The Renaissance dismantled. It was a little dusty in there, so of course I took the opportunity to clean and disinfect it.
Underneath the white lever on the cord winder is a little wheel, which, when dirty, can possibly cause cord winder problems such as the one I was having. I simply cleaned the wheel with a q-tip, reassembled everything, and lo and behold, it solved the problem. I hope it doesn't occur again, at least for a while, but its not a huge problem to fix it again. If it continues to be problematic, I'll replace the entire cord winder.
As can be seen, the Renaissance has a single stage/fan motor. Note also the plastic box-like cover over the rest of the motor.
The Renaissance exhaust system. When this plug is pushed down, as I'm doing here, the vent is closed off and the exhaust redirects upwards (i.e. into the hose for blowing). When in normal position, the exhaust blows out through the vent, over the motor, and out through the attachment compartment. I always wondered what this configuration was like, and now I know. Presumably brothers Renaissance C104H and Epic 8000 are the same.
Incidentally, I hadn't dismantled any of my vacuums for a long time, until today. It's good to get back into the guts of things, so to speak.