal-Mart, and Target.

And speaking of Hoover, these folks have been around forever and have instant brand-name recognition.  Many people trust Hoover and have for years since they’ve entered the vacuum cleaner market way back in 1907!  That’s a long time.  Hoover carpet cleaners can be found at a variety of stores and also at do-it-yourself centers like Lowe’s and Home Depot.

The Best Carpet Cleaner

Well, I’d like to tell you that Consumer Reports did bang-up job testing the various machines, but alas, they have not.  At least for some time now.  So, we’ll got to ‘the people’ and see where they cast there vote.

And the winner is …..

The Hoover F5914-900 SteamVac with Clean Surge!

The selection was made by the overwhelming popularity of this Hoover machine by the folks that commented on over at Amazon.com.

And it was a landslide!  Over 1,000 people sang the praises of this machine and over 700 gave it their highest recommendation – 5 Stars.

So there you have it.  If you’re interested in solid, honest and unbiased carpet cleaner reviews, I say we trust those who have already invested in this machine and regularly use it.   My vote goes to the Hoover!

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