Occasionally a manufacturer boasts that it now offers "Super-Climbing Brushes" on its robotic cleaners. To transform standard to super, all but Water Tech, manufacturer of the Blue Diamond and Blue Pearl cleaners, simply add a little thickness to the material.  This actually puts more stress and wear and tear on the expensive drive motors, kind of like driving your car year round on snow tires.  It also often results in the brushes themselves wearing out quicker, and almost always stretching and coming off.

  The Blue Pearl and Blue Diamond have true Super Climbing Brushes, made of Polyvinyl alcohol, a 21st century material that is far more expensive, durable and most importantly, effective than the cheaper rubber with bristle material used on Aquabots, TigerSharks and Dolphins.  The little bristles begin to crack and break off immediately and need replacement about twice as often as PVA Brushes.

     Polyvinyl alcohol has excellent film forming, emulsifying, and adhesive properties. Our brushes were tested on the many pools in Europe that are entirely tiled, rather than just at or above the water line as here in the good ol' U.S.A.  Tiles are far slicker, and virtually impossible to climb with traditional brushes, It is also resistant to oil, grease and solvent. PVOH is an atactic material but exhibits crystallinity as the hydroxyl groups are small enough to fit into the lattice without disrupting it. It has high tensile strength, flexibility, as well as high oxygen and aroma barrier. However these properties are dependent on humidity, in other words, with higher humidity more water is absorbed. The water which acts as a plasticizer will then reduce its tensile strength, but increase its elongation and tear strength. PVOH has a melting point of 230°C and 180-190°C for the fully hydrolysed and partially hydrolysed grades. PVOH also decomposes rapidly above 200°C

THEIRS:   No matter if it is the overpriced ($1800) experimental Aquabot T-4 Remote, the 15 year-old Aquabot Turbo, the 25-year old Dolphin Dynamic, or its clone the Tiger Shark (top of the line QC version shown here), every robotic cleaner on the market, except the Blue Diamond and first true 21st. robotic cleaner, the Blue Pearl, use the old standard, rubber brushes, with their little fingers (bristles?), just waiting to wear out.