Whilst the weather in the southern hemisphere has cooled and for most of us, pool season has closed, your pool still needs to be looked after. And this is where the iGarden Pool Cleaner K Series comes into play. We were sent the 6-hour GT60 model for review.
As well as the pool cleaning robot, inside the box is a charging cable, a hook, and the manual. The robot itself resembles a miniature black sports car, accented with a bold red trim on the oversized wheels. The sleek, curvaceous design sets it apart from the faded blue appearance of your average pool cleaning device. The iGarden pool cleaner certainly sets itself apart from the rest.
There’s a handle on the end for lifting the device and another handle in the middle for putting out the detachable debris basket. It’s easy to get the two confused. This isn’t too bad on land, but you don’t want to be pulling the filter basket out when you are hooking the device out of the water (more about that later).
There’s a circular dial with a padlock symbol on the underside of the device with a padlock symbol. If you hadn’t read the manual, you’d think it was more likely for maintenance that be a master switch.
The pool cleaner is programmed via an illuminated touch panel on the top of the robot. You press and hold the on button, which starts flashing and lights up the option buttons.
You have a few pool cleaning options. You can adjust the cleaning time between 1 hour, 1.5 hours, 2 hours or cleaning until the battery runs out. There’s a choice between standard mode and turbo mode, which doubles the device’s suction to get rid of stubborn debris. There are two selectable cleaning modes: floor only or floor, walls and waterline. You can also dump the cleaner in your pool and have it clean every 24, 48 or 72 hours.
You make your selections and press the on button again to stop the light flashing, which indicates that the robot is ready for cleaning. You only have 3 minutes to put it in your pool before it switches itself into a sleep mode. If you drop the robot in the pool whilst it’s in sleep mode, or if you forget to confirm the programme, you have to fish it out and start again.
Once the robot is ready, you just drop it in your pool and away it goes. intelligently maps the layout of your pool, starting with a thorough sweep of the floor before moving on to the walls. With autumn leaves strewn about the bottom of my pool, the iGarden pool cleaner wasted no time in vacuuming them up. It also tackled the telltale tidemarks that tend to build up over winter, leaving the pool looking pristine.
The underside of the unit suffered a few scratches, likely caused by navigating the rough aggregate finish of the pool in the area of the steps. It struggled with the pool’s steps, but I’ve not seen a robot pool cleaner that hasn’t.
When cleaning is complete, the robot settles on the pool floor. To retrieve it, you’ll need to use the included hook, which attaches to your pool net pole. the iGarden pool cleaner can feel a bit like a game at a fun fair, with the device’s black body making the hooking point tricky to spot.
iGarden recommends cleaning your pool twice a week for an hour each time. The battery will last for 6 hours of continuous floor cleaning. The device is charged via the charge cable, which is inserted into a port that is optimistically covered with a rubber bung when the robot is in use. The charge time is about four and a half hours. After every test, there was water around the charging pins. But I’m not sure what sort of effect this will have on the device in the long term, if any.
The pool cleaning robot can also be set up using the mobile app. There were a couple of iGarden apps on the Google Play Store and, of course, I chose the wrong one (which did seem to support the robot but wouldn’t connect). The “iGarden Robot” app paired with the pool cleaner with no issue (the app was also able to pair and control my barbeque warmer, which was interesting). From the app, all the settings for the cleaner are available. Unfortunately, the app offers very little additional information like stats such as cleaning times or area cleaned.
The robot is designed for easy maintenance. The debris basket can be unscrewed from the body for a good clean or replacement if it gets damaged. Similarly, the impeller can easily be accessed if debris gets caught up in it. The cleaning brushes at the front simply unclip if replacement is required. The tracks can also easily be removed for replacement as required. Detailed instructions for the above are included in the manual, and there are videos available online. It’s good to see a company actively promoting user maintenance in this way, with thought given to making these tasks easy for the end user.
The iGarden Pool Cleaner K Series will clean your pool and do a very good job. The lack of a surface cleaning facility is unfortunate, but it shouldn’t be a dealbreaker. Getting to grips with the set-up takes a bit of getting used to, but after a few goes, it becomes a breeze. As well as doing an exceptional job on your pool, the pool cleaner looks stylish, and quite possibly one of the best-looking pool robots you’ll find. Whether maintaining your pool in the off-season or getting your pool ready for the summer, you really should take a look at this pool robot. The iGarden Pool Cleaner K Series will be available in Australia and New Zealand from October.