Steam Cleaners are not vacuum cleaners.  You will need to vacuum your carpet as usual, but where carpet cleaners come in is to actually wash the carpet fibres in your carpet.  This can give your carpets a new look and feel, though that obviously depends on the state of your carpets in the first place.

Some Steam Cleaners may not actually use steam to clean the carpets.  What seems to be a common mechanism is that hot water and detergent are applied to the carpet, and then brushes might be involved in agitating the carpets to clean the fibres.  Hot air is then often forced down into the carpet to help efficient cleaning.  The dirty water is sucked back up into the carpet cleaner, and hot air used again to dry the carpets.

When you use a carpet cleaner, be aware that your carpet may require a few hours to dry before you can walk on it.  However the results speak for themselves, with dirty carpets coming up as new.

The Hoover Steam Vac with clean surge is a vacuum cleaner with a difference. Imagine being able to steam clean your own carpets, upholstery and bare floor boards?

Features of the Hoover SteamVac include:

• 12 amp motor
• Deep cleaning using hot tap water and carpet solution.
• 5 spinning brushes to lift the dirt and clean the carpets, upholstery and even bare floor boards.
• Two water tanks used to keep the dirty water separate from the clean water.
• Clean Surge will give you an extra burst of cleaning solution when the carpet or unholstery is particularly dirty or stained.
• Brush rotation indicator so that you know when the brushes are rotating.
• 8 foot hose useful for cleaning stairs and upholstery with the stair/upholstery nozzle.

There is a convenient trigger on the handle of the SteamVac that releases the cleaning fluid. Once you have finished cleaning your carpets, you release the trigger and the Hoover SteamVac pushes hot air.

The Hoover SteamVac is a very popular floor cleaner although calling it a Steam Vac is a bit misleading. On Amazon over 1000 people have reviewed this machine, awarding it an average of over 4 out of 5. 67% of those who wrote a review awarded the Steam Vac 5 out of 5, and overall the machine averaged well over 4 out of 5.

Reviewers liked the following on the Hoover SteamVac:

• Cleans carpets exceptionally well. What more can you say?

.. and some people did not like:

• Dirty water container fills up too quickly.
• Slower than a pro machine, but then you get what you pay for.

The Hoover F7411-900 SteamVac Dual V Widepath carpet cleaner is not a vacuum cleaner but a carpet cleaner that uses water, carpet cleaning fluid and heat.

Carpet cleaners like the Hoover F7411-900 SteamVac are designed to give your flooring a good deep clean with carpet detergent like the Hoover 40321128 Deep Cleansing Carpet 7 Upholstery detergent. They work by applying hot water and detergent to the carpets, and scrubbing the carpets with a rotating brush. Hot air is then forced into the carpet so that the brushes and cleaning solution can do their job efficiently.

The cleaner has a number of features, including:

• 8 foot hose with onboard tools
• removable tool caddy
• powered handheld tool for stairs and upholstery
• 3 speeds of rotation for spill pick-up, gentle scrub and power scrub modes depending on your cleaning requirements.
• 12 amp motor with rotating brushes that clean your carpets – this patented Spin Scrub loosens dirt and cleans carpet fibres thoroughly.

The Hoover Steamvac Dual V Widepath has received a number of reviews on Amazon. With 108 reviewers of this machine, the average rating is between 4 and 5 out of 5, with over 77% of customers awarding it a 5 out of 5.

Things people like about the Hoover SteamVac Dual V carpet cleaner:

• Very easy to use
• clean water rinse gets all of the detergent out of the carpet
• Carpets practically dry when the Hoover Steam Vac finishes its job
• Build quality is excellent
• Several reviewers report that this machine is better than professional carpet cleaners

.. and things they don’t like:

• Slow to clean a carpet, but the results are worth it.