Thanks Madrat, good advice, I'm certainly considering sending back to Dyson. I'm really checking 2 things before though.
1. Is the rubber strip meant to be like that?
2. Is there an easy fix, or has someone else experience with a similar problem? Maybe I have missed something simple that would make it silly to go through packing up the whole thing and sending it back to Dyson and all the hassle that comes with.