David Farber wrote:
The model number is 113.179255.

A picture of the filter is he
http://webpages.charter.net/mrfixiter/index.html


The nut you see at the top of the picture won't budge. Thus, I cannot
remove the filter. I called Sears and they said it should come off
easily without any tools. The vacuum is less than a year old and only
used a couple of times. I don't think I ever removed the filter
before. You can see how mangled that plastic nut is now after trying
every tool the in drawer to remove it. (Why would they use a plastic
nut?) I must be missing something really obvious. One other thing I
should mention, the owners manual shows the parts blow up which
includes a "filter nut lever." I didn't see anything like that
attached to or near the nut.
Thanks for your replies.

Is there any chance the the whole end turns to loosen it?