Customer Reviews

BISSELL Little Green ProHeat Turbo Carpet Cleaner, 1425B

5 star:		(105)
4 star:		(43)
3 star:		(23)
2 star:		(27)
1 star:		(50)

 

 

I heavily researched before buying this model. I was attracted by the heater and turbo brush, and I read many positive reviews. It works great on carpet cleaning, however, within three uses the trigger 'jammed up.' When I took it to a Bissell repair shop (a very reputable vacumn repair shop) I was told that the cleaner burns onto the heater each time it's used, causing it to stop spraying. He recommended that it be flushed through with hot water after each use and stored without the fill/empty canisters. Otherwise, it would continue to break. He also said that the heater only adds about 10 degrees so it's a minimal benefit. He strongly encouraged me to return the model for a basic unit (1400) which is ... cheaper. He repairs all brands and encouraged me to purchase the Hoover SteamVac Jr. instead. He rairly encounters problems with their model, but sees many Bissells.
I purchased one and have used it once. I really love it. It works as well as the Bissell (both clean extremely well) but is easier to operate. I no longer have to 'flush' the system each time I use it (who has time for that?). With two little ones, purchasing a portable steam cleaner is a must; Bissell and Hoover make excellent choices (but stay away from the heater units)
I hope this is helpful.

Before I got this carpet cleaner, I bought the cordless Bissell Spot Lifter. I sent the Spot Lifter back because it would work only 5 minutes before you had to recharge the battery (12 hours). Even though Little Green isn't cordless, it is small and lightweight and works incredibly well.
We had old pet stains on our cream colored carpeting and since we got the Little Green, we've been able to get all of them up from the carpet. Whenever our dog creates other messes, we're able to take the cleaner out right away and clean it up without having to go through too many steps to get the Little Green ready for use. I would recommend this to anyone, especially those with pets and small children -- I don't know why I didn't get this months before -- its made a huge difference in the look of our carpet and well worth the price.

As others have stated - it works well when it works. I was really happy with the way it cleaned. I especially liked the turbo brush. But when I went to use it for only the second time the sprayer wouldn't work - a frequent complaint I understand. You don't have to be particularly handy to fix it. You need a screw driver, a pair of pliers and a paper clip. Unplug the machine. Take the four screws from the top out. Pull the top up. Underneath you will see a black box with 4 screws - undo. Underneath the cover is heater box. Lift up and undo the 5 screws on the bottom. You will see what is causing the problem. You don't need to disconnect the wires. Release the clamps holding the plastic tubes with the pliers and gently remove the tubes. Use the paper clip, opened, to clean out the holes in the heater. It did not take long at all.

Folks, it isn't so much a design flaw, rather its as much a problem with the chemistry. Jets only get clogged if soap solutions are too concentrated, the water used is dirty, or some chemistry conspires to build up lime or sludge.

I have a proheat clearview upright... used it for over 3 years now. Noticed the spray wasn't as zippy for the past two years as I seemed to recall when we first bought it. Tonight, it wouldn't spray at all. Thought: bad belt, but the belt was fine. Thought: clogged sprayers (these are a bit larger than on your model), but they both were fine. Traced the lack of pressure all the way to the heater block in the neck of the beast. Called Bissell and a really nice rep kindly told me they aren't allowed to sell me that heater block. Something about insurance (blame your neighbors who are all to happy to sue at the drop of a hat -- none of us here are that shallow, are we?)

Anyway -- one of you told the story of the repair guy taking the heater apart. I never would have thought they made the thing servicable -- but sure enough! I removed the heater carefully, marking all of the wire colors and which hose was which, flipped it over to find 7 screws holding a bottom plate. Carefully removed them so as not to damage the silicon seal or the 5 littel o-rings, took a toothbrush and scrubbed the soap goo out of the channels... one of the nozzles was choked closed, but a pipe cleaner and some patience got it looking nearly new. Carefully screwed it back together, tightening evenly -- rebuilt the beast and it's cleaning like it hasn't in years. Probably piss off Bissell service shops by telling this, but maybe the handier of you will benefit.

