My Dolphin: Now I'm getting rid of it

[brent.roberts]

About the only thing I think they could do is have a level switch that started a timer when they went up a wall. A simple program on a chip could capture the time it took between hitting walls and figure out something about the pool lenghth and width.

From observing mine all that the timing would do would be to tell it how long to spend going in each direction so it had some time when it hit the surface to creep along the waterline ... doing 2 things. First it would actually be scrubbing the waterline a bit and secondly repositioning it for a reverse run across a new section of bottom. I have notice that mine does not spend a lot of time scrubbing walls at each end of a run. Almost all the scrubbing at waterline and creeping along, is at the same end of the cycle. This ends up with the thing actually going around the pool in the same direction in each cycle. When you take it out to clean it and reverse the handle, it goes around the other way. Not very sophisticated "robotics" but it kinda works. It does generate a random pattern that eventually, in like 6 hours, covers the bottom of a traditional 16x32 pool. But if it was real smart it could cover that area in less than an hour.

There appears to me to be no encoders. No idle wheel that senses that it has hit an obstruction. It might sense current draw on the motor when it hits an obstruction but that seems unlikely. It might also sense that it has not gone up a wall in a while and know it has hit an obstruction. I think Carl reported that his Diamond did that when it hung up on his ladder.

By the way I have never challenged the Dolphin with a ladder. Took the ladder out and left it out. Neither Kreepy Krawly, nor Barracuda, nor Polaris ATV could work with the ladder in.