The stick vacuum is a relevantly recent invention, first introduced by Dyson with their impressive and innovative DC16 in 2006. They managed to carve out a significant share of the vacuum cleaner market by serving a purpose that traditional, heavier vacuums were not really up to. This purpose is to perform quick, light cleans on a regular basis.
The Henry range of vacuum cleaners have traditionally been strong, tough, durable but also heavy machines with large dust capacities. Therefore, the HenryQuick is quite a step away from their traditional offering, aiming to provide a solution for homeowners who want to quickly nip around the home, performing a quick spring-clean, without having to carry a heavy machine around and being bothered by a cumbersome cord.
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If you like the idea of performing quick, regular cleans and if you aren’t too keen on lugging a heavy machine around your home, this is a great fit for you. From what I can tell, you really aren’t sacracificing anything in terms of vacuuming ability. The price tag, however, is still double that of the original, cannister Henry, so if cost is an issue, I would opt for that machine instead.
James Cook - Product Tester at The Henry Range
Henry Quick is not a heavy-duty vacuum cleaner. If you are looking for a machine to use in a commercial setting, or one that can be used to perform a deep-clean of your entire house in one go, this probably isn’t the vacuum cleaner for you. However, if you like the idea of a stick vacuum with good battery life and excellent suction power, with attachments that make it versatile too, then read on. The HenryQuick retains all of the durability and practical design features of the original Henry and it certainly is worthy of the iconic name.
What’s the difference between HenryQuick and Henry?
Henry Quick is quite a different machine, compared with the original Henry. Firstly and perhaps most obviously, Henry gets his power through a cable that plugs directly into a wall socket. This means that with him, you are dealing with a trailing cable as you vacuum around your home. With HenryQuick, you don’t have to worry about tripping up or changing sockets, as you run out of reach. The classic Henry is much heavier (4.3 kg heavier) but he also has a much larger dust capacity (6 litres compared with HenryQuick‘s 1 litre). Furthermore, the original Henry runs of mains power at 240 V and HenryQuick‘s battery has 25.2 V of power. Lastly, HenryQuick is a lot quieter than Henry when it is running.
These two vacuums in the Henry range have been designed for different purposes. The original Henry is a workhorse, but he is heavy and a little cumbersome. HenryQuick‘s main selling point is that it is light and convenient, ideal for quick cleans and for those with any strength or mobility issues. It can also be very easily transformed into a vacuum that can be operated with a single hand, without the wand.
However, the elephant in the room, when comparing these two machines, is the price. HenryQuick is double the price of the original Henry. You will have to make up your mind as to whether the advantages, and disadvantages, I will lay out in this review are worth this extra expenditure.
Unboxing
The box that HenryQuick was fairly small and compact, but the contents were certainly not sparse. Contained within were the the main floor head, the wand, main handle (which houses the dust bag and motor), battery, the plug for the battery, crevice tool, combination tool, 6 x pods (dust bags) and lastly a wall-mounted bracket and a small scented disc.
Assembling HenryQuick for Upright Use
To assemble HenryQuick, all I had to do was first load one of the dust pods into the handle. Next, I clipped the battery into it housing in the handle. Then, I clipped one end of the wand into the floor head and the other into the handle. I wasn’t completely sure whether the battery was already charged but once I pressed the power button, I was pleased to hear the reassuring sound of the motor running and the LED display indicated that I had full charge.
The whole process took a couple of minutes and it was compltely intuitive, I didn’t even look at the instructions.
Assembling HenryQuick for Handheld Use
One of the main selling points of this vacuum is the fact that it can be used as an upright or handheld. To assemble for handheld use, all I had to do was unclip the handle from the wand and then replace it with either the combination tool or crevice tool (the two attachments that you are supplied with for handheld vacuuming). This whole process of switching took less than 10 seconds.
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The Battery
Henry Quick uses a 25.2 V lithium ion battery that fits snugly underneath the handle. To charge it, all I had to do was unclip from the handle and plug into a power socket using the plug provided. The battery came fully charged and it lasted me 15 minues on HenryQuick‘s high setting and 60 minutes on it’s regular power setting (more on those settings later). In terms of how long it took to charge up, it took me 2.4 hours.
Now because all lithium ion batteries will naturally degrade over time, the fact that HenryQuick‘s battery is removable is a really positive feature. This is because you won’t have to replace the entire machine in a few years time. Instead, you can save money by simply purchasing a new battery. Additionally, it is much more convenient being able to charge the battery up on a bedside table or kitchen worktop, instead of having to plug the whole machine into a power socket.
