Ratings: Ease of Use, Performance: 23/25, Look & Feel: 22/25, Features 23/25, How much I enjoy 25/25
Total: 93/100
The Eureka Capture Model 8802AVZ is a bag less upright vacuum cleaner that has several filters to trap the dust before it gets into the important parts of the vacuum. This is one of the major concerns when dealing with bagless vacuums and the Capture does an excellent job in this area.
The Eureka Capture is not just another bag less vacuum with its several filters to stop the finest dust and particles from getting through the vacuum and going into the motor and worse yet back into your home. The Capture has several nice features and is a very good vacuum at getting the pet hair, dirt and even rocks up from your carpet and hardwood floors.
The Capture does weigh a bit at 21 pounds but it does pack a big punch when it comes to pulling the dirt out of carpets. The Capture comes with a 30 foot cord for plenty of non stop vacuuming from room to room and has a nice comfortable loop handle. The head of the vacuum attaches to a hose then runs through the cup that catches the dirt and then through three filters. This allows you to unhook the hose and use the hose with attachments for quick cleanups, corners and other cleaning, even inside your computer.
The Capture comes with a small brush attachment and an extension tube as well as a telescoping duster and upholstery cleaner called the Power Paw. The duster cleans itself when you place it in the holder and turn a knob below the holder. This action diverts the vacuums suction from the head of the vacuum through the duster holder to clean off the duster. The duster is a nice feature and handy to have on your vacuum so you can dust and vacuum at the same time as well as clean the duster easily.
Other nice features of the Eureka Capture are the nice close to the edge vacuuming you get with the edge cleaning on the head of the vacuum as well as the large wheels for easy pushing. The head of the Capture has a nice bristle brush spiraling across it with a nice small brush around each edge for the edge cleaning. The height adjustment is a knob on the front of the head that raises the head by pushing these two small wheels down or up. When the head is closest to the floor this is a nice setting for really low carpets and bare floors.
The Capture works well on bare floors as it does not spit the dirt and rocks around but has enough suction to pull it up. It also does not roll the rocks around in the roller brush as I have had other vacuums do; you know that annoying rock skipping around before it finally gets sucked up. I think this has to do with the fact that the roller brush is not this perfectly round bar but is contoured and has plenty of room in the area that the bristles are not for the dirt and rocks to get past.
The Capture really does a fantastic job on carpets and gets a lot of the finest dirt and dust out of the carpet. I used the Capture vacuum for a month and have done a very good job of cleaning at my home as well as taking it to my wife’s day care and cleaning her carpets. The Capture vacuum picks up stuff their vacuums just do not get and it does a great job of getting that pea gravel without spitting it around or continuing to roll it around in the brush area.
I found the edge cleaning worked very well and got up a lot that other vacuums I have used did not. Especially when I used the Capture at my wife’s daycare and got to try my hand at all that pea gravel the kids bring in from the playground. The Capture did a great job n pet hair and very little got caught up in the roller brush but got lumped into a nice ball in the cleaning cup.
The cup that catches most of the dirt and debris is large enough not to have to empty it after one or two uses but you should check it often when doing a large amount of vacuuming. The vacuum will work better with frequent emptying and you should also check the filters every so often. The filters keep the dust and finer stuff from going through the vacuum as the filters will attest to when you check them.
There are three filters to check and replace, one is a foam pre filter and the one below that is a plastic fiber filter attached to a plastic tray that the foam filter sits in. This filter tray and foam filter sits directly below the cup for your dirt. When you remove the tray and filters there is a small lever that you turn to release the plastic cover over the Hepa filter.
I found the Capture vacuum and the filters at Wal-Mart and Target so finding the replacement filters is no problem as well as being able to check out the vacuum yourself. The foam filter and the filter tray are both washable and all you have to do is squirt some dish soap or slosh the filters in a small soapy water mixture and rinse them thoroughly. The foam filter will take some extensive rinsing and you probably should replace this filter every few months like the company recommends because this filter will get dirty quickly and is going to be catching the most dust and dirt.
The duster is a nice feature and easy to use, you just pull it out of the holder and twist the head to extend the handle. After dusting all those nooks and crannies you simply push the head back down and twist the portion back into the handle and push it back into the holder. You might have to play with the bristles of the duster to fit them back into the holder a bit but once in you just turn the vacuum on and turn the knob to clean the duster.
The upholstery cleaner or Power Paw works very well and has a brush inside the head that rotates from the suction of the vacuum. This is a nice cleaner for chairs, couches and even the car or minivan. The Power Paw works very well and gets those tough jobs like the foot area of a car or minivan for a good deep scrubbing action on the carpets. One word of advice when using the Capture in your vehicle, stand the vacuum up on a sidewalk or driveway and not the gravel drive. The brush keeps rotating even when using the hose and it kind of spits rocks and tries to pick up your whole gravel drive while sitting there.
A few not so positive points about using the Capture vacuum are its weight and the noise level. The Capture weighs 21 pounds so is not a light weight carrying up and down stairs. The vacuum does have plenty of power and then some to pick up the dust and dirt but it does weigh a good amount for all that power. It is also quite loud and can drown out the television while in the same room.
I really do like the Capture vacuum and it does live up to its rating here. It does an excellent job of picking up dirt and debris and vacuums the finest dust and particles I have ever seen in any vacuum. I have used several models and brands of vacuums, even several that were supposedly commercial grade while working at my wife’s day care and have not seen one yet that picks up this fine a dust.
I have no fear that the Capture will loose power over time as the two filters are very good at getting out most if not all of the particles and small dust that usually clogs the motor and eventually ruins it. The Capture has plenty of power and does an excellent job at the big jobs of carpets and bare floors as well as smaller ones like dusting and even those really dirty carpets in vehicles.
I highly recommend the Eureka Capture vacuum as a very powerful and easy to use vacuum for a whole house cleaning. The vacuum does weigh a lot but it is very powerful and you can check them out at your local Wal-Mart and Target stores for the vacuum and filters.
