Me and My NaviBot, Day 3: An All-Over Rover

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After being pleasantly surprised to see the Samsung NaviBot SR8855 do an OK job of cleaning my kids' pigsty of a bedroom, my little blue friend impressed me even more in the tight corners of our corridors and alcoves.

After cleaning the living room and the bedroom, I decided set the NaviBot off cleaning the upstairs landing (would it fall down the stairs?) and then the torturous winding corridor on the lower level of my flat.

Logical routes

To effectively clean in the tightest spots, the NaviBot seems to follow a perfectly logical route. Honestly, even if I'd been magically transformed into a NaviBot myself I couldn't have done a better job. Unlike in the larger rooms of the flat, it doesn't suddenly stop and change directions. Instead, it moves forward progressively in a regular, methodical manner, without leaving the smallest patch of floor uncovered.
 

And then it arrived at the top of the stairs and my heart literally stopped ... but then so did the NaviBot (phew!), which trundled along the edge of the staircase without falling over the edge. After the initial relief, I suddenly felt like giving it a little kick just to see what would happen, but no, my conscience got the better of me. Plus, I wouldn't want to break my new toy when I've only had it for three days.

 

After finishing the long upstairs landing with its tight corners and strange alcoves (it even cleaned under the furniture), the NaviBot headed back to its charging station. It's a good job Nathalie isn't here; she'd have a fit if she saw just how much dust, dirt and fluff this automatic vac had collected! It's really quite impressive, especially since I thought the upstairs landing was already quite clean. At the same time though, the impression of the NaviBot's incredible efficiency is almost certainly exaggerated by the fact that the dust container is so small (0.6 litres, whereas a regular vac can hold two to four times more). In fact, the NaviBot tank would look full with just three grains of rice in it.

An all-over rover that's great for cleaning tight spots and difficult-to-reach areas

I then took the SR8855 downstairs and set it off again. Its new mission was to clean the corridor (shaped like a kind of double S chicane) and then the kitchen. It also had to tackle our pantry, which is actually a kind of storage area under the stairs. Because of its sharply sloped ceiling, we tend to avoid going in there as much as possible. Needless to say, we very, very rarely go in there broom in hand.
 

Once again, the NaviBot did a great job in tight spaces like the pantry and effectively dealt with the sharp corners of the corridor. It looked to be in its element cleaning our tiny kitchen (approx. 8 m²).

I think me and my NaviBot are set to become the best of friends.

On day four: is the NaviBot just a noisy, power-guzzling gadget? I investigate.

> Me and My NaviBot, Day 2: Nathalie vs NaviBot in the Kids' Pigsty!

> Me and My NaviBot, Day 1: A New Member of the Family

 

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