My husband is not the "chore type" so when he came home with this machine and set it up, I assumed he would leave it for me to do the actual work of cleaning up the many spots on our carpet. Imagine my surprise when he spent the next hour on his knees searching out every little stain and spill he could find in our four bedroom house -- and attacking it. It truly is satisfying to see those stains disappear (even the oldest ones) with so little effort. For some time, I had been loath to call the carpet cleaners, since all they really do is pitch unwanted services, and, since their last visit, we had owned two dogs in rapid succession. You can imagine. Then there was the miracle it worked on the carpet areas of my minivan that aren't covered by mats. It even got the red drink up. I'm sold!

After doing my research into carpet cleaners, I bought the bissell little green pro heat thinking that it looked like a great product. The heating option sounded great to me, hot water meant cleaner results right? Well, After having it for only one year, I have had to have it REPAIRED THREE TIMES! And after getting to watch the repairman take it apart and fix it he showed me exactly what was wrong with it. There is a metal box that the water passes through to heat it and if you use any soap in the water, the soap gets too hot and gums it up. Whe the repairman opened this box up, it was full of jelly like goo. This clogs up the sprayer, and you get no spray. It has to be taken completly apart to be fixed.It is VERY FRUSTRAITING! This happened three times to me, even after making sure I used only clean, filtered, plain water. The repairman said that he has had to repair several with the same problem. I suggest you buy another brand, or one without the heater. It has only been a source of frustration!

I have an older Bissell model called Little Green Deluxe which I have used successfully for pet stain removal. The various tools have become difficult to remove from my old machine so I just purchased the new Proheat Turbo--I always assume new is better but in this case it is not.

The brush on the turbo just isn't stiff enough. I think there should be a stiff brush for carpets that can take a beating and a softer one for upholstery. The stain I cleaned seems to have been partially removed but some parts look brighter and lighter than others--perhaps the cleaning solution has been improved. However, the heater doesn't do much. Bissell customer service claims the heater will add 25 degrees to the heat of the water/solution mix you add to the input container. Oddly enough the instruction book says you can leave unused solution in the container and ready to go but in talking to a customer representative I was told NOT to do that because the heater will only heat cold water to 25 degrees. They recommended I pour the solution in a different container and heat it in my microwave (but do not boil) and then pour it back into the Bissell input container. Furthermore they suggest you keep unused water/solution mixture in a jar and never in the Bissell container if you will not be using it immediately.

The reason I called customer service is that the second time I used the unit (within a few days of first use), the nozzle had clogged. Easily unclogged with a pin but I never had this happen with my old unit. Instructions say that if the unit doesn't spray the nozzle could be clogged but does not tell you how to unclog it. I got through to customer service right away but was thinking that if this was Sunday when they are closed I would not be able to resolve this issue immediately--best to have had those instructions in the manual.

I also notice that there has been no improvement to the way the tools attach to the hose part. They snap together much like a vaccuum but in time my old unit has become very hard to push the little button down to release the tool from the hose. I have resorted to using the back of a spoon or anything else I can think of to depress this little piece of plastic. I have tried petroleum jelly around the connections hoping it would make the release easier but that did not help. I am talking about an older unit but don't understand why the new one has no improvement in this area.

The suction on the Little Green Proheat is not great--even on my older unit I have wanted better suction power. I was using the turbo brush on a tightly woven garage carpet and could not understand why it just was not sucking up the dirty water. When I finally gave up on the job and took the machine to the kitchen sink to clean it up I discovered the turbo brush water intake area was clogged with dog hair even though I had thoroughly vaccuumed the area before using the Proheat. This is not a problem experienced with my older unit but then it doesn't have a turbo brush and the intake area of dirty water on the regular brush seems to have a larger opening. I guess I should have resumed the suctioning once I discovered the dog hair but by that time I was done with this whole thing and proceeded to empty the containers and clean the unit.

