Wagner, SIDEKICK Powered Roller, Included (qty.) 1 Width 9 in, Adjustable Handle, Model# 0530010

We spent a lot of time with drop cloths the first day. Totally unnecessary with this. Most of the drips from traditional painting come from pouring paint into the pan, loading the roller, etc. the reduced prep time makes this a no brainer. The clean up IS a pain. By the end of our house, there were dried chunks of paint inside the metal roller rod, which made the paint distribution uneven, but I would attribute that to the fact that we often wrapped the roller in a plastic bag and left it if we were not changing color, and as result it often went three days without being cleaned. If you were really religious about cleaning it, I’m sure that wouldn’t happen, but thoroughly cleaning this takes at least an hour. all that being said, I still give this a five star review, because realistically the cost is only about $10-$15 more than you would pay for traditional roller pieces, and if you’re only doing one house (i.e., you are not a professional painter who intends to use this every day for a year ) then I think you can justify this and throw it away when you’re done. After you get the hang of it, this is substantially faster than traditional dip, painting, much less messy. I would not recommend it for someone who is just doing one or two walls, but for someone who intends to do a large DIY project like painting their whole house, this is a no-brainer.

I don’t know what happened to the people who had bad experiences with this roller system. I thought it was great. It didn’t leak at all and was a lot easier to clean than I imagined it would be. I also was worried about the weight being an issue during use, but even without great upper body strength, I had no problems. I actually think it used much less effort than a normal roller and all the extraneous movement involved in going back to the paint tray 4,000 times.The only thing I had trouble with was getting it to suck up the paint once the can level was low (about 1-1-5”). I should’ve expected it, but I didn’t. Otherwise I really enjoyed using it and think it was a totally worthwhile purchase.

I have always found that the Power Roller is worth the clean-up if you are doing a big job. The Sidekick is similar to the Power Rollers I have used in the past, but there was one big problem that I had to get creative to solve.In prior Power Roller models that I have used, the button to send the paint to the roller was at the bottom of the extension handle. The paint flowed through the extension handle. It made sense. The sidekick's design did not make sense when I tried using an extension handle.Because the button to turn the pump on and off - and therefore control the flow of paint - is located in the handle that is connected to the roller, installing an extension pole puts the button with the roller at the top of the extension pole. As a result, you have to press the button to start the flow of paint, quickly use the pole to move the roller to the ceiling to apply paint