I have to give a huge thumbs up to the PoolCleaner as well. Their customer service is outstanding. I have had a 2x for 6 years now with a variable speed pump. The suction cleaner will run with the pump at moderate speeds. I have manual valves on the skimmer line and the dedicated suction line so that I can adjust the flow through the cleaner. I usually leave the suction line full open and cut the skimmer line down by about 1/3 to get the cleaner running well. I have to admit that the cleaning was not the best for me but it worked well enough and I lived with it. I just called Poolvergnuegen because I had a major repair needed and they offered to let me ship it directly to them for repair since my original pool contractor who installed it screwed me over and then closed up shop. When I discussed the full situation with them, they realized that I really need a 2x cleaner and needed it all along (yet another thing this contractor did wrong). The Poolvergnuegen customer service team is really going out of their way to make me, an end-user, whole again. I am not sure I have ever had customer service this good from any manufacturer ever. This is unheard of.
Please recommend a new pool cleaner for a newbie
- Thread starter Galun
- Start date
susa
0
>> Your info is little off
agreed ... Paid no tax and bargained the price down a little, ordered a Pentair IntelliWand at the same time from them to keep track of diagnostics history data for the SWCG
agreed ... Paid no tax and bargained the price down a little, ordered a Pentair IntelliWand at the same time from them to keep track of diagnostics history data for the SWCG
susa
0
>>.. have had a 2x for 6 years now with a variable speed pump.
>>.. they realized that I really need a 2x cleaner and needed it all along
am a happy poolvergnuegen (..plus entire extended family being slowly converted over, now at 3+ pools..) user also but it was not clear from your writing if you had some other model and their customer service helped you to update/upgrade something or some component? did you mean to write you had a 4x and now they helped you to a 2x model?
>>.. they realized that I really need a 2x cleaner and needed it all along
am a happy poolvergnuegen (..plus entire extended family being slowly converted over, now at 3+ pools..) user also but it was not clear from your writing if you had some other model and their customer service helped you to update/upgrade something or some component? did you mean to write you had a 4x and now they helped you to a 2x model?
This IS confusing. Let me try to make this clear: I had a 2x for 6 years. It was not optimal for my pool. I did not get the coverage I should have. Recently, I needed a large repair on the cleaner and I called Poolvergnuegen directly and discussed everything with them and they got the pool measurements etc. It does turn out that I needed a 4x cleaner all along and the original pool contractor had made an error in spec'ing the 2x (one of many errors...look in my previous posts for the full story). Poolvergnuegen's customer service discussed everything on the phone with me. In my case, since my original supplier is now out of business and was somewhat incompetent, Poolvergnuegen made the call to help directly as the end-user. They took in my 2x to make repairs on my unit and also to make it work like a 4x (they have some way of doing that in-house with changes to cams). In the end, after inspecting it, it was decided that too much needed replacing/repairing after 6 years. They offered to either do the repairs or help me to properly upgrade to the 4x. They clearly explained pros and cons but did not pressure me either way. I chose the second option which is an upgrade to a 4x. It is on its way to me. The entire process took less than a week turnaround. Most end-users would go through a contractor or distributor for service. The distributor in turn either does repairs in-house or sends the units to Poolvergnuegen for larger repairs. You can rest-assured that your contractor or distributor will get great service from Poolvergnuegen. They have spent a lot of time on me, an end-user, and I have found the experience with them to be top-notch. I'll provide an update on the 4x when I get it.
susa
0
Just an update on what I decided to do.
I decided to put in automation because I am pretty sure we will go solar in the future, so I might as well put the automation in place. I will take chem geek's suggestion and re-plumb my current pressure cleaner line into a suction cleaner line, then use a valve to divert all flow to the line to drive the cleaner.
As for the cleaner, I bought the MX-8. The net cost after rebate is $329, but I will have to buy a suction vacuum cover for my cleaner line (it is included with the pool cleaner), so the price really isn't that different from the 4 wheel pool cleaner The local leslie's had an MX-8 on display and I took it apart to look at the internals. It seemed like less moving parts mean less potential to break - this was the major deciding factor over the pool cleaner. I also looked at how the vacuum worked, and in theory it seems to be able to chop up larger soft debris into smaller pieces better than the pool cleaner. I was quite curious in how this would work in real life, and decided to give it a try. If it turns out that the MX-8 cannot handle the debris of my pool, I will sell it probably for a slight loss and buy the pool cleaner.
