Bought this via the VAX website. Advertised as having a 6 year guarantee. Don't be fooled. The guarantee is worthless as I found out when reporting a fault. Apparently, the wheels falling off after one year is "fair wear and tear". The wheels are held on by a thin plastic ring. best way I can describe is that the plastic ring reminds me of the little tab that you pull back on a small drinking water bottle to break open the lid - same thickness (almost see through its so thin) and same type of plastic (and this holds the wheels on!!!). As with the drinking bottle, the VAX wheels are clearly designed to break easily. The whole vacuum is complete rubbish - extremely poor design and everything about it designed to break. DON'T get taken in by promise of any guarantee over a year - it's deliberately misleading and the whole enterprise is based on selling the machine cheap, tempting the gullible with a "6 year guarantee" and making the profits on the inevitable spare parts as it falls to pieces. Mine (18 months old) is going on the local authority tip tomorrow - with four and a half years "guarantee" still "valid".

Does the job perfectly.light and easy to use. Good suction. Just make sure to clean filter regularly. Have had this for two hears with no problems. Much better than the ten ton Dyson Ihad before.

Had this for almost a year now and about to replace it with a model from a more trusted brand we should have gone with in the first place. To start with the positives, this vacuum is very light in comparison to many on the market. Unfortunately that is really all it has going for it. For the negatives, The swivel design makes this very clumsy to use, as it is so lightweight it has no low centre of gravity to keep it from generally getting stuck or toppling over. Its suction seems quite powerful in that it is great at sticking itself to the floor, however it fails at actually cleaning the floor. The brushes have no height adjustment so whilst ok on hard flooring, with anything more than a very thin carpet they dig in and get stuck. The hose is too short to reach most places you find yourself needing it, oh yes and the lightweight body topples over at the slightest tug when you run out of hose. The whole thing feels cheap and plastic, the clip on the hose tends to just fall off both the main body or the attachments during use. The bin is easy to remove for emptying but i find myself having to take it to bits to actually empty properly as the dirt/dust gets stuck on the filter or whatever it is in the middle.

Oh where do I start....my well known bag less vacuum needed replacing and the salesman talked us into purchasing vax air 3 well...... it is so heavy to push I feel I'm doing a fitness class at the local gym. It sometimes picks the dog hairs up. Quite often the hose will un clip itself from the base and flap around. It leaves black marks all over the skirting boards. The wheels are wearing away leaving red plastic dust....although I don't know how because they never seem to turn. And now, just as the warranty is up.......it blows up ....fantastic!, so that's the negatives now the positives........it's blown up so I have to go and replace it with a dyson and not feel guilty that I spent over $500 on a complete lemon that I have to use because it cost me over $500..........and not being made of money if is a complete false economy.

I bought this vacuum in February. I have had a new motor from Vax as it burnt out....scary! I have to thoroughly clean it after every use and now the motor is making an unbearable high pitched noise. My first and last Vax that's for sure!

My carpets are disappearing fast, sucked up by my Vav Air 3. I have checked to see if there is any adjustment to reduce the suck or the hight of the machine but no luck. I am a man and find it unbelievably difficult to push and pull so would imagine it would be extremely hard for a woman. It sure does suck!

I agree with the other comments about poor quality, I have had mine about 6 weeks and it is already starting to fall apart! The main problem is over the last 3 weeks the joint attaching the the head to the main body of the vacuum had become very stiff so as you are pushing it forwards and backwards the head doesn't stay to the floor and lifts the beater into the air, making it very difficult to use. The rubber on the wheels is also badly fraying and falling off, this started happening in the first couple times of use! It does have a lot of power and is easy to use but I have found it no good for thick carpet because if you look at the ground clearance of the back wheels it's about 5mm and drags on the carpet making it's difficult to push forward. It generally just seems cheap and has basic design faults.

we had one of the original tub style vax vacuums years ago and as the dyson we had been given had snapped its brush drive belt we thought we would buy another more modern vax as the old one was great ( and still is in my workshop ) what a mistake! within a couple of weeks the brush belt broke, vax sent a replacement, after a couple of months the motor went, it was shipped to vax for repairs and returned smashed to bits! Vax sent us a slightly more modern version, it was too heavy! and after once round the house would need stripping down to clean the cyclones out which bunged up with anything at all and after very little time it died completely, Vax shipped it back to them and returned to me 2 weeks ago a new and improved Vax air 3 max pet! Wot a Pile of Rubbish, it was ok the first time it was used but rapidly lost suction, I took the filter out to find again the cyclones jammed with fluff, hair, large pieces of paper etc which there is no way should get there, the only way to clear it is to remove the screws that hold it together and spend 20 minutes cleaning it all out, this wa after only 10 minutes cleaning 2 bedrooms! I have complained to Vax who were very argumentative but did agree to send out a new filter! that was fitted but the same thing happened again within 10 minutes, Vax have now told me that they " have never heard of the cyclones getting blocked on any of their machines before " and " it must just be the stuff we are hoover up " I fully stripped it yesterday and cleaned it out very carefully and used it to hoover my reasonably clean car out, no pet hair etc in there, guess what, there is about half an inch of dirt in the bottom of the collector and the cyclones are packed with fluff and god knows what so I called vax again today to be told " they are a very powerful vacuum and because of this are very high maintenance " well im sorry but im not having that, if they were supposed to be stripped down each time you used them they should have easy turn fasteners holding the cyclone together instead of screws. apart from that it is hard to manoeuvre! the turbo tool doesn't work on anything other than a smooth non carpeted surface, if you use the hose to get into corners the hoover falls over backwards banging the back of your legs or furniture. my view is don't waste your money, put some more into buying a modern dyson which is what I am going to do at the weekend, as for my 2 week old Vax Air 3 Max Pet? it is going to be cleaned out, put in its box and put in the local auction to get rid of it. my last words? don't buy another Vax!

