It's here! Had to happen, and it has! You now have your very own "Man Friday" to do your house cleaning for you! Well, don't dump your vacuum cleaner just yet, but yes, you can sit back and relax while the vacuuming gets done by itself, thanks to the floor robot vacuum cleaner.



All you have to do is to turn the robot on. After that it deals with all the vacuuming duties by itself, no supervision required! It runs according to a program which is embedded in its circuitry. The robot can be easily reprogrammed by the user from time to time. This reprogramming can be done directly or remotely. Some robots use the Internet, others use the equally ubiquitous cell phone system to perform remote programming.

The floor cleaning robot uses the latest robotic techniques and logic to perform its job. It sees the dirt on the floor or the carpet and determines how many passes it should make over that area. The models that are available now are pretty small, deliberately so, so that they can go under beds and settees.

The robot is programmed to navigate around objects, or to turn back when it reaches the end of the room. How it does so depends on the model you buy. Sophisticated but expensive models detect boundary conditions using non-contact techniques like infrared or ultrasonic. Cheaper models stop only after colliding into the obstacle. This can damage the robot as well as the furniture and the walls, so you're well advised to get a model with rubber bumpers.

The robot vacuum cleaner does its job real well. There is a small problem with cleaning tight areas like the join of the floor and the wall, and corners. This robot does a great job with general house cleaning. The fine cleaning will have to be done manually.

Your robot can't climb stairs and so you'll have to do the stairs too. Then you'll have to look out for other problems that the robot can't handle. One example is the loose fringe that is often found on the edge of rugs and carpets. The long loose threads of the fringes can get ingested by the robot vacuum cleaner, causing it to come to a grinding halt. These and some other problems still need to be sorted out. But they are incidental to the main work that the robot does so well, and that is floor cleaning.

The robot works on any flooring surface that is common in households and offices. It is good at picking up the usual mess around the house, bits of paper and plastic, matchsticks, hair shed by your pets, and even a little water or other liquid spilt here and there.

The mobility of these robot cleaners is due to their self-contained power packs. When it is time for a recharge, the robot advises you of this by audio-visual signals. Some really brainy models scurry themselves off to the recharging station and get the recharge done by themselves! The starting price of these robots is really quite affordable. Specialty features raise the price, and according to the features they provide the price can rise to what can fairly be called exorbitant.

The robot takes over the boring task of vacuuming for you, and lets you devote your precious time to more important functions, like looking after someone ill in the family or preparing the day's meals. Be warned that the robot floor vacuum cleaner actually takes quite a lot of time in cleaning the floor! If you need the floor cleaned in a jiffy, then you'd better do it yourself.

Ah yes, there's also the small matter of emptying the robot floor cleaner which is still your responsibility. But this is just a minor irritant compared to the advantages of having a robot do your vacuuming for you. Not only does it save you your time, it releases you from that feeling of drudgery that is part and parcel of doing the same old job, day in and day out.