polly.walker

I am thinking of buying a swimming pool robot to clean the pool. Lazy I know, but it's a task I just don't relish anymore as the older I get the more arthristis seems to hinder me.

Can anyone recommend a good one that goes up the pool walls to the waters edge.

Thanks

jdr

You will struggle to get it to go up the slope let alone up the walls.

snikpoh

... I've never heard of one that climbs the walls as well

For a robot to work properly you need a certain pressure of water. We tried one on our pool and it just wouldn't move - I thought our pressure was good but clearly not.

Why not see if you can borrow someone else's first to see if it works.

fionamw

I was giving this one some consideration earlier in the summer and never got round to it. A friend had, and swears by it. I thought they worked on pressure through the skimmers? ... oh, and yes you can get them to go up the sides I believe, a friend had one at his place in France but that was an all singing all dancing probably four figure sum version! The one from the ferreteria here is less than €100.
Borrowing first sounds a very sensible plan.

snikpoh

Absolutely correct. We have a mighty pump but I think it may be down to the size of pipes going to the skimmers.

fionamw

So if you don't go down the route of borrowing first, what pressure do you need to see on the filter thingy or isn't that the way of telling?

Fred James

I have one. It's a Zodiac and cost about €500. It attaches to the dedicated vacuum line or if you don't have one of those then it would go through the skimmers using whatever attachment you use for normal pool cleaning.

It works fine and does climb up the sides. You do need a slight curve in the join between the sides and the bottom to get the best from it but frankly the sides shouldn't need much cleaning anyway.

I gave up using it after a few months. At that time our road was unmade and it was covered in very fine dust almost like cement. It was a real pain. The cleaner sucked it up OK but it was so fine most of it went back through the filter into the pool. I wondered why the water was never crystal clear!

I then started to always vacuum to waste using the normal brush on the end of a pole with the vacuum tube. That worked fine. We have plenty of cheap water so topping it up isn't an issue. They have made up the road since and dust is only a minor problem so I have never got back to using it.

The other problem is that it stays in the pool all the time and that doesn't look nice and it gets in the way if you are swimming.

So, essentialy it works fine but I can't be bothered with it. I only vacuum the pool about every 3-4 weeks and the biggest problem is leaves which I scoop out with a big net in a few minutes.

polly.walker

Thanks for that Fred. Are you intending to use the vac again at sometime?? If not would you consider selling it??

Fred James

Will PM you.