This invention relates to vacuum cleaners and more particularly to a safety or protective device for those cleaners having a belt driven agitator brush roller assembly.
Upright vacuum cleaners and power nozzle attachments for canister type vacuum cleaners include a rotatable brush roller assembly generally having a beater bar for effective cleaning of the floor covering. In the known cleaner and attachments of this type the brush rollers are driven by a rubber belt connected over a spindle of the output shaft of a universal motor. If for some reason the brush roller should become jammed and stops rotating, the torque of the rotating motor causes its rotating spindle to slip on the now substantially station-ary belt. The frictional forces on the belt effects a heating and excessive wear condition resulting shortly in a rupture of the belt. Since jamming of the brush roller can be caused by hair, twine or the like becoming entangled about the brush roller bearings, or by picking up cloth, clothing or other articles that can become wedged between the brush and chassis or about the bearings, the belt breakage problem is one that has plagued the vacuum cleaner industry for some time.