Sport exhaust pop and crackle of a…Dirt Devil M2881-0 vacuum cleaner? (WHL #60)
Someone had fun. With the old crap that everyone technical gets for free when visiting family. This time: An old vacuum cleaner, probably close to ten years old. Described to me as “makes weird noises, shut off immediately” (sure). Oh, and of course it was someone else that used the thing when it went from fully working to probably defective. Aah, family.
Plugged it in at home and had a giggle:
People spend thousands of Euros to make their shitty cars even more ridiculous, and here’s my extremely low riding Dirt Devil asphyxiating on pop and crackle noises 
Alright, further disassembly just reduces weight and didn’t uncover anything stuck inside. Note how the thing jerks clockwise when the 1200W motor turns on hard.
Filters and other stuff were already cleaned by others in an attempt to save it, so it’s something around or inside the motor. As this thing is at a decent age for retirement this was a destructive teardown. If one knew it was the brushes and how to access/replace them, this is repairable. Well, if there’s replacement parts available, which I did not research.
This is the fully extracted brushes from the motor. I have to say I’m not an AC motor expert, but given their uneven wear with crumbling edges, the strange pitting in the center and the uneven color of the commutator, it probably was the brushes causing the very rough idling and the heavy smell of …amps. Length-wise, those are only down half their original size which should be okay. I would have thought the springs were stiff enough for solid contact, but apparently that’s not the case. The rectangular brush cases had contact with the commutator, which, given all those parts are fixed in place relative to each other, could indicate some good ol’ drop down the stairs during operation. Furthermore, there was a clicking noise and slight resistance every full turn of the motor plus the bearings were a bit stiff, so the Devil has reached EOL.
Here’s the commutator with the strange uneven color and wear on the lower side of the brush contact zone.
Scrapped!
