Automatic Litterbox Central

I still can't decide what litterbox to get, the automatic ones seem to be full of pros and cons. I have heard some good things about the Littersweep from another board. Has anyone here used it?

I've been using it for about a month now, and think it's the best automatic litter box out there (not perfect though). I've tried both the littermaid and the litter robot in the past. I found the way the litter robot works to be great, but the fact that the drawer was not sealed meant odor would seep out into the house. The litter sweep works similarly to the littermaid, except it uses a wire "scoop" instead of a rake, and has a bag-lined bin for the waste.

Pros:

-The bin seals well, keeping odor to a minimum
-The machine waits 30 minutes before going off, as opposed to 10 for the litter maid so that clumps have time to harden
-Relatively low maintenance - I do a full change/wash once every two weeks or so
-Don't have to purchase the proprietary bags to line the bin. I've found that large Saran Quickcovers work just as well.
-Everything disassembles easily without tools, so it can be taken apart for cleaning

Cons:

-As another poster mentioned in these forums before, small clumps are sometimes too light to fall into the canister, and as such get dumped back into the litter pan. I haven't found this to be too much of an issue... every now and then I'll go and manually scoop the litter to get rid of any small clumps that remain. Also, switching to a harder clumping litter helps.
-The wire scoop doesn't touch the bottom of the litter pan, and as such, some litter can stick.
-Litter scatters all around the pan without the separate hood

Overall, I've been happy with my purchase... hopefully the unit won't break anytime soon. The price is great too at $80 from Petsmart.

I just got a littersweep and so far am really impressed! I think for about $100 it is the best deal for a litterbox.

I like the litter sweep for the first month. Three months later, it stopped working. But there are some design problems that become apparent after a while: 1) The litter drawer is so shallow that the litter pile get's too high for the scoop to dump after the first couple of uses, (2) The metal rake begins to rust after only a month - when it rusts, everything seems to stick to it and (3) it is really loud.

They really need to make some engineer changes to this before I could recommend it.

So if you were to buy 4 of them, I guarantee they would well outlast one litter-Robot. I think $79 is an incredible value. I still prefer the litter-Robot if money is not an issue.

Just my two-cents from the peanut gallery!

VelvetXJones wrote:(2) The metal rake begins to rust after only a month - when it rusts, everything seems to stick to it...

How easily does the rake come off? If it isnt too hard, maybe if it were taken off before the box was in use and sprayed with some sort of clear laquer, that'd solve the rusting (rustoleum or something). Also, I've heard that spraying these automated litter rakes with cooking spray also helps, think that'd work too? The oil would also help protect against rusting.

Also, I've heard that spraying these automated litter rakes with cooking spray also helps, think that'd work too? The oil would also help protect against rusting.

I'd been spraying the rake liberally with WD40 from the beginning, it didn't help prevent the rust situation. The laquer idea sounds interesting, however, it would be easier if they supplied a non-rusting rake. As much as I hate to say it - a plastic rake would be superior to a rusting metal rake.

Only a stupid or crazy company would make a part out of ordinary steel that was going to be crashing into moisture day after day. Anything you apply to the rake like paint will be worn off by the litter as if it were being sandblasted every day.

Meatnog wrote:

VelvetXJones wrote:(2) The metal rake begins to rust after only a month - when it rusts, everything seems to stick to it...

How easily does the rake come off? If it isnt too hard, maybe if it were taken off before the box was in use and sprayed with some sort of clear laquer, that'd solve the rusting (rustoleum or something). Also, I've heard that spraying these automated litter rakes with cooking spray also helps, think that'd work too? The oil would also help protect against rusting.

Stainless steel would be a better design.

I wrote to stylette and they said they will send me a replacement rake for no charge. There email is: mailto:Customers@stylette.com

While I agree that stainless steel would be better, I'm just trying to figure out solutions using what it comes with. not blue-sky suggestions.

I bet if the rake were lightly sanded then sprayed with rustoleum or even a clearcoat (like they put on cars), it'd resist the sand awfully well.

Maybe I'll pick one up and try it out. I'm sick of waiting for the 'perfect' automated litterbox to come along.

We got a Litter sweep ultra and we LOVE it. no complaints.

I've had a Littersweep for about a month and it is a disaster. The rake comes out and flings the clumps straight across, hitting the underside of the flip top of the litter receptacle. The rake is supposed to, however, turn down and dump the clumps. It doesn't. Most of the clumps, therefore, remain on the rake ... only to be redeposited back in the unit (some getting stuck on this door, yuk). Sometimes the unit just never comes on at all but worst are the times when the lid to the waste receptacle remains closed and it flings the clumps and feces out onto the bathroom floor. Yikes. What a mess. I am sooo frustrated. I've called this company about 1/2 dozen times and keep getting transfered around. I've written multiple emails that are completely ignored. It's as if they don't exist. Anyone have any success getting any customer service out of this outfit?

Wow, sorry about your problems magster. It sounds like yours doesn't work. I e-mailed them when our rake started rusting and they responded right away and sent me a new rake(which hasn't rusted). If you still have the box you could probably return or exchange it.

As VelvetXJones stated earlier, the waste receptacle is way too small. I noticed that right away because we have two cats and one of them prides herself on being a well-oiled poop factory. And, yes the rake doesn't tilt down enough to make sure that everything actually gets dumped and not brought right back into the litterbox. But I noticed the bigger problem is that poop already in the waste receptacle can prohibit the rake from having a good release of the new poop coming in. (Can't believe I'm actually typing all this crappola). But anyway, if you are going to be changing the bag in the receptacle every couple of days what's the point? So I built a wooden box that is about a foot in depth with a hole cut out on the top and I have the Littersweep machine on top. I also cut out the bottom of the littersweep receptacle with a jigsaw (cuts out very easily and nicely) so the poop gets dropped down into a big (normal) size plastic litter box that i have lined with a trashcan plastic bag. The poop always drops in and I'm not worrying about anything. I added a hinge swing door on the front of my box and I lift it and slide out the plastic box. No smells. No mess.