Green (Living) Review: Gtech AirRAM cordless vacuum cleaner

Review by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Suction power does not equal cleaning efficiency

Vacuum cleaners have not changed much in the time that they have existed. They are heavy, much too heavy in fact. They also have not improved much in respect to cleaning efficiency. In fact cleaning power has decreased which suction power – I don't really want to pick up a bowling ball with my vacuum cleaner – has increased and energy consumption.

Today's vacuum cleaner is one of the most power hungry domestic appliance that you use in your home, bar, maybe, your cooker, if you cook electric (as I do).

In the day of the Hoover Junior and its competition soon all the vacuum cleaners were about the same in performance and the marketing wars began and suction power became the buzzword and still is today. There is, however, no correlation between suction power and cleaning power and today's most powerful, in suction and energy consumption, bag-less vacuum cleaner, using a whacking 2,000 watts, has less cleaning power than the Hoover Junior of the 1950s, which only used about a quarter of the energy. Instead of using good design most work on brute force. Gtech, however, is aiming to change all that with the AirRAM cordless vacuum cleaner.

With a consumption of 100 watts it has more cleaning power than the Dyson bag-less vacuum and similar and with a weight of 3.5kg (about 7lbs) is it the lightest vacuum cleaner one could imagine.

Ten years ago Gtech led the way by bringing out the fist battery-powered carpet and floor sweeper, and those have come a long way since then also, and now the company has developed the most powerful vacuum cleaner with batteries.

The battery enables the AirRAM to work on full power – due to a built-in computer there is no loss – for about 40 minutes with a 4 hour recharge time. Forty minutes running time should be enough for most cleaning around the home.

The dust is collected in a plastic box with two compartments, creating two little dust bricks, making emptying less of an issue than the emptying of either vacuums with bags or without bags, and the filters can be removed and washed out time and again. No need to change your filters every so often and also no bags to buy. A total win-win-win situation.

I have been using the AirRAM quite a lot around the home now since I got presented with a it at the launch event on Tuesday, April 24, 2012 and am very pleased with it indeed. In fact, “pleased” is an understatement. The word amazed much better conveys the message.

The Gtech AirRAM cordless vacuum cleaner has managed to get dust, etc., out of rugs and carpets in my home where powerful vacuum cleaners of other makes have simply failed dismally.

The green credentials of the Gtech AirRAM cordless vacuum cleaner, aside from the fact that it has extremely low power consumption, are that there are no consumables that need to be purchased and that the machine is also repairable, should the need arise.

This is yet another great product out of the Gtech stable and it will certainly revolutionize floor and carpet cleaning.