If everything goes according to plan, all this goes in this weekend, and I will report back on my findings.
Thanks for all the help!
I decided to put in automation because I am pretty sure we will go solar in the future, so I might as well put the automation in place. I will take chem geek's suggestion and re-plumb my current pressure cleaner line into a suction cleaner line, then use a valve to divert all flow to the line to drive the cleaner.
As for the cleaner, I bought the MX-8. The net cost after rebate is $329, but I will have to buy a suction vacuum cover for my cleaner line (it is included with the pool cleaner), so the price really isn't that different from the 4 wheel pool cleaner The local leslie's had an MX-8 on display and I took it apart to look at the internals. It seemed like less moving parts mean less potential to break - this was the major deciding factor over the pool cleaner. I also looked at how the vacuum worked, and in theory it seems to be able to chop up larger soft debris into smaller pieces better than the pool cleaner. I was quite curious in how this would work in real life, and decided to give it a try. If it turns out that the MX-8 cannot handle the debris of my pool, I will sell it probably for a slight loss and buy the pool cleaner.
If everything goes according to plan, all this goes in this weekend, and I will report back on my findings.
Thanks for all the help!
Everything is installed successfully.
The MX-8 seemed to work well at 20-25gpm flow rate. It does a pretty good job climbing up walls - there were many instances where it went right up to the water line. It had problems getting on the steps in my pool. The sweep pattern looks pretty random.
On debris, as expected it had problems with large leaves, but my Polaris booster pump pressure cleaner had problems with those leaves as well. I was fairly impressed with how it handled bushy leaves. In theory the MX-8 chops up the leaves into smaller chunks, and it does do that. It doesn't chop up everything right away, but after a pass I see some leaves torn away from the main branch.
It does a good job picking up small stuff. I had the choice of plumbing the cleaner line as pressure or suction. Ultimately I decided on suction as I thought scooping up big stuff is easier than picking up small stuff, plus the skimmer will hopefully get most of the big stuff before they sink, so I'd want to optimize the performance of picking up small stuff.
The Intelliflo tells me I am using about 500 - 550 watts per hour. I think my cleaner line is only 1 inch OD pipe so flow is restricted. In order to get 20 gpm I need to run the pump at 2200rpm. But even then, the old booster pump used almost 3x that amount.
By my calculation I now use 2.8kW to run the skimmer 2 hours, cleaner 2 hours, and low speed circulation for 9 hours to get a turn. My old setup of 6 hours at single speed and 2 hours with booster used 13.3kW. Still need to wait for an electric bill to confirm the savings, but it certainly looks promising so far.
The MX-8 seemed to work well at 20-25gpm flow rate. It does a pretty good job climbing up walls - there were many instances where it went right up to the water line. It had problems getting on the steps in my pool. The sweep pattern looks pretty random.
On debris, as expected it had problems with large leaves, but my Polaris booster pump pressure cleaner had problems with those leaves as well. I was fairly impressed with how it handled bushy leaves. In theory the MX-8 chops up the leaves into smaller chunks, and it does do that. It doesn't chop up everything right away, but after a pass I see some leaves torn away from the main branch.
It does a good job picking up small stuff. I had the choice of plumbing the cleaner line as pressure or suction. Ultimately I decided on suction as I thought scooping up big stuff is easier than picking up small stuff, plus the skimmer will hopefully get most of the big stuff before they sink, so I'd want to optimize the performance of picking up small stuff.
The Intelliflo tells me I am using about 500 - 550 watts per hour. I think my cleaner line is only 1 inch OD pipe so flow is restricted. In order to get 20 gpm I need to run the pump at 2200rpm. But even then, the old booster pump used almost 3x that amount.
By my calculation I now use 2.8kW to run the skimmer 2 hours, cleaner 2 hours, and low speed circulation for 9 hours to get a turn. My old setup of 6 hours at single speed and 2 hours with booster used 13.3kW. Still need to wait for an electric bill to confirm the savings, but it certainly looks promising so far.