The Dyson v6 seems to be one of those cordless vacuum cleaners people swear by. Yesterday I visited their showroom to try one out.

The Dyson v6 is Dyson’s cordless vacuum cleaner – and I was invited to an event at the Dyson Showrooms, to watch a demonstration of how good it is. Now, this may not seem exciting to a lot of people, but it was for me. We’ve had a Dyson DC04 for over twelve years now, we bought it as a wedding present, and on getting it home, started using it straight away. We were impressed – our hallway carpet had a clean white stripe down it, as years of dust were whisked away from our lives. Embarrassing how dusty our flat was, but happy as it wasn’t any more!

So what makes a good vacuum cleaner? In my world, having perennial rhinitis (a year-round dust allergy, so I have to keep everywhere as dust-free as possible) means a good dust busting cleaner is needed. Our bedroom has laminate floors, however this attracts a lot of dust, and our house is a dusty one. We end up using wet floor cleaners in our room as our current vacuum cleaner (Dyson DC04) is a bit too big for our room and the little corners.

On arriving at the showrooms I grabbed a seat and found myself with various Dyson parts, including this interesting looking cleaner head. I had a good look at it, it felt heavy. That’s because the Dyson v6 has its motor in the head – something which makes perfect sense when explained. After all, when you’re using a cleaner the last thing you want is to be lugging the heavy bit around while keeping the light bit in front of you – it doesn’t make sense.  This piece of Dyson technology was in front of me, and we couldn’t work out what it was from. A robot vacuum maybe?

We were called over for a demonstration by a Dyson engineer who explained lots about the Dyson v6. At home, we have a mixture of laminate and carpet floors, and some things are awful to get out – my biggest problem is glitter from the carpet, although dust within the gaps in the laminate is also a pain. This is where the v6 comes in – as it has an extender which appears to be in lots of colours depending on the model you have so you don’t bend down, but get the full benefit of the powerful engine. It’s kind of useful when you feel a bit Star Wars and want to pretend it’s a lightsaber. Fortunately another lovely blogger also wanted to… (photo credit – Helen at Kiddycharts)

A photo posted by Helen Neale ~ Kids / Travel (@kiddycharts) on Oct 10, 2015 at 9:55am PDT

Practical stuff: the Dyson v6 takes 3.5 hours to charge, and you’re likely to get 20 minutes of vacuum time. It has a capacity of 0.4 metres.

The Dyson v6 also has a Max Mode option – up to six minutes of extra vacuum power for more difficult tasks. I had a race with another blogger on a multi surfaces area, and found that it has a good overall pickup rate, but that for edges you need to go back over it, which is fine, as that’s the same as with any other vaccum. But yes, going into the Dyson Showroom and racing with another blogger to clean things up. My mum would be proud!

Dyson say “Other cordless vacuum manufacturers compromise on either weight or suction, because they have to choose between motors that are either bulky or weak.”

We got to clean up many different kinds of things from the floor – cereals, rice, coffee and the aforementioned most hated of mine, glitter! The Dyson v6 did the trick every time, and with the Max Mode for additional suction, I was sold. It cleared the lot! Here’s a little video of me doing a spot of hoovering – this is coffee.

The best thing about the Dyson v6 was how you can use it on most surfaces and change the attachments easily. There’s also a handy docking station where you can charge the machine, as well as store all the attachments. Otherwise you can just plug it in to charge.

Things we learnt – the Dyson engineers print off 3D plastic models for their new designs so that they can try them out and make any modifications before it goes into production.

As for emptying the contents, there’s a button you press (which isn’t easy, so you can’t do it by mistake) – making sure you have it over the bin of course – and it’s a simple straightforward disposal.

Then there’s the filters. They can be washed, left to dry and used forever. This is why I love Dyson, because the only thing we’ve ever had to buy since owning one was a new filter (because I keep forgetting to wash it from time to time – it’s a cotton one). If you look on the picture below, the v6 filter is the blue circular shape on the top of the machine – the extra filter is the one pointed out.

The machine itself fits together easily and logically. I’m the kind of person who doesn’t bother reading instructions unless I absolutely have to, and didn’t have any problem with the Dyson v6.

We were also shown the impressive Dyson v6 Absolute, which has an extra filter to help people with allergies (like me!) – the air it filters out is cleaner than the air we breathe. If I had the money to buy one I’d definitely consider this with my allergies, and H is a sneezy child too. All the Dyson v6 have twice the amount of suction of any other handheld vacuums out there. We tried so many different surfaces and I’m impressed. The fact you don’t need to change heads for different surfaces and it still works is a good thing, especially with a bad back like mine!

What sells the Dyson v6 for me is that I can use it as an upright cleaner or a handheld. While it will never replace our old Dyson, I’m impressed with how easily it picks up everything. The extra tools make it a very adaptable vacuum cleaner.

I was invited to the Dyson Showrooms to view the vacuums, all opinions are my own. If you want to find other posts from bloggers at the event, search for the hashtag #NoCordsAttached – thank you to Joe Bloggs Network and Currys for the invite. You can buy the Dyson v6 at Currys via this link.