While the name of this one is slightly more difficult to make a joke out of, I’m sure I can do something with the Premier. Probably a head of state based joke. Regardless, today I will be looking at another standalone device from Maytronic.The Dolphin Premier is not a member of a three tiered family, like the Quest before it, but considering its feature set and price tag I would call this an upper mid range option. I am impressed with the wealth of features on offer here, and again, we have a device that is easy on the eyes. It does have a few regressive tendencies, putting this closer to the old DX series than the Supreme line of bots, but it has a fantastic cycle time to compensate for it.
The premier is a well put together bot, whether or not it is worth it to you will depend on the price I think. So let’s dive right in, see if this is the right bot for you.
Maytronics Dolphin Premier Design and Build Quality
Always make sure to perform the rattle test on any new robotic pool cleaner you get. It’s easy to do, just give the bot a bot of a shake. The Premier is one the larger end, so that might be a little more difficult than with the smaller bots, but it is important. Rattle is indicative of a lack of flush fit parts, and can mean a factory fault. You would have to make use of your warranty at that point.
The look of the bot is not that important, I realize that, but in situations where you are deciding between multiple builds, it becomes important.
Maytronics Dolphin Premier Features and Specs
I have reviewed an a lot of robotic pool cleaners, and in that time I have learned a lot. I have been sorting the bots by design, by core features, and have made a short list of features that I require be there in order to recommend the cleaner at all. The most important is the ability to climb the pool wall, a good filter and a powerful set of scrubbing brushes, able to break up the hardiest of debris.
Taking a step up from the Quest here in terms of features. Let’s get the similarities out of the way first. This is an in ground pool cleaning robot with a 50′ cable. That is a swivel cable, making it tangle resistant. If you know anything about robotic pool cleaners you know that a tangled cable is responsible for the vast majority of stoppages. We again have the dual bottom loaded scrubbing brushes, cleans real deep and excellent at removing algae build up. The Premier can also clean your pool wall, making that 90 degree wall transition with ease. Not many bots can manage that so the fact that it is standard across the Dolphin line is impressive.
New features include a bag conversion kit, if you would rather clean out a bag than the whole bot, and a handy remote control. You cannot move the machine remotely with it though, it is for changing cycles and starting the bot. Dimension wise we are looking at 23.1 x 19.8 x 14.1 inches , so a little bigger than the Quest, but then those extra features have to fit somewhere. Our built in filter pump is the standard Maytronic Dolphin high powered pump, filtering 4,322 gallons of water per hour. The cycle time is roughly the same, with an average cycle lasting 2.5 hours.
I would not call this the most fully featured build from Dolphin, but it is still an impressive build from the pool cleaning robot juggernaut.
Maytronics Dolphin Premier Ease of Use
There are two kinds of robotic pool cleaners on the market at the moment. The all in one models and the external filter models. The external models are great, they come with their own issues regarding ease of use, but I prefer all in one cleaners. All you have to do is plug them in and hit start. All in one bots can be further divided into two categories. The Legacy Design models and the Ultra Moderns. The Premier falls into the Legacy Design category, though in reality is is more of a transitory design bot.
Legacy design bots tend to have bottom mounted filter chambers, and they use bags instead of filter meshes. The Premier does indeed have a bottom mounted filter chamber, so changing the filter is cumbersome and annoying from a day to day use stand point. The vanilla version of the Premier does use a filter bag, which are hard to clean, and more often than not need to be replaced frequently. What I find interesting here is that the Premier can be outfitted with a filter mesh, making it far easier to clean, and granted more longevity to the bot.
Robotic pool cleaners by their very nature are easy to use. It is why this section is so focused on the nitty gritty, on annoyances through use rather than more serious issues. Put simply, there are no serious issues in terms of use. There is one other type of all in one robotic pool cleaner, those I call the Post Moderns, and by far are they the easiest to clean and used on a day to day basis.
Maytronics Dolphin Premier Pricing, Value, & Discounts
The other major cost to owning a robotic pool cleaner is the price per cycle. Now, with an Aquabot robotic I can tell you exactly how much it costs to run, as they have provided the power consumption information to all of their builds. this is not the case with the Maytronic Dolphin line of robotic pool cleaners. You can estimate by looking at your local price per kilowatt hour and slotting in 180W, shouldn’t be much more than 10c per cycle though. Not a huge figure, I’ll grant you, but one that does add up and should always be considered.
Maytronic still have yet to get back to me with their full warranty. I enjoy wading through a good warranty, and if you take a look through my Aquabot reviews you will see that. Without the full details I am unable to make a recommendation or even form an opinion on the value of Maytronics 36 month bumper to bumper warranty. I will update all of my Dolphin reviews when they get back to me.
Maytronics Dolphin Premier Conclusion
In all a fine build, let down by the fact that Maytronics themselves offer better machines at lower prices. If you can find one of these in the sub $1000 range then it might be worth your time, if not then go for an M400.
Pros:
- Automatic, requires no supervision. All in one bots are amazing.
- Can climb the pool walls, in addition to my other prerequisite features.
- Weekly timer frees up more of your time.
Cons:
- Bottom loading filter mesh
- A little more expensive than I would like at the moment.
- Warranty info is light on the ground.