Customer Reviews

Drinkwell 360 Pet Fountain, Stainless Steel

5 star:		(37)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

I have been shopping for a new watering set up for my new Maine Coon cat who adores water! I came across this the day it was released. It was similar to the plastic model but it looked like it had a stainless steel insert. I had a bit of an issue with the price but I ordered it anyway. I got it the very next day and was I surprised! The dish is 100% stainless steel! The quality is top notch! I use the ring (the few plastic parts it has) with a 3 spout. My Mokie LOVES it! If he had opposable thumbs he would give it a 2 thumbs up rating, so I guess it is a 2 dew claw rating for now from him and a 2 thumbs up from dad. It runs quiet, noisier if you want it to and adjust the volume of the water high. It is attractive, functional and I am proud to have it out in full view when people come over since it doesn't look like a cheap cat fountain. I love this and am VERY glad I went ahead and spent the extra on the stainless model for both aesthetic reasons and for the health reasons for Mokie since stainless resists bacterial growth better than plastic.

2 PAWS UP, way up!

My cat has enjoyed this Stainless Steel Drinkwell fountain for about a year. Stainless steel is the best route to go to avoid bacteria in the water that can be harmful for the cat. Bacteria can get in cracks and pitting in plastic units. My 16 year old cat loves to drink the water from the stream and I am sure that drinking from this fountain is helping her kidneys and keeping her healthy. However, my husband and I have a VERY hard time putting the unit back together after cleaning it. It takes a LOT of patience to line up the parts to get it working again. I think that the company should work to improve the design. One idea would be to make the cone in the middle (or a portion of the cone) with BPA free glass so that it would possible to see that the fountain unit is properly aligned with the motor to get it running.

I purchased this as a replacement fountain for my beloved original Drinkwell 360 fountain. While still difficult to clean, the original 360 fountain was the best of all the Drinkwell fountains I have owned, and I have owned many. I loved my fountain, but I bought this one specifically for one of my indoor cats that is having terrible cat acne issues.

Pros: stainless steel, so good for cats prone to cat acne from plastic bowls. Some people will like the shiny metal. Still has the great features of the original such as a good pump, multiple number of spigots, and the parts fit together well.

Cons: The shiny metal makes it difficult to see the water level in the bowl. The faint markings on the shiny metal make it difficult to judge how much water should be in the bowl at all. The new clips are difficult to lock down, and then difficult to remove for cleaning. No markings on the bottom to indicate where the pump should be placed. Hard to reach certain areas to clean, but better with bottle brushes (sold separately). Base is bigger than the other -- doesn't fit into my standard sized sink, so is difficult to clean.

I've had this in use for a little over a week and just did the first cleaning. The stainless steel part seems to be working - my cat's underchin acne is clearing. However, the terrible cleaning experience leaves me wishing I had never purchased it. For starters, the basin is too wide to fit into a standard sized sink. It's larger than the original by enough to make it only fit by angling it, where the original fit perfectly at the bottom and stayed flat, making it a great basin to hold the parts as you were cleaning. The next thing I noticed was how difficult it was to get the clips off. In the original design, the cone just locked into place with built-in plastic grooves, which was a really easy way to get it to stay in place, even if you didn't lock it down all the way. With the clips, I had to get out a butter knife to pry the edges away from the rim - which means they will break off at some point. Cleaning was no easier than the other, but buying the bottle brushes they sell separately was certainly worthwhile.

When putting it back together, I noticed that it was difficult to remember which direction the pump should go, as the instructions say to put the pump in relation to the rounded edges of the spot for the pump. Guess what, all the edges are rounded in the spot for the pump. Once the cone was in place, I realized I'd put it in backwards and the water wouldn't flow up the cone, so had to take it apart again. The clips were difficult to put back, not hooking as easily as I'd hoped. I appreciate the hole in the base of the cone where the cord goes.

To help alleviate the mess I'd been making all week trying to see the water levels (since there is a minimum water level to maintain for the pump), I decided to use a red sharpie marker to mark the two lines (min and max) to see if that helps. It did help on the minimum level, but once you start adding more water, the reflection from the water on all that metal just makes it all shimmer, so you really can't tell if the water is too full or right at the line. You can't tell if it is a reflection lapping at the line or the real water line. Hopefully the marker lines won't disappear. Once water is in the bowl and the bowl is placed on the floor, all those lines disappear from the angle.