Cleaning the Proheat is no easy chore. A great improvement would be a completely detachable hose. Be sure that the hose end is hanging in your sink or you will have dirty water on the floor, countertop and maybe on you. I looked into the hose and saw clumps of wet dog hair so I ran water into the hose to see if I could flush it out. That worked but it also flushed out a lot of yucky stuff into the area formerly occupied by the bottom of the dirty water tank so that created another mess. There is also an area where I could see more guck but couldn't reach it--kept probing with my fingers and wishing this machine came apart and could be properly cleaned out since once the guck dries it might really be stuck in there. Many water flushings later I think I got most or all of clumped dog hair and guck out--not easy to lift the machine and shake it upside down over the sink. No matter how many paper towels I used, I could not get all the remaining sand out of the area where the base of the dirty water tank sits. After it dried overnight I was able to vaccuum up the remaining sand with another machine. More time was spent on cleaning the Proheat than using it.

Although this machine looks "cool" and it is nice to see the water levels in the tanks, you cannot stand those bottles up when they have liquid in them. This is minor but I had an occasion where I wanted to set the container down and didn't have it capped yet and that is not possible (phone rings at the worse times).

I expected Bissell to have made a much better product and I don't think there's much else currently on the market for quick spot cleaning of home carpets or car interiors. The idea of this machine is great--a useful product for many people but this machine needs better design, more suction power, perhaps real "steam", detachable hose, improved tool to hose connection and easier to clean would be on my want list.

Until improvements are made I will use my older model and take this new one back to the store.

If you've read the majority of the reviews for this product you'll notice there is a consistent problem with the sprayer clogging and no longer working. Here's how to fix it. We originally bought the machine a year and a half ago and it quit spraying after only 2 uses. Bissell replaces it under warranty but the bad thing is that your "new" Little Green is only warranteed for the the rest of the time left on the original one you bought. Of course our replacement quit spraying as well until today when my husband figured out how to fix it. Get some liquid CLR Calcium Lime Rust Remover or Lime-Away product and pour straight into the clean water solution tank. Fill only to about 3/4 of an inch of the CLR in the tank, then turn on the Little Green and push the sprayer button. It will immediately begin spraying again. Let it sit for about 10 minutes, then run the rest of the CLR through. Then run through a tank or two of clean water. The problem is the phosphates in your water that clog the sprayer line. This should get rid of the clogs. I would also follow the advice of running through some clean water before storing your Little Green. Other than the sprayer problem the Little Green is very effective at carpet stains and cleaning.

It should be understood that are TWO models of this unit. One has heat and the other doesn't with a considerable price differences. I feel the added price is worth getting the heated unit which can clean better and comes with a better cleaning Turbo brush.

The unit is very good for small to medium spots on carpets and furniture and in some case without a clean solution (just water) in the holding tank.

The unit works basically works like a small wet and dry shop vacuum but compacted with brush and heated water/solution applicator.

For what you're expecting to get out of unit, I can not find anything really bad to say about this unit.

Because of the way the water/solution holding tank connects to the machine at the bottom of the holding tank and completing the seal with just an O-ring. I would expect this to leak at some point in time.

Would I buy this unit if I had to do it again, YES.

I bought this one after my 2nd Hoover SteamVac Jr. had a broken part. Granted, we have cats and an old dog in the house, so there is a lot of cleaning for the little Vac. Still, I was tired of having to replace the steam vac. So I decided to try the Little Green machine.

Compared with the Hoover Jr (which is by no means a super machine), this machine does a POOR job vaccumming up the liquid it sprays out. It leaves carpet and other surfaces practically wet. But that is not what bothers me most.

This machine is designed in such a way that one is bound to spill the nasty yuck one vaccums up. Part of the reason is that the bottom of the dirty reservoir leaks. Then the dirty liquid reservoir is designed with an opening on top (why???) and if one is not extra careful, that nasty stuff inside will spill out with the slightest tilt. It is exasperating how easy it is to spill the dirty liquid.

This machine is not worth the trouble. I am going to get another Hoover SteamVac Jr.