Choosing The Best Carpet Steam Cleaner

Choosing The Best Carpet Steam Cleaner

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Weather your doing a little spring cleaning, preparing for guests, or maybe hosting the holiday meal, now's the best time buy a new carpet steam cleaner. A major issue can be, because there are many on the market to pick from, deciding which one meets your needs. Lets walk-through a few of the options and work out which options you need before you decide to lay out your money.

First we have to clarify that there's absolutely no steam utilized with a carpet steam cleaner. It will always be a mixture of hot water and a scrubbing action which loosens the soiled dirt. Excess water is then extracted as well as the debris into a holding tank where it's later discarded. Some models have the cleaning wand and the container separate and others tend to be self-contained. The all-in-one styles are the types we will be emphasizing for the moment.

If you're a home owner you will probably be looking at a consumer grade model. Bissell and Hoover are classified as the main players in the market. Each one has their benefits and drawbacks, and it truly depends on what benefits you are searching for and what you will be using it for. Should your house have large area rugs or has several rooms with wall to wall carpeting, an upright unit will likely be the most effective for you.

Bissell Carpet Steam Cleaners

Bissell features three primary product lines having many models to select from in each line. The top of the line Bissell is close to a professional quality machine, and unless you are a property manager where you need to clean loads of carpeting, the Big Green Deep Cleaning Machine will be over kill for you. Another line of cleaners that Bissell offers is the Pro Heat line of carpet steam cleaners. Many of these cleaners have all exactly the same basic design, with some basic feature differences to make them stand apart. They range in price between $279 and $149 and are the most likely candidates for homeowners. The last line in Bissells arsenal is the Power steamer and Quick Steamer line of cleaners. These range in price between $129 and $79 and have a bare minimum amount of features.

Hoover Carpet Steam Cleaners

Hoover does not seem to categorize their cleaners the same way Bissell does. Each one of these seems more specifically designed for a certain usage or a certain set of cleaning situations. Their top of the line is the Platinum Collection and they retail around $399. Towards the bottom of the line is the Steam Vac Quick-N-lite for approximately $99. The nice thing about Hoover is that it appears each model is specifically designed for a particular type of cleaning tasks, rather than piling different features on a certain model to alter its purpose only slightly.

Carpet Steam Cleaner Construction

The first thing to keep in mind is the construction of the unit. A consumer grade unit won't be as durable as a commercial grade, and the cheapest model will probably not be as durable as a mid grade unit. Sometimes price is an indicator of the quality, but not always. A mid to high priced unit might be priced high as a result of all the added features and attachments, not as a result of durability. Make sure that you look at durability and the capability of fixing the unit yourself if you have problems. Repair shops will likely charge big dollars to fix issues that can easily be ordered and fixed yourself. Many fixes like the drive belt or brush problems can usually be fixed rather easily on many models.

Pet Hair Issues with Your Carpet Steam Cleaner

If you have pets one thing that needs to be kept in mind is the cleaning of the brush rollers. Just about all carpet steam cleaners on the market today possess some type of brush system that is designed to aid the soap solution in dislodging the dirt. Be sure to pick a unit that the rollers are easily removable. Pet hair will end up clogging the rollers and will need to be cleaned. There are lots of carpet cleaner models available on the market that will publicize easy removal of the roller brushes.

Carpet Steam Cleaner Water Heating

Another nice feature you will need to keep in mind is the units strategy to heat the water. A number of the lower priced models do not have the ability to heat the water on board the device. These machines rely on the temperature of the water an individual adds to the machine, which cools rapidly as the machine is being used. Hot water really helps break up the embedded dirt between the fibers. Mid level to high end machines almost always have on board water heating systems. Some heat water within the tank, some heat water while in the line between the tank and the discharge nozzles and some actually heat the floor where the solution is being sprayed. The key here's to make sure the water is hot when it passes through the nozzles. The dispersion of the water out of the nozzles will drop the temperature a little, so the closest to the nozzles the water is heated the better. When selecting a carpet steam cleaner, make sure there is some water heating method on the machine. It will help you in the long run, even if it is a bit more expensive initially.

While we are on the subject of heating the water, be sure you have the ability to shut down the heater in situations where you're going to clean something delicate. You dont desire to ruin an Oriental rug, wool carpeting, or delicate furniture with excessive heat.

Cleaning Water Extraction

The last basic feature to consider about selecting a carpet steam cleaner is the ability of the unit to pick up the water after its already down in the carpet. The extraction process is really what separates many good cleaners from bad. Many different models offer various patented methods for picking the water back up, and they all sound great, but that's where you really need to read customer reviews. After narrowing down your search to three or four models, go to Amazon.com or some other site that offers customer reviews and read through them carefully. Customers usually are most vocal about wet carpeting. So, if a particular machine is leaving the carpeting wet, choose a particular machine with little if any negative comments regarding the extraction.

Those are the major components to look at when choosing a carpet steam cleaner. There will be other available choices that make some machines more attractive than others, but if you find a machine that has got the above options right there will be a good chance you will be happy with your purchase.

About the Author:
For more information about carpet steam cleaners or carpet steam cleaning equipment go to http://www.best-carpet-steam-cleaner.net/.



Article Originally Published On: http://www.articlesnatch.com


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