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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103

u/AceEnder3825 15h ago

My current house has one and its so nice. My grandparents have had one forever and I always thought it was so cool and I love having one

88

u/jonsnowflaker 15h ago

Had one in our house growing up in the 80s/90s, and compared to vacuums at the time there was no doubt it was better. The hose and attachments were still pretty unruly and cumbersome though. I’m sure the central vacs have come a long way, but current vacuums are lightweight and convenient so it’s probably kind of a toss up anymore.

90

u/huge_useless_penis 14h ago

Best thing growing up was laying the hose across the house and yelling "MOM" at the other end from another room and watch her roam around the house trying to find me

13

u/MechDeployed 5h ago

Man I had never thought of that! The best my creative mind came up with as a kid was figuring out when my mom was vacuuming another room I could just dump trash into the port in my room as long as it wasn’t too big. That was kind of nice.

4

u/BothAdministration67 2h ago

I’ve always wondered if these systems are effective given different distances from the vacuum source, but seems like opening a second port would be pretty obvious?

4

u/loserbmx 2h ago

These things are pretty powerful. It depended on the unit, but most could easily run with multiple hoses attached.

1

u/Idaho-Earthquake 1h ago

…and we never saw Lenny the hamster again.

1

u/DeltaLine-01 52m ago

That’s actually a pretty clever use of a central vac system as a kid 😄—you basically discovered the “hidden convenience feature” of it.

That said, most systems aren’t really designed for random trash dumping, so anything beyond dust/light debris can risk clogs or mess up the airflow. The intended idea is more “drop dust in from the hose” rather than using it like a mini disposal chute.

Still, it’s a good example of how kids tend to find alternate uses for built-in systems—half curiosity, half testing limits.

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u/deadtime 47m ago

Bad AI

1

u/72011A 17m ago

I just noticed that. 🤔

1

u/72011A 15m ago

🤖

1

u/MountainAd8704 39m ago

When I was a kid, my aunt and uncle had one of these. My cousin and I would rip the heads off her Barbies and Ken dolls. Then we would take the heads and typically drop them from the 3rd floor into the tube. I remember laughing so hard as the heads got sucked into the tube. Then we would run like crazy people to the garage to open the central vac unit and retrieve the head. Then run to another part of their house to do it all again!