I run my fountain without the carbon and debris filters, since my cats get RO water. It all runs fine without it. Debris from their food and from shedding is pretty much a guarantee that I'll clean it weekly, so I don't mind that part and is a great reminder when a week is up.

All in all, I have loved my other fountains from Drinkwell, but I'll be rid of this one as soon as I humanly can. The design flaws definitely outweigh the part about having a stainless steel bowl area. I don't know how this one made it to market when it is such a let down compared to the original 360, and I certainly don't recommend this to anyone who will be cleaning it out on a weekly basis. You're much better off with the original plastic one. Now if they would just incorporate some of the better designs from the original one into this one, I'd be a happy camper.

In my opinion, you should not believe the advertisement that says this fountain will cut down on plastic allergies. We ordered this product for our cat whose lip kept swelling up. The vet thought it might be from her plastic drinkwell fountain or the bacteria that can grow on the plastic despite regular cleaning. All of the fountain parts and pump of the stainless steel version as well as the clips that sit in the bowl are all made of the same plastic as the original drinkwell. I verified it with the company so your pet's water will constantly sit in plastic parts and be filtered through plastic parts. If the cat drinks from the top they will be touching plastic as well. If you are buying it for looks, fine; but if you are buying it for a plastic allergy, save your money and the aggravation of sending it back.

I got this as a "Christmas present" for our six cats. One of them has an allergy to plastic (evident by blackheads on the chin, that look a bit like dead fleas at first), so I had to stop using the plastic waterers that I really liked. Actually, I jury-rigged one by cutting the vertical "wall" from the drinking vessel, and set the whole thing into a large glass baking dish. That way, I could still just keep the "tank" full, without the cats needing to touch the plastic. Anyway...I also liked the idea of keeping the water fresher through circulation. I could always tell when it was time to clean and change the water in my cobbled-together dish by how insistant everyone started getting about alternative sources of water (toilet, my glass, the shower, etc.) This was the only fountain I could find that held a decent amount of water, and was made of something other than plastic.

Some of the kitties took to it right away, but others not so well. I had to turn it off for several hours/day for a few days, just so one of my cats would try it out/stay hydrated. Eventually, he got the hang of it.

With six cats (in the winter), I need to top off the water level once/day, with about 30 oz. However, I can go two days before it gets critically low. While I have to fill it more often than my old waterer, it is much easier to do so, since I just have to pour it into the bowl. The manufacturer recommends changing the carbon filter every 2 weeks, but I think that's just a money-making tactic. I've been running it for over a month (6 cats!), and have not had any problems. I wouldn't have been worried about filtering the water even if we didn't have as good a quality source as we do, but I'm leaving the filter in until such time as it doesn't work anymore. Then I'll just run it without. (Perfectly fine to do!)

I have two minor gripes about the design. 1) The three black plastic clips that hold the cone into the bowl aren't designed very well. There are no indentations in the bottom of the bowl for set locations, so if you are on a hard surface (kitchen counter), and press down on the whole thing, the clips will be forced off. They are also a bit difficult to get on, and never really feel secure. 2)The cone best lines up with the pump cord in such a way that the Min/Max fill lines on the cone line up towards the side of the bowl that you would expect to be closer to the wall (near the cord), making it awkward to see how much to fill the bowl. This may seem a little silly, but when pouring clear liquid into a highly reflective vessel like this, the level of the water isn't always the easiest to see.

I haven't played too much with the varied number of streams available through the different rings. I just quickly settled on 2 streams, as it allowed two cats to drink from the opposite sided streams, while leaving enough room for a cat to drink directly from the bowl without risking getting his head wet (and not liking the bowl.)

Well, I have had almost every type of Drinkwell fountain made. Personally I really like the 360 design the best for cleaning. And now in stainless steel it cleans up even faster, and better too. I noticed that even with the high quality of the plastic they used on the original version, it began to feel somewhat etched after a while and was not as smooth as when I first bought it. Made it difficult to tell if it was really squeaky clean or not when servicing it. But the stainless is great. No chance of it getting etched or worn at all. And boy, this one is absolutely silent if you wish. You can increase the water flow if you like which does then make the waterfall noise, which most people find a pleasant sound anyway. But I like being able to make it fully silent at times on the lowest setting. It is tough to see the water level marks printed on the fountain now because of how shiny the stainless steel background is. But it isn't really hard to tell when it needs to be topped off just by a glance once you get familiar with it.

After reading most of the reviews here before I bought the stainless version, I was a little leery of the clips that hold the two main pieces together. But I have had no problem at all snapping them off and back on. I just use my thumb on the bottom to pull them slightly outwards and they just pop off. And they do somewhat click into place on the bottom, so I have had no trouble with mine. I did order more in case they break, as well as some of the additional pump filters because that seemed like a good idea to me. I added one extra clip to my fountain so now I have 4 on instead of 3, but I just did it because I think it looks nicer, more symmetrical. This fountain really is very pretty.

The only thing I dislike about either 360 version is that despite the pretty large width of the entire unit, the bowl part of the fountain is somewhat narrow. Because of this the kitties heads are almost pressing against the cone shaped middle piece if they try to drink out of the bowl portion, rather than from the flowing waterfall, and some kitties do prefer a bowl of water to a running waterfall. Still everyone seems to be getting enough water so I think they are ok with it.

Other people mentioned it is hard to line it back up during re-assembly. I just look down through the empty filter housing piece to make sure it lands on top of the intake tube that is sticking up from the pump and push it into place and then continue putting in the charcoal filter and the other pieces after that is done. It has been very simple doing it that way.

I bought the reusable refillable charcoal filter by Forever Filter, also available on Amazon, and so far feel it is a quality product. I like not contributing to the landfills by constantly disposing of the other plastic ones. And it will pay for itself after 5-6 months. Overall a great fountain. I was very pleased. Now I have to get one for my sister's kitties. Maybe for Christmas!

I've been using the standard Drinkwell and Petmate fountains for years, and while they were as good as they could be, they all had a fatal flaw, which was all the nooks and crannies that made cleaning them well almost impossible. Over time they'd inevitably build up crud and slime that was more or less permanent. I was about to order yet another replacement Petmate fountain due to this problem when I decided I'd blow some Amazon Rewards points and try this fountain. After using it a few weeks, all I can say is wow! This unit breaks down very quickly with a little practice, and there's virtually no small inaccessible places for crud to collect. The only place I can see where that might be an issue is the bottom of the filter housing, but by the time the water gets there, its already gone through two stages of filtering, so I don't see it being an issue. At least, I haven't seen any build up in there yet. And even if it becomes one, it's a $7.20 part that needs to be replaced, versus the entire unit when it becomes too dirty to clean anymore. The rest of the fountain cleans up very quickly, especially the two peices of the main unit -- there's no surface you can't swab down with a sponge and soapy water. I also spent a little more and got the Reusable Filter :Reusable Filter for Drinkwell 360 + 3-month Supply of Carbon - from another vendor, and while a little pricey at first, it'll pay for itself quickly and enable me to change the filter media with each cleaning. The cats love it already -- they drink right off the stream like kids drinking from a bubbler.

Love the Drinkwell 360 plastic version. Thought the stainless would be even better, but we have very hard water so after a few days of use the stainless Drinkwell became very ugly looking. It is almost impossible to clean unless you soak it all in CLR (which I have a hard doing due to my hesitation of using deadly chemicals on something my cats drink out of). Going to go back to plastic.

I have owned several Drinkwell Pet Fountains and the 360 Pet Fountain is easily the best. Although the filters are a bit more expensive than their less expensive pet fountains, this one is so easy to clean. It takes me about 3 minutes to disassemble the fountain, clean it and put it back together again. My cats also love to drink out of it. I highly recommend the Drinkwell 360 Pet Fountain.

this is a great watering system for the cats and would be for smaller dogs too. it is large, or seems that way initially, but it is just right for a small herd of cats. it must be cleaned weekly, but them you wash your glsses and coffee mugs once in a while too, don't you? before purchasing this i spoke with the manufacturer and came away convinced it would be a good purchase for my needs. they make the same 369 degree fountain in plastic, and that initially caused some concern about evil slime growing in the pores of the plastic. the drinkwell fold are smart enough to know about that and they use a non-porous plastic in all of their drinking fountains. having spoked with the designers i was quite happy to find this product lived up to my expectations. you can't go wrong here. one cat dove right in, so to speak, and the other had to be weaned from her purposefully dripping sink. it took a while, but the effort was worth it in the end.