Hands-On: The iRobot Dirt Dog
By Chuck CageSummary/Conclusions
Our experiences with iRobots Dirt Dog were surprisingly positive. We went into the testing with a number of concerns, each of which turned out to be unfounded:
- The bin is large enough to avoid excessive emptying.
- The battery will last through an entire cleaning.
- The ‘Dog can handle quite large objects — even small nuts and bolts. Objects too large for pickup are treated mostly as barriers, which the ‘Dog vacuums around.
- The wheels operate well on slick floors, rough floors, and even carpet.
- It cleans floors well — better than a shop vacuum, which doesn’t feature rotating brushes.
One caveat: It can become trapped on certain objects, however the solution is simple. The first few times you use the ‘Dog, you’ll want to stick around to see what it gets hung up on, then move or modify those few objects to avoid stoppage. With just a little tweaking, we suspect that we could successfully use the ‘Dog on a regular basis even in our complex shop environment.
Street pricing starts around $130-$150 — a small price to pay for a constantly-clean floor and the novelty of your own service robot. It’d make a great “big” gift for your favorite tool-loving techie.
The Dirt Dog [iRobot]
Street Pricing [Froogle]
December 16th, 2006 at 2:54 pm
Great review. I think I would rather use this on in my house than a regular roomba.
December 16th, 2006 at 8:00 pm
I’m curious how it would handle “swarf”, long ribbons of metal that you get when drilling or turning steel - they are hell on a shop vac, relaibly plugging the hose by getting hundg up on the ribbing.
So drill a bunch of 1/2″ holes in steel and aluminum on the drill press and send the “dog” through that…
December 18th, 2006 at 7:22 am
Greg, if you look at iRobot’s specs, they actually say to specifically _NOT_ use this inside on residential carpet, as it’s basically too “hardcore” (high RPM, hard bristles).
We have a Roomba for the house too, and “Roomba-proofing” seems like a common growing pain. Once you watch the bot have a few go’s at it, you’ll quickly realize what it’ll have troubles with, and it’s pretty quick to set the room up for a proper robot-scrubbing before you set it loose.
I’ve been asking the wife for one of these Dirt Dogs since I saw the press release a few months ago.
January 31st, 2007 at 3:36 pm
Thanks for a wonderful review of the dirt dog. I’ve been looking for a comprehensive review on it for a while, this is the best i’ve seen. I own a roomba and was considering a “dog” for my garage/workshop as soon as i heard about it. I think your review convinced me to get one. If you search around there are places selling it for $99.
thanks again!