Pleatco vs Unicel, any recent experience?

I can't answer your question but I would like to see what the others say. 5 years seems like a good run on some filters.

I have seen a lot of posts that are happy with their Pleatco's. I am still on the original set but plan on buying a second set of Pleatco in the near future. As for the dirt on your filters if the bands are in decent shape and you don't have holes have you thought about a TSP soak? If nothing else could give you a second set for backup or easy swap vs full cleaning each time.

I don't know how old our Unicel cart is but I replaced all 4 of them with the same brand last year. We get lots of leaves and debris from neighbor all year round but we have a robotic cleaner and hair net in the skimmer. Our filter clean pressure does not change but I clean the cartridge at least once a year if I don't feel lazy! Pool is about 18 yrs old and I took ownership 3 years ago. As a preventative measure, I replaced all the o-rings, pressure gauge, air relief valve, drain plug and the bottom manifold just last week.

I have yet to try Pleatco for my next change. But yeah, I think 5 years is a good run but why change if they are still in good shape!

I don't have 'recent' experience with changing out carts. But I do have ongoing experience with my original Unicel carts in my 11 year old quad de100 filter. I have done 3 overnight TSP soaks throughout the years. I don't have backwash capability so I do clean them 2-3 times/yr when I start gaining a few pounds on my pump discharge. There was a time when I thought they wouldn't last more than 5 years so I reached out to Pentair tech support and was informed that Unicel would be a perfect replacement cart since that is what Pentair puts in their filters at the factory. Whether or not that is still the case I don't know. I tell myself everytime I take the filter apart to clean the carts that I need to get new ones because they are quite discolored. But, they continue to filter like new. I keep expecting to find tears in the media but they are fine. One of the bands did break on my last cleaning. My post cleaning discharge psi is 1-2#, just as it's been since the pool was new. I'm surprised by the longevity of the set I have. The only maintenance I've done to the filter over the years is replace the PRV/gauge a few times after hard freezes and just recently, primed and painted the outside shell. I know I'll have to eventually replace the carts them but now I'm waiting to see just how long before one of them fails. Unless money is no object, my advice is don't try to fix something that hasn't broke yet.

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I've been using Pleatco for years and they are great.

I bought pleatcos and really like them, the pocket book likes them also