Missing Link

If you own a Roomba, and also own an area rug that happens to have dark colors, you’ve probably run into an issue where your Roomba thinks the dark colors are actually perilous drop-off’s that will lead it to it’s doom.  In other words – it won’t clean that rug, or will freak out and get stuck.   This is because the Roomba’s Cliff Sensors have trouble distinguishing between dark colored carpet and an actual “cliff”, so to be safe it backs away.

The easiest fix for this is to tape a piece of white paper (cut to size) over the cliff sensors (four of them).  While this works fairly well,  I found with my Roomba that often this taped on paper gets torn up and dirty over time, requiring it to be replaced – which means further upkeep and maintenance beyond the fairly high routine maintenance you already have to do.  I often would not have the motivation to re-fix the cliff sensors,  meaning my Roomba would be benched for weeks.

Last night I got tired of fighting with my Roomba over this, and decided to implement a more permanent fix.

The way the Roomba’s cliff sensors work are that they fire a beam of IR at the ground with an IR Transmitter,   which bounces off and is received by a separate IR receiver.   These are kept separate from each other in the sensor housing.   When a “cliff” is encountered, the IR signal doesn’t bounce back, and the Roomba backs off.   This also occurs with dark colored flooring.

The fix involves an almost complete dis-assemble of the Roomba (following directions found here: http://www.pottsland.com/roomba/Roomba_5xx_Cliff_Sensor.html), an effort that is not difficult assuming you’re comfortable taking apart and re-assembling electronics,  and taking the IR transmitter and Receivers out of their housings, taping them together, and putting them back in the clear sensor casing.   This way – when the IR Transmitter sends its signal, the receiver always sees it.

For obvious reasons you should not do this to a Roomba that will be operating where it can fall down stairs or where it needs to avoid falling from heights.  Mine cleans the ground floor of my house, so I don’t have to worry.

The fix worked great – no more worrying about cliff sensors for me.

Now if only I could get the Roomba (his name is FloMar by the way), to clean his own brushes….