Shallow Areas: In search of the Holy Grail

PGQ24

Well-known member
Nov 3, 2024
53
Texas Gulf Coast
Pool Size
65000
Surface
Plaster
Chlorine
Liquid Chlorine
I have a large shallow area with 3 channels that go to a huge landing. All are about 4" to 6" in depth. I want to clean it with a 25 micron bag. I can clean larger debris with a net. I've called, asked, but no one seems to have a good solution for under $500, or even $1000. Below are some things I have tried and researched:

1. Call Bottom Feeder. Great vacuum for 4" area. However, they don't make heads that is about 8" wide to clean my 12" and 24" wide channels. It's also about $1500 with the smallest micron bag of 57 or attach a 60 sf filter.
2. Someone suggest to brush and push it to the main pool area and let riptide do the job. Lot of labor to brush and pushing it out one channel sucks in the other channel. A lot of work for little result.
3. Riptide or hammerhead requires at least 12" depth.
4. I used a pondovac or similar. Hoses, electrical cables, tubes, weak suction, and stops every 30 seconds is time consuming and too may parts to setup and carry. The other end drains out into a 25 micron bag.
5. Pool side/skimmer suction hose. Hoses requiring water filled to work, and it would just suck it right into my filter. Don't want that either.
6. Pool Blaster: Portable, but requires 12" depth. No go.
7. I looked and tried the Kokido xtrovac 200. It's tiny and was similar to using a handheld vacuum on a whole primary bedroom floor. They have the kokido 410 which looks promising, but I don't know if it will do 4" shallow area. Also, the smallest micron bag is 250 microns.

If I may ask you to put on your engineering cap, please make suggestions on what is the most efficient, cost effective way get the best and quickest result in cleaning the shallow area. I want something portable with a re-sizeable head to do 18" or 8" wide. I want something powerful like the bottom feeder (I think around 18 gallons/minute) and do small debris that could be heavy like a small pebble) and run off a 12v lifepo4 battery like the riptide. I want something that can connect to standard pool pole. I'll provide the manual labor as long as it provide quick results.

For reference, the tile is 16x16. The length of the steps is almost 40 ft long.
 

Attachments

  • 20250428_153629.jpg
    20250428_153629.jpg
    426.4 KB · Views: 6
  • 20250428_153658.jpg
    20250428_153658.jpg
    487.7 KB · Views: 6
Vac Daddy with shallow water adapter would work, but you only get down to 70 micron.

 
Thanks for the suggest. The vac Daddy is also $1200-1500. I tried it with my pool blaster, but the thing kept on floating up. It primed water OK, but once I lift the head out of the water, it needed to priming all over again. I think the advantage of the bottom feeder design is that suction happens right at the head, and the blade motor is flipped upside down compared to riptide/hammerhead for shallow area. It is similar to the kokido xtrovac 200. However, neither the kokido nor the bottom feeder is flexible or cost effective as mentioned above for the circumstance.

I was even able to get my riptide to continue the suction at the wide steps. But I can't get it to fit through the widest middle channel. That was a huge disappointment. If only the riptide was a few inches narrower, I could at least do the large area and the middle channel without taking it out of the water.
 
Last edited: