Automatic Litterbox Central

We purchases the LitterSweep Ultra and the hood for it. It seems to work good, but it is very loud! I don't know how the noise compares to the other automatic boxes, but I can hear it from the other end of the house. I wanted to get the paw cleaning ramp for it, but they didn't have it at Petsmart and it is backordered on Petsmart.com. I'm hoping the store gets it in, I don't want to pay $6 in shipping for a $10 item.

Purchased the Littersweep Ultra and hood five days ago. The one issue I'm really having with it is that our cat really likes to cover her mess -- she pushes all the litter to one side. This seems to cause the sensor to stay activated and even pushing the button manually will not work until you scoop the litter away from the side! Using less litter will not work, I've tried and she still does it! Any suggestions would be appreciated.
We were using the 40 lb Litter Clean (sold at Sam's for around $9.00) and it seems to work just fine in this machine. There doesn't seem to be any sticking on the pan or the rake. Odor control is very good. Yes, as previously mentioned, it does miss some smaller pieces (the tines of the rake should be closer together perhaps) and I wish the container was a little bit deeper. However, with only one cat, I can realistically see only doing regular maintainence (quick manual scoop and emptying the bin) twice a week.
Overall, I LOVE the Littersweep Ultra -- just need to find a modfication to either the machine or the cat's behavior... quickly!

We have had the same problem with all the litter being on one side and it not working. It's only happened a couple times. Other than that it does a good job and there is NO smell! We are thinking about taking back the Ultra and getting the regular Littersweep without the sensors for that reason about it getting stuck with too much litter on one side.

We, too, were considering taking the automated one back and getting the Roundup; but we've been known to take quite a few weekend trips, so I really wanted it to be automatic. Now, I have no more worries -- I've managed to modify the Littersweep so it's working perfectly for us!

Our cat is predicatable... over 95% of the time, she was piling the litter in one place and disrupting the same two sensors over and over again. I disabled those sensors and voila, I haven't had to rearrange litter since! Note: I feel that this is still very safe as our cat is of a good length and weighs about 12 lbs., so the remaining sensors still know when she's in there. I don't think I would feel comfortable doing this with a very small cat or kitten.

If this will help anyone, my "mod" was very easy, took about five minutes, the only "tools" required were a strong pair of scissors and two small plastic hairspray caps (from Garnier Fructis, to be exact... though I'm sure they're all about the same)

Unplug the unit. Remove the rake, the guard, and lift off the litter pan. Right under the pan there are six sensors (springs with a black round plastic piece). Cut the caps down until they are the exact height of the sensors. Pop the caps over top of the sensors. Replace the litter pan, the guard, and the rake. This keeps the offending sensors from being pushed down -- but still leaves four sensors operational. Perhaps the best part of this solution is that it's easily reversible. If it doesn't work for you or you acquire a kitten, etc. just remove the caps and everything's back to normal.

We're giving up on this product.

Our cat digs like there is no tomorrow. She piles the litter in huge piles which keeps the sensor from allowing the box to cycle. Since she's a real digger, she tossed the litter out of the box at first, so we had to put the box away until the hood became available.

We had to wait 3 months from the time the box was released until the hood was available. (Can't return the box now) The hood does a poor job of enclosing the box and crowds the cat causing her to throw the litter the only direction she doesn't feel crowded - out the door of the opening. On the rare occasion we do get it to cycle, it only dumps two sets of waste before the rake won't dump into the receptacle. It then carries the waste back to the litter pan and spreads it in a lovely spiral Zen Garden pattern only to be re-raked and redistributed repeatedly. I never envisioned cat feces and urine balls in a Zen Garden before!

The record-player motion and freight train noise of the cleaning cycle really freaked out the cat and brought the dog running. The cat wouldn't go near it for 3 days after the first time it cycled. She also hates the unsteady feel of the box. It feels wobbly when she steps into it because it is spring loaded to sink and depress the sensors when she steps in. She doesn't like riding a sinking toilet.

The only plus (and it was a pretty small plus) was that the liners were exactly the same as Saran Quick-covers. Expect to change them almost daily.

Save your money. In my opinion, this is a poorly designed piece of garbage. If you absolutely have to give it a try, at least buy the cheaper model and save yourself the sensor hassles. You'll end up raking and then pushing the button to cycle the automatic model most of the time anyway.

Well, I bought the Ultrasweep today and set it up. When I manually activated it, the rake does not return once it gets to the point of being over the receptacle. I thought perhaps I'd used too much litter and removed some. I've tried several times now, all with the same results. Back to the store tomorrow, I guess. Has anyone else had this problem? I really would like to try out this product, I'm hoping I just happened to get a lemon.

Jean Ray, it does sound like you may have got a lemon. Ours never stopped during the cycle. Our cats aren't very good about covering their waste, so for the most part the automatic cycle will work. It is loud, our cats aren't quite sure what to think of it.

I'm interested to hear from anyone who has tried both the Littersweep and either the littermaid or purrforma. We still have the receipt, and we've only had the box a couple weeks so we can still return it if there is a better automatic box out there.

I had bought the Ultra & returned it before the month was up. The concept is better than the LM but it doesn't dump all the clumps into the box. It would spread it around when the rake came back. It definately was easier to clean the box than the LM but I still had to scoop it. Then the rake would grind up the stinky clumps it didn't dump back into the litter. The first time I washed it I noticed the metal rake was starting to rust & I only had the box about 1 month.. can you imagine the rake after 1 yr?
My LM is dead. So thats why I wanted to try it... I will save up for a Litter Robot. Seems thats the only box that really gets a good review.

There are some great posts here about this product. I went out and bought one on the 27th at Petsmart w/the hood. We are haven’t had a lot of experience with it yet, as it has taken our two cats a while to get used to using it.

Here's my 2 cents.

1. It is VERY loud! We live in a two bedroom apt. with the larger bathroom being the master one, so that's where it is for now. Made me jump out of bed the 1st time it woke me up! (May try the suggestion of leaving it off overnight)

2. One of the 1st things I noticed is that the bin/door that the stuff gets raked into is part of the entrance to the box. This is a major design oversight since cats will not only splash around the litter from within the box, but they'll track it on the way out. It would be great if the cover to the bin was designed like their "Paw Cleaning Ramp" with holes to catch the tracked litter.

3. True the rake does not dip as much as it should. A little more angle would probably help with the stuff staying on the rake when dumped – haven’t tried the cooking spray yet but will try that soon.

4. seems easy to clean but haven’t needed to yet.

I believe the litter you use makes a big difference with this. When I bought it, I also purchased a bag of the “World’s Best” cat litter. It is an all-natural, flushable, corn-based litter that seems to be less dense than other regular type of litters (have been using Tidy Cat Crystals Blend for a while now) I first set the LSU up with the new litter type, keeping the old litterbox around just in case.

BIG lesson number one: do not try to change your cat’s litter type and go from a manual to auto litterbox at the same time! My one cat got very freaked out by the Littersweep – he still runs to watch it whenever it goes on – and couldn’t get used to the new litter. My other kitty didn’t care either way – she’s easy like that.

To try to keep my problem kitty happy, I changed the litter in the LSU to the old Tidy Cat formula. Now he goes in it, but there were some obvious differences in how the LSU works with it. The World’s Best definitely clumps better. Better clumping means cleaner raking. The other litter beaks up too easily and is apparently heavier – once I put it in, I was getting the ‘red’ imbalance light all the time. Plus, there is much less tracking with the World’s Best litter.

I am going to try to acclimate both of them to the new litter first and put the LSU away for now. Once they are used to it, I’ll try the LSU again – I only have a few weeks left to return it!

Hi All,

This is great to see reviews of these auto systems. I had a littermaid for a while and it broke right after the year warrenty was up so I bought another and that one died the same way. So i've been manually cleaning for a couple of years now. I saw this new litterbox at Petsmart as many of you have and almost bought it but wanted to read some reviews.

One thing I learned about PetSmart, they have a 1 YEAR RETURN POLICY. Isn't that great! If I had known that I might still have a littermaid. With that said I think I'm going to try this one. If it sucks, I'll just take it back.

Thanks,

Brian

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I see that someone called a hot-line for the LitterSweep Ultra. After several months of no problems, the rake seems to have lost power and won't finish the cycle. The thing just keeps running. I have to unplug it most of the time, plug it in a couple of times a day to scoop the litter and then help the arm lift.

I can't find my instruction book, so I am wondering -- Can someone please give me that hot-line number so I can call about my box. I live in Canada if there is more than one number to call.

Thanks