Power
Henry Quick has two power settings – a default mode and a boost mode. The small silver button on the top of the handle turns the motor on and HenryQuick automatically starts on his default power setting. In this default mode, you can expect up to an hour of cleaning time, which is pretty impressive considering the relatively small size of the battery. For those more intense cleaning jobs, the boost mode is a nice feature to have, but I actually found it quite unecessary and the default mode was more than adequate. The button with the plus symbol engages boost mode but if turned on, the battery will drain in just 15 mintes.
The 1 hour of cleaning time that default power mode offers is more than enough to vacuum my entire house, which took me perhaps 30 minutes. Therefore, HenryQuick gets top marks from me on its battery run time.
Dust Bags and Capacity
The way that HenryQuick stores dust and dirt is quite different from the rest of the upright stick vacuums on the market. It utilises the same method for dust storage that all of the machines in the Henry range use, which is a dust bag. This is a far cleaner and effective way of both storing and disposing of detritis, because there are no nasty filters to clean or compartments to manually pour into your bin. The bags are called pods and have a capacity of 1 litre, which lasted me 3 weeks of regular vacuuming.
When the dust pod is full, a clever flap over the opening prevents and of the dust and dirt from escaping, as you carry it to your outside bin for disposal. The whole process of changing pods is very clean, simple and quick.
Storage
Henry Quick comes with a wall-mounted bracket, that it can be clipped into, or easy vertical storage. In my home, the most convenient space (that will still out of the way) was underneath my stairs, next to our shoe rack. Once I had drilled some holes and screwed the bracket onto the wall, I found it to be very easy to access it and then store him away. On the underside of the wall mount is a double-barrell shaped tool storage, which allows you to slide in and store the two attachments.
Storage is a major advantage that HenryQuick has over the other vacuums in the Henry range, which are all quite large and not particularly easy to store, without disassembly. With HenryQuick, as long as you have a similar space with enough verticle room, you don’t have to disassemble anything.
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Attachments and what they’re for
Floor Head
The motorised floor head is the tool that I used for the majority of my vacuuming with the HenryQuick. It contains a rotating brush roll, which can be turned on or off using a button on top of the motor. I tended to switch the brush roll on when I was vacuuming my carpets, where hair and dirt tends to stick quite stubbornly.
At the front of the floor head is a strip of red fabric, which acts as a buffer, preventing damage to your items of furniture, as well as the floor head itself. The small red lever to the left of the floor head is a vent, which allows you to reduce the suction power slightly, which is handy for lightweight rugs or ery thick carpets. This vent means you can quickly move between different floor types and adjust the suction as you go.
I used to own a Vax cordless and one of the most annoying things about it was how I was required to unscrew three miniature screws each time I had to cut out hair from the brush roll. However, with this floor head, you don’t have to remove any screws at all. Instead, all that is required is to press the red button (just above the air vent) and pull out the brush roll, read for cleaning. I cannot overstate enough how much I love this design feature.
I found the motorised floor to have good performance on both hard floors and carpets. I tried using it with the brush bar turned off but the results didn’t seem very good, so I think you really do you have to use the brush bar to make it effective for carpets. After approximately 15 minutes of use there was a fair amount of hair wrapped around the brush roll, which showed me that it was picking up pretty well. However, the task that follows (cutting out the hair with a pair of scissors) is not something that you have to do with a more powerful, regular cannister vacuum that doesn’t use a brush roll.
The motorised floor head can either be attached to the wand, allowing you to vacuum as you stand upright, or it can clip directly into the handle, which is really handy for cleaning stair treads (more on that later). This is a nice design feature that increases the vacuum’s overall versatility and usefulness.
With the motorised floor head attached to the wand, HenryQuick has a fantastic reach underneath objects that are high enough for its relatively flat floor head to reach under. I was able to reach easily half way underneath our double bed, finishing off the remaining carpet from the other side.
Combination Tool
The combination tool has been designed to tackle upholstered items, including car seats, chairs and curtains. It is the roughly the same width as the upholstery brush that comes with the majority of vacuums in the Henry range. What I really like about the combination tool is the fact that the brush bar can slide down to cover the circumference of the tool, which is great for when you want to dust more delicate items such as lamp shades, ceiling fans, picture frames and shelving.
Crevice Tool
The crevice tool is almost identical to the tool of the same name that comes with the Henry, Hetty, James, Charles etc. It is long and thin in shape and is designed to funnell all of the suction power through a very tight gap, which is ideal for those nooks and crannies such as down the sides of your sofa, car seats and along your skirting boards.
Both the combination tool and crevice tool can also clip directly on to the wand, meaning you can reach cobwebs and perform high level dusting.
