Forget the Polaris 380; the Polaris 280 is a far better unit.

Polaris makes the best cleaners on the market (unless you want to spend more than $900) and the Polaris 280 is the best cleaner Polaris makes. I’ve owned 3 Polaris poolsweeps and here’s my story. I bought a Polaris 180 in 1982 and it worked great for me for 19 years. I really liked the look of the 380 (with the easily removed bag and larger throat) so in 2001, I “upgraded” to the 380. I liked the larger throat and easy-to-remove filter bag, but compared to my 19 year old Polaris 180, the Polaris 380 was a big disappointment. The drive system uses 2 rubber belts that fray and break frequently. The 380 would clean OK, but it took a lot more time to clean the pool than my good old 180. It often ‘floated” about 12 – 24 inches off the floor of the pool (not cleaning anything). I had a Polaris rep come out and check the pump pressure and volume, hose length, wheel speed etc, and he stated everything was working as necessary. My local pool guy looked at it also and recommended a 280, stating it was far superior to the 380 in his opinion.

Two months ago, I had it and bought a new Polaris 280. In case you’re not aware of it, the 280 is a newer version of the reliable and effective Polaris 180, but has a bigger throat and easy-to-remove bag. The 280 is quite an improvement over the 180 and (even more so) the 380 and costs about $100 less than the 380. Don’t waste your time on the 380. Polaris had the best cleaner on the planet with the 180. The 380 was supposed to be an improved unit, but in my experience certainly was not.

Finally, if you’re buying a pool cleaner, be aware that all good effective cleaners will need to be serviced and have some wear parts replaced every few years. The parts aren’t expensive and many pool shops do the labor for free. Be prepared to spend about $30 - $40 every two years for wear parts.