No love for the Dolphin Premier?

Jump to latest Follow Reply
M

maxBR

Active member
Apr 6, 2022
29
Long Beach, CA
Pool Size
17500
Surface
Plaster
Chlorine
Liquid Chlorine
I've been frustrated trying to buy a Dolphin Pool cleaner, so after not hearing back from Marine for a couple days on my inquiry I impulsively bought a Dolphin Premier online. Did it just now, have not received it. I have researched through google over the past week and almost all the "best pool cleaner" lists have it at or near the top. Then I figured I'd just check what people think about it here.

And it's crickets! Most of the threads are really old! So, no love for this cleaner? Is an S200 variant as good or better? Has the Premium been updated at all to make it more relevant today vs the old threads? I'm just confused why it's one of the top cleaners mentioned everywhere online but here! Maybe i should try to cancel my order...
 
$1300.00 Dolphin Premier would be overkill for most when the $700-800 Dolphins are *really* good on their own and IMO the basket is far easier to empty. I picture the Premier being more for really large pools, but I could be wrong?

Maddie 🇺🇦
 
Max,

I had a Dolphin Premier and I now have an S200. The Premier worked fine, but the S200 is by far a better overall robot.

From a cleaning point of view, they both do about the same job. My Premier cost me about $1,200 bucks and the S200 was about $700 bucks. Not sure what the prices are today.. The Premier is based on very old technology, almost like the original Dolphin Diagnostics. The S200 is new modular technology.

I've worked on both.. the Premier requires a pint or two of blood to do almost any maintenance, the S200 not even a band-aid.

The Premier has a bottom mounted very small filter basket. The S200 a large top loading basket. The Premier worked for me as I have a very light leaf load. If you get a lot of leaves, then the Premier is not for you.

The Premier came with a remote... I used it once and that was it. A total waste of money. The S200 has no bells and whistles, and it cleans just was well as the robots with all the "magic".

The Premier was about 7 years old when it died and I replaced it with the S200.

I don't think buying the Premier is a bad thing, I just think that for me, the S200 is an overall better robot. That said, it is only a couple of years old, so time will tell if it can last 7 years like the Premier.

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
What convinced me was the dual powered brushes, the multiple filter types, 3 vs 2 year warranty, and the ballast thing that supposedly makes it great for the waterline. That and every site on the net saying how good it is lol. Hopefully worth it...
 
maxBR said:
What convinced me was the dual powered brushes, the multiple filter types, 3 vs 2 year warranty, and the ballast thing that supposedly makes it great for the waterline. That and every site on the net saying how good it is lol. Hopefully worth it...
Click to expand...
So I , like you came to the same conclusion about the premire and about to buy it for my new pool build. I like the choices of filters and the online reviews of how well it works on the waterline. Let me know what you think about yours.
 
P,

The S200 does about a 100% better job on the waterline than the Premier. This is because the Premier uses old technology and the S200 has thrusters that hold it to the wall and force it to move. Something the Premier does not have.

The Premier cleans the waterline just fine, just not as well as the S200.

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
  • Like
Reactions: maxBR and parkinsmith
Jimrahbe said:
P,

The S200 does about a 100% better job on the waterline than the Premier. This is because the Premier uses old technology and the S200 has thrusters that hold it to the wall and force it to move. Something the Premier does not have.

The Premier cleans the waterline just fine, just not as well as the S200.

Thanks,

Jim R.
Click to expand...
Awesome , thank you for your feedback , going to check it out , There are so many and its a bit confusing for a first timer like me . Really appreciate the advice .
 
We're off to a bad start. I think I got a repackaged bot. There's got to be no way this is factory packaging. It's completely inadequate with one tiny peice of styrofoam and a couple strips of cardboard. I think the bot is ok somehow but wondering if I should just send back. Last pic is all the protection there was inside the box.
 

Attachments

  • PXL_20220426_023210163.jpg
    PXL_20220426_023210163.jpg
    496.6 KB · Views: 54
  • PXL_20220426_023307076.jpg
    PXL_20220426_023307076.jpg
    383.6 KB · Views: 55
  • PXL_20220426_023525625.jpg
    PXL_20220426_023525625.jpg
    332.7 KB · Views: 55

Enjoying this content?

Support TFP with a donation.

Give Support
Max,

It was a long time ago, but I don't remember there being much more packing than what you have. It should be pretty obvious if the robot has been used.

A word of warning.. The brushes have what are called climbing rings. When they are dry they look almost like cardboard. I came within a few microseconds of ripping then off, as I initially thought they were packing. When wet they swell up. In theory, they are supposed to help the robot climb the walls. Mine fell off after about 4 years. I never replaced them, but the robot climbed the walls anyway. :mrgreen:

Good luck with your new robot.

Jim R.
 
