You know until recently I'd never thought much about having a central vacuum system. But once I began considering the advantages, noise reduction, convenience and cleaner air, I started warming up to the idea.  And finally decided to put one in. Well, actually I guess it might have been the stairs that convinced my wife Lynn and I of the merits of a central vac. Hey Chris, how are ya? Come on in, buddy. For this project I teamed up with Chris Ellis, an installer for Cyclone Home Systems in nearby Newington, CT, a dealer for Beam Central Vacuums. So Chris, I really hope you can do this without opening up the walls. Because I just went through that with a sprinkler and I don't want to do that again. Now the concept behind the central vac is fairly straightforward. The motor and filter for a central vacuum system are located in an out-of-the-way place like the garage, or, in our case, the basement. PVC plastic pipe is run from the power unit to outlets throughout the house. 

We’re going to want them everywhere from the attic to the basement.  vacuum cleaner repair pune Is there a way to get from the basement up?vacuum cleaners kingston pa Well typically, we like to look for closets that line up from the first floor to the second floor. ebay vacuum cleaner beltsAnd that will allow us access to run the pipe. We've got one here.  When you say line up, what do you mean? Well, from the second floor to the first floor and that will allow us to run a pipe. [BOTH SPEAK AT ONCE] That isn't gonna work here.  There's no closet on top of this.  In fact, there are only two closets on this floor, on this level. But I do have a laundry chute here.  And this goes up to the second floor.

I'm not sure where it goes from there.  But I could show you where the other end of this is.Up here is the top.  Okay, so here it is. What do you think? So this is gonna be a way we can get the pipe from the basement clear up to the attic without having to open the wall, right. Definitely, I think so.That's really good news. Well that’s a relief to me.  Chris collects his tools and a bundle of plastic pipe and we begin by drilling a hole through the bottom of the laundry chute and into the basement. All right, I'll pull it out. Yeah pull it out.  Okay I'm coming back up at you with a hole saw now. Yeah, it looks good. Okay, I'm coming up. I know the laundry chute goes all the way up to the second floor.  However, I need to run the pipe into the partially finished attic above.  So Chris and I cut out a portion of the attic floor in search of the top of the chute. Okay, grab the flashlight there. Shine it down there.  Yeah, I think that's the top of our laundry chute right there. 

So what do you think Chris?  Why don't you go down -we'll go down and sort of drill a hole up through the top of that.  I'll watch from here and be sure that we are in the right spot.Can you see me? Can you see me? Yeah, I see light. To make sure the holes are aligned, I drop a plumb bob all the way from the attic into the basement. Now we have a way to get the pipe from the power unit up to the attic.  From the attic, the plan is to run pipe downward inside the walls to reach the outlets on the second floor. We’re almost through the top plate of the wall when … There's so many nails and screws - I don't believe this - well Murphy is at work again.  We've drilled into a veritable minefield of nails and screws.  So we're left with no choice but to move over and try again. All right, you want to clean it out with a hole saw. Yeah, we can do that. Make it nice and clean. With a clean hole at the top, Chris goes down to the second floor and pushes a screwdriver through the wall where we've planned to locate the outlet.

I check the alignment from above.  So Chris marks and cuts out the opening for the outlet. All right, it's cut. I want to drop a plumb bob down here, okay? I'm gonna put it in the center of the hole. It's sitting up in the middle of the cutout. Okay, Chris, are you ready for the wire? Okay, I'm sending it down. This low voltage wire will run all the way back to the power unit. When the hose is plugged in, the wire will carry a signal that turns on the vacuum.  Chris connects an elbow to the back plate, inserts the plate into the wall, then attaches the cover with a couple of screws. So what's happening, this is the fixture you've got right here in the wall of the master bedroom, right? And that piece you're dropping down in is gonna fit right in this L.Right in there, snug. And you're gonna - you're gonna drop that in from up here. So this is the pipe coming up out of the bedroom. Now we're ready to go all the way down to the basement, right.

Start by running the wire. Yeah, run the wire.I'm just gonna go down through the second floor.  Coming up on the first floor, okay.  Now we're into the basement. Well, next we'll run some pipe.  Yeah, why don't you go on the second floor - I'll fish this to you. Chris lowers the PVC pipe inside the laundry chute from the attic to the second floor, to the first floor and into the basement. We repeat this process for another outlet in a second floor hallway.  To install the first-floor outlets, Chris drills holes from the basement up inside the walls, cuts an opening and installs the low voltage wire and outlet fixture…attaches the cover plate … then feeds the PVC pipe up from below to make the connection.  Well, we've installed a total of six outlets. One in the attic, two on the second floor, two on the first floor and one in the basement. All pipe runs lead to one place: the central vacuum power unit. Okay so I've got - I just walk from room to room with this, set it down and do my cleaning, huh?