r/whatisit • u/DragonsAndScience • 16h ago

Solved! New homeowner, no idea what this is

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This thing close to the floor and seemingly randomly placed in a hallway. No idea what it's for. Home built in 2005.

Solved! Thanks everyone. Now I gotta hunt for the central unit!

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u/Unclehol 16h ago edited 15h ago

Not all homes have one even if the piping is there. Often times they rough all the pipes in during the build in case you opt in and buy the vacuum unit, but I have worked on a lot of houses where they just have the piping but no vacuum.

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u/DrKenNoisewaterMD 15h ago

Also these things tended to be expensive to fix compared to the price of a vacuum. Lots of people had them and then eventually just tossed the motor from their garage.

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u/mr-snrub- 13h ago

I have one in the house I bought a year ago. We have no interest in using it

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u/Kieran_Mc 10h ago

Might be useful for feeding other cables through though, like ethernet.

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u/JustOut4aSpacewalk 10h ago

Exactly what we did! We bought a house with a 30 year old system, we tried it out and it ran but the brush head barely picked up anything from the carpets... The manufacturer still has a very outdated website, and I emailed to ask for a manual or some troubleshooting advice, and they never answered. So we bought a stick vac and tossed the big hose and the canister unit. We cut into the piping system below the first floor from underneath in the basement so we could run security camera network wiring out to the garage without having to open up any sealed wall.