  • Like
Reactions: maxBR
Ran it last night and watched it work as much as I could. This is the first time I've ever seen a pool robot working and my first one, so my impressions are pretty much things I have already seen in my research. Before this I had "The Pool Cleaner" vacuum running 8 hours a day while my pump was running and that seemed to do a good job but I'm going to be upgrading to a variable speed pump soon that I want to run at low speed. Also I wanted a new toy :)

  • It definitely does not have any orderly navigation algorithm. It brings me back to the old Roomba days where it just bounces around the pool. It seemed to hit the same spots over and over while ignoring large areas but probably over the whole run time ends up hitting most places at least once. I love my RoboRock indoor vacuums with lidar. Lidar changed the robot vacuum game and the pool bots needs to make a leap like that.
  • The filter full indicator starts blinking within minutes and is lit up indicating the filter is full within about 10 min. I figured maybe the bag was not seated quite right the first time. I changed to the cartridge filters and it was the same. So this is either broken or just useless overall.
  • The scheduling capability is lamer than expected. You can set it for every day, every 2 days, or every 3 days and it's just a lit up LED on one of those 3 programs. What time might it run? Who knows!? I am going to switch a wifi plug and schedule that way like the cheaper robots.
  • I see why buying the cheaper bots is suggested. Driving manually seems like it would be a chore, the scheduler is not well done. I have a lot of tech gadgets in my life, the aforementioned Roborock vacuums, a computer controlled espresso machine (Decent Espresso Machine), smart home gadgets. Maytronics is not really keeping up with the times with what's possible. Granted, I didn't get the app controlled bot but I don't have much faith it would be well done.
  • It ends up floating around the middle of the pool quite often. This happens when it's trying to clean the waterline, then sort of falls backwards and just starts floating for 20 seconds or so before it turns on the jets and shoots itself back towards the wall or floor.
  • My pool has 3 steps across the whole side in the shallow end. It will climb as high as the second step which is good, but it can't get any horizontal motion going so it might brush them a little but I'll have to keep doing the steps. I was expecting this or even that it might not climb them at all.
  • I know this stuff doesn't really matter, but first impressions are bad when you see the poor packaging. I still don't see how half of these aren't broken in shipping. The documentation is minimal and not written well. It's printed in black and white and maybe even photocopied. I expected more from a product costing this much. They have a manual with a lot of embedded videos online, which I suppose is what they want everyone to read instead of putting a more complete manual in the box.
  • Does it clean the pool well? TBD, since I've only run it once and tested a couple things otherwise. I'll update. I assume it does so in that sense I think I will be satisfied overall with the purchase.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Newdude
Anyone have luck with their robot cleaning the spa too? 😅

I thought it'd do better at climbing here but I guess it doesn't like the 90 degree angle at the walls.
 

Attachments

  • PXL_20220429_174947835_exported_1651255155152.jpg
    PXL_20220429_174947835_exported_1651255155152.jpg
    761.4 KB · Views: 26
Well I just purchased a new Dolphin Premier and the results are not positive. This is a brand new unit in the box. From new it refused to climb a vertical wall. It will climb the 45 but once it gets to any 90 or vertical it tries for a while then goes in reverse. For the last three days I have tried every conceivable float adjustment and combinations of adjustments. I also checked the impeller as well as scrubbed the walls twice.

This is a 20x40 rectangle pool. Pool is crystal clean.

If anyone has any ideas to try it would be greatly appreciated. Other than that I will contact the seller next week and see what they say.
 
When I had my Premier, it climbed 90-degree vertical gunite walls with no problem. Not sure about vinyl pools.

Are the climbing rings still on??

Just keep in mind it only climbs once, out of X times.. Not sure what the ratio is but it only climbs once out of every 5 to 10 tries. This is normal and not something adjustable.

Thanks

Jim R.
 
Thanks for you input Jimrahbe. Yes the climbing rings are on. I understand its kind of random but it has not had one successful 90 degree climb.
Ben messing with the float adjustments for three days and many hours. None of the adjustments seem to make a difference. I know the walls are clean.
Maybe a defective unit?
 
Harry,

The float adjustments don't have anything to do with it climbing the walls, what they do is make the robot tilt to the side so that the robot "somewhat" moves sideways along the tile line.

The S200 uses water thrusters that hold the robot to the wall and cause it to move along the tile line. A much better design.

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
I'm with Jim on the robot choice. I had the Pentair Warrior SE which is the same thing. There are a lot of different brands they sell the s200 under. One thing that's important for me is the automation mode. This lets you use a smart plug to control it. If you don't have automation mode the unit won't start when you power it up and you have to manually do it with the control box. The Pentair version documentation does not cover this feature but the unit does have it and it works just like the s200 to implement. I was on my 3rd year with this when we sold the property. Worked great and I left it in 24/7. Not what most will tell you to do but it worked fine for me. Taking this thing out every day was not workable for us... maybe later on when I'm fully retired that might work but I'm not convinced it's really needed.

Chris
 
Harrybeerbelly said:
Is the S200 the same as the Quantum?
Click to expand...

The S200 has no bells and whistles. it is just a Plain Jane cleaner. A couple of years ago it was $699, no tax and free shipping at Marina. The S200 has all the same internal parts as the more expensive models but does not have cell phone controls and other useless things. It also does not come with a caddy.
No idea what the current prices would be...

The Quantum appears to be the same basic robot, but for the price I suspect it has more bells and whistles. Looks the same as an S400...

Thanks,

Jim R.
 
Last edited:

Enjoying this content?

Support TFP with a donation.

Give Support
You must log in or register to reply here.
Thread Status
Hello , This thread has been inactive for over 60 days. New postings here are unlikely to be seen or responded to by other members. For better visibility, consider Starting A New Thread.
Top Bottom
Back
Jump to latest Follow Reply