Shark Corded Stick Vacuum Cleaner [HV390UK] Lightweight, Purple

Product Information

Used in its fully assembled mode it’s plenty easy enough to move around, attributable to the wheels, two rollers and its moderate suction power.

With its twin rollers and own electric motor, the Duo-Clean floorhead is a big and weighty unit. This isn’t so much of an issue on floors, but using it single-handed on stairs requires some serious wrist strength.

Shark NV601UK Lift-Away Upright

As noted, cleaning is easy, aided on the larger brush roller by a little channel that allows scissor access to cut off hairs. This Shark is rated at only 450W, including the floorhead motor. Around this level of suction isn’t dissimilar to the power from the best cordless cleaners, including Shark’s own battery powered models, so don’t expect a big uplift in cleaning power for the cable-connected inconvenience. A few stray hairs were left behind when we cleaned the entire carpet, though. While the floorhead is good at drawing out entwined hairs, there isn’t the sheer suction power to pull that last 1%. Like the carpet cleaning test, however, a few more passes over these spots and all was clear. The super-long 10-metre cable allowed us to get right to the top of our semi-spiral stairs in a single run, and performance of the pet tool is admirable. The motorised operation is far more consistent than air-powered ‘turbo’ brushes, and the rotation speed is far lower, ensuring a good clean without unnecessarily battering your carpet. We do worry about always-on rollers on softwood floor, but a couple of cleaning sessions on old parquet showed no signs of damage. The harder bristles on the rear roller barely touch the surface of hard floors, thanks to a well-judged front roller and rear wheel height. Shark Duo-Clean TruePet HV390UKT – How does it clean carpets?

To empty your canister, just press a button when aiming it over the bin. Remember, although the process for emptying the container isn’t hard, it’s also a bit messy. Thus, make sure you’re prepared for a plume of dust.The head is also very easy to clean out, thanks to a top-mounted removable cover and huge thumb clips. No need to find a coin to turn release-screws here. It’s also worth noting that the product is a lot lighter when it’s in hand-held mode. With that in mind, you might want to avoid using the full setup unless you’re cleaning your entire home. Even with the extra weight, the Shark isn’t particularly challenging to handle. The rubberised grip means that that you can work on your carpets and hard floors with confidence. Additionally, the weight is quite well-balanced, which makes moving the machine around a lot easier. The design of the HV390UKT might be excellent, but there are other things you’ll need to think about before you decide if this is the right one for you. For instance, how comfortable are you going to feel using the vacuum? The Duo-Clean floorhead is mighty heavy and its huge footprint makes it unwieldy on anything but straight flights of steps with open sides. You’re best to deploy the Motorised Pet Tool for stairs.

Switched on to the ‘Hard Floor, Area Rugs’ setting, the motor power is reduced and the brush bars turn more leisurely. While absolute suction power isn’t massive, the Duo-Clean floorhead more than makes up for it with its superb mechanical cleaning abilities.However, pet hair did cause us some issues. Frequently, big clumps of hair would get caught in the transition port between the cyclone and the bin itself, requiring reaching in and resulting in dusty fingers. As ever with Shark products, all the HV390UKT’s fixtures, fittings and clips are clearly labelled, very well made, and operate with a solid precision. Shark includes a five-year guarantee as standard on this model, and it’s easy to see why.