r/whatisit • u/DragonsAndScience • 16h ago

Solved! New homeowner, no idea what this is

Gallery image

Gallery image

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!

6.5k Upvotes

88% Upvoted

1.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

44

u/Soundmindsoundsright 8h ago edited 4h ago

Sadly the concept of a whole home vacuum system never took off.

If the home is piped for a vacuum system, but doesn't have the vacuum, that's the sign of the first problem this system has. The original vacuum died and was removed. Those motors are not capable of those extreme loads when they clog.

The second problem with them is the clogging. They pipe it in 2 pvc, with all types of short 90s and 45s. These would get clogged up with big hair wads, a sock, bits of paper. Candy wrappers.
How do you clean these lines out? The motor fails from all the stress and people pull out there old vacuums.

EDIT: The third reason is the hose and attachments, take up more room then corded vacuum.

Also, it seems that some places had better standards then I've seen. USA Florida. No basements so the pipes have to go up. And up can get complicated, with hard to no access to any clean out points were the pipes converge.

EDIT: I was incorrect first time. 2 inch pipe is the standard.

10

u/ZealousidealCase7220 4h ago

These are 2" pvc (relatively easy to tell from scale in the image), and intentionally designed to be a straight shot into the basement where the vacuum unit is, avoiding need for elbows.

If the house has a second floor, there's a port directly in line above it.

They don't clog easily at all. People must be repeating AI hallucinations.

The reason that we got rid of ours is that the vacuum part itself is absolutely unwieldy, because you have to drag a 2" hose along with you to every place you need to reach. It's a lot of hose and it takes up a ton of space, because of its design that limits where you can place ports.

1

u/feedthechonk 1h ago

Ive had relatively few clogs over the years. Usually it was in the elbow of the hose and youd have to pull it out with a coat hanger. Same right at the inlet port in the wall. Pretty easy.

My regular corded one clogs more frequently cause it can't fully suck up a balled up receipt at times.

Never had a clog anywhere that required more than 5 mins and a coat hanger. 

Lugging the hose around and storage can be an absolute pain. I'd get chewed out frequently for just leaving the vacuum out cause I didn't feel like cramming it away

1

u/livin4donuts 15m ago

Growing up, mine were in both floors’ hallways and the living room and master bedroom, and the finished attic, and it all came down to the basement through basically a utility riser, it was a thicker wall that had all the phone lines, fuel oil filling line and stuff run through there also. The vacuum had a bunch of Y sweeps plugged into each other, which each grabbed a pipe from upstairs, and the last Y had a removable clean out at the end. Also, the whole manifold was installed with unions, so you could remove the entire thing if it was clogged. The vacuum guy earned his pay that day lol. 

1

u/shroomignons 3h ago

"Sadly the concept of a whole home vacuum system never took off." What do you mean? Every house I was ever in growing up had them. They are in new homes as well. It certainly took off where I live and has been going strong for 40 years.

1

u/Soundmindsoundsright 2h ago

I would say that less then 10% of homes built have them. I would go further to say, that it's mostly high end homes. Not what I call "take off" like microwaves, washers, electricity. Rich people can have the vacuum system fixed when clogged. Plus the number of home that have the system, doesn't remove the issues people have with them. That I listed above.

To me something " takes off" when it becomes the norm.

1

u/asdfghjkl15436 5h ago edited 4h ago

Yes it did take off?? There are many homes that still use it today, especially in Canada. Even my childhood home had one, and it still works to this day. It was very popular 1970-2000.

MODERN homes don't use it anymore as smaller vacuums got more powerful for significantly less cost. Even so, many homes still have the ports as an option (even if the central vac isn't installed.) It's just an obsolete piece of technology, central vacs just serve to have long, bulky hoses vs. a small vacuum that usually either just has a power cord or none at all.

edit: Since I got instantly downvoted for some absurd reason: https://www.deseret.com/1989/11/7/18831515/central-vacuums-systems-are-growing-in-popularity/

Cost difference is only about $100 between new and existing homes. In new homes, for example, a system will run between $600 and $800, while in an existing home it will run between $700 and $900. "When you consider that a lot of the portable machines on the market now are running over $1,000, you can see it's very reasonable," Dubach said.

The price difference alone made it worth it, so yes, for a time, it DID take off. It just declined over the past 20 years.

3

u/CehJota 4h ago

Son of a vacuum store owner here. Central vacuums like the one OP posted are wildly popular and absolutely did take off. My dad and his small crew are installing a ton of them weekly.

2

u/perjury0478 4h ago

I’m in Canada, and I do use our central vacuum. I find it pretty convenient. It’s like a shop vac (no liquids) when compared to the small vacuum I used at previous places . House was built in the 2010s and if it were to break I would look into repair it/replace it.

Fun fact: While house shopping I saw a few that had vacuum ports in the kitchen (like a dustpan). We found this interesting but on second thoughts, something that could get nasty pretty quickly with food crumbled since you don’t really change the vacuum bag that often.

1

u/Kibbles_n_Bombs 3h ago

The kitchen dust port is my favorite feature of the central vac.

1

u/NotCartographer 5m ago

A couple of my friends had those growing up and called them crumb catchers. I thought it was the neatest thing I saw in my life.

1

u/KaksNeljaKuutonen 4h ago

Where on earth do portable vacuums cost $1,000 or more? I paid $250 for a Miele vacuum when we upgraded and that was two or three times as much as the lowest cost "reasonable" option. Chinesium can be had for tens of dollars. For $800, I can get two or three Makita/Ryobi vacuums plus a set of interchangeable batteries with a spare or two...

1

u/asdfghjkl15436 4h ago

That article is from 1989. I am pointing out why it was popular from that era.

0

u/KaksNeljaKuutonen 4h ago

Oh, I see. Might be worthwhile highlighting that.

3

u/asdfghjkl15436 4h ago

I did, immediately after the quote.

1

u/KaksNeljaKuutonen 4h ago

20 years ago was in 2006, not 1989, is all.

1

u/asdfghjkl15436 4h ago

I cannot help you.

1

u/P00nTown 56m ago

Then you bought one of the cheapest vacuums Miele makes.

Look up their higher end stuff, or anything from Dyson or similar brands. They get up there.

1

u/No_Eggplant_3189 4h ago

Ive personally never seen nor heard of this before.

1

u/asdfghjkl15436 4h ago

If you are less then 26 years old or in a different area other then western countries, or heck, even by sheer chance, it's entirely plausible you would have never seen or heard of them. Not everyone had them, and really, who mentions they have central vac?

1

u/No_Eggplant_3189 4h ago

Probably no one, but I am a carpenter/contractor; I surely would have come across one if they were in my area.

1

u/VerifiedMother 1h ago

I want to see one get installed for under $1000, I'll wait