At first glance I was I love with the vax air 3. Very lightweight, moveable and stylish. After only a few days however my feelings dramatically changed. As an upright it worked pretty well but i wanted to get right in to the corners and skirting boards. The attachments are diabolical, never stay on and drastically lose suction as soon as they are put on. When using as upright be VERY careful not to get too close to the skirting boards (especially white skirts) my home is now filled with gruby black marks from the rubber surroundings. This comes off with a good scrub but how inconvenient every time!! Then there's the filter that gets clogged at every use. Plastic hooks to hold hose snapped after a few weeks and loud noise has now starting coming from the motor. I have never taken the time to write a review but this Is most defiantly needed. Using the vax air 3 has been nothing but hard work and hassle...I wish I would have read the reviews before buying :(((

Great hoover. Good suction. Length of power lead is brilliant. Pretty quiet. Lightweight. Tool storage poor. However.. Only had the Air3 since Jan and its already lost two bits of trim and starting to feel tired. The clips for holding the pipe in place have snapped off. The brush roller gets full of dog hair and pieces of rug quiet easily and usually needs to be cleaned out a few times a month. Power lead is great length, but would be better if it was on an auto rewind reel. Tool storage is poor - no where for the long crevice tool - ideal place would be inside the handle as it seems to have a space. All in all a great hoover, let down by some iffy build quality Better quality than equivelant Dyson.

We had a long-serving Dyson DC-24 but it died after many years of great service. To try and save money we bought a Vax Air 3 U88 AM-B. It is not a disaster, but in nearly every area it is substantially worse than a Dyson. Its tools are not as easy to use, getting in at bits to clean needs a screwdriver instead of a 50p piece and it just does not do the job as well. The design is basically a copy of a Dyson, but the overall build quality is just a little bit poorer in every area. The real frustration begins when you try to put one of the heads on to clean out the car or whatever. The accessories twist around rather than maintain position, and nothing quite stays on - the heads often fall off. The hose is just too short to be useful, is in the wrong place and has a frustrating clip required to attach anything to it. You also have to disassemble the whole handle. There are no instructions with it so you just have to work it all out. When you use it on a carpet, it leaves stripe marks where it has hoovered, due to the strength of the suction - it is just unnecessarily rough. The final thing that is just so frustrating is the length of the electric cord - it is just a metre or so too short. We have had to cut the plug off and extend the cable - all so unnecessary. Anyway, it does the job, but when we buy another hoover, it will not be a Vax and will almost certainly be a Dyson. It may be £100 more, but frankly it now seems cheap at the price.

I bought this VAX at Christmas. Problem with wheels, had to get it sorted out. The hose is a rubbish as it's not long enough and awkward. It says to clean the filter every three months but I had to do it every week as it clogs up so much. Next time will buy a Dyson like we have before.

We bought this vacuum a few months ago and have only just started to use it. At first it was fine then after the third time of using the item, there has been a loud buzzing sound from the top. I've contacted Vax on numerous occasions and they keep sending me parts to try on the vacuum. None of which have helped. This machine is awful, and I would not recommend Vax to anyone who wants to purchase a vacuum cleaner. Terrible product, terrible customer service. All round awful. I will go back to buying Dyson's in future. This machine will be thrown away next time I go to the local dump. Do not purchase anything Vax, you have been warned.

Bought my vax air 3 max pet (three wishes I wish I had not bought it x 3) about 7 months ago, wheels would not turn properly it was heavy to use nothing like the advert. Vax replaced the unit with the wheels and brushes on. This transformed the cleaner and could vacuum with ease but had to clean the filter every time I used it as it clogged very quickly. Next thing to go was the handle such poor build quality the piece of plastic that locks handle in place came off vax sent me another handle. New handle has gone exactly the same way as the first so Vax has sent me another handle wrong colour but it works (for now). Last week the clip that holds cleaner upright has broken so it flops around and no longer turns brushes off it clogs after 2 mins of cleaning and hose clip that attaches the extendable hose to the base of the machine has broken as well. Never buying a Vax again machine cost £300 had it 7 months it is only fit for the bin ! Bought a Seebo fantastic machine must phone Vax again but even with it repaired it is just net up to the job.