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Performance
I was really curious to see not only how HenryQuick performed on hard and soft floors, but crucially how it compared to the much cheaper original Henry. The corded, cannister Henry vacuum has a lot more suction power, but it is also lacking a rotating brush roll. So, does the brush roll make up for this loss of suction in the HenryQuick? In the comparison below, HenryQuick is on the left and Henry is on the right.
Carpets
For this test on carpets, I used the contents of the HenryQuick, that I had collected from a couple of weeks of vacuuming. It included general detritis, including mainly dust and hair.
Carpet Cleaning Before and After (1 stroke up and 1 stroke down)
The HenryQuick is on the left and the original Henry is on the right. HenryQuick was used on his default setting (not on boost mode). For this test I stroked once upwards and once back downwards.
I was quite surprised by the results on this test, with the Henry Quick coming out on top. Both machines did very well, but it seems that the rotating brush roll in the HenryQuick not only makes up for the reduction in suction power that this vacuum has over the Henry, it even surpasses it. If you look closely, you can see some debris remaining on the carpet in front of the classic Henry, whereas HenryQuick left absolutely nothing on the carpet after only one stroke up and one stroke down. Impressive results!
Hard Floors
Lets repeat this experiment on the hard laminate flooring in my kitchen.
Carpet Cleaning Before and After (1 stroke up and 1 stroke down)
Once again, the HenryQuick is on the left and the original Henry is on the right. HenryQuick was used on his default setting (not on boost mode) with the rotating brush bar off. For this test I stroked once upwards and once back downwards.
There was no clear winner on hard floors, with both the HenryQuick and Henry performing very well.
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Stair Cleaning with HenryQuick
One of the major disadvantages of the original cannister Henry is just how inconovenient it is for stair cleaning, due to its awkward shape and heavy weight. HenryQuick is a breath of fresh air in this department, and this makes it fantastic for stair cleaaning. My first instinct was to attach the motorised floor head directly to the handle, because I wanted the power of that rotating brush bar.
I was very pleased with the results on the treads and the machine itself, in handheld mode (without the wand) was light enough to carry in just one hand. The floor head didn’t quite reach the corners of the treads however, for which I used the crevice tool. This is the first time that I noticed the illumination lights on the front of the floor head, which is a welcome vacuuming aid.
Car Cleaning with HenryQuick
As the weather has started to improve, our family have found ourselves making quite a few trips in the car over the last few weeks. With two young children making up our number, this inevitably leads to a mass of crumbs, half-eaten sandwiches and mud building up all over the seats and footwells. Therefore, there couldn’t be a more perfect time to test out HenryQuick‘s car cleaning capabilities.
Firstly, it was very convenient not having to plug a cable in and stretch it across our drive, particuarly because we get quite a few people walking past and I usually worry about the cord getting in their way. I decided to use the machine in boost mode, and I was pleased with the results. I predominantly used the combination tool with the brush bar extended, which was great at removing dust from the seats and crumbs from the kids card seats in the back, as well as cleaning the dashboard and the air vents. In boost mode, HenryQuick is noticeably more powerful and the cleaning results were very good.
The crevice tool also came in handy for reaching down the side of the car seats, where I usually can’t even fit my hand to manually pluck out bits of detritis. Both of these attachments were very useful for car cleaning and I give the HenryQuick top marks overall.
Henry Quick is a very fine example of an upright stick vacuum, that has been designed with practicality in mind. It feels solid, tough and durable and it performed very well at all of the everyday vacuuming tasks that I threw at it. The battery life is impressive (1 hour) and, unlike previous stick vacuums that I have owned in the past, it does not need to be used on its high (boost) setting to get good results.
I was surprised to see how well the motorised floor head performed on carpets. Indeed, even better than the classic Henry‘s combi floor tool. There is the downside of having to manually clean the brush roll to consider, but this task has been made easier by the clever quick release feature.
So who is HenryQuick best suited to? If you like the idea of performing quick, regular cleans and if you aren’t too keen on lugging a heavy machine around your home, this is a great fit for you. From what I can tell, you really aren’t sacracificing anything in terms of vacuuming ability. The price tag, however, is still double that of the original, cannister Henry, so if cost is an issue, I would opt for that machine instead. However, it is still worth bearing in mind that HenryQuick is half the price of the likes of the comparable Dyson 15.
James Cook is an expert of the range of Numatic Henry vacuum cleaners from the UK. Having reviewed all of the Numatic vacuum cleaners over the course of the last 6 years, James is highly experienced at helping you choose the right model for your specific needs. His work has been featured in major publications such as Helping.co.uk, TheWhoot.com and Simplemost.com. Visit our About Us page for more information regarding James. Alternatively, you can contact him on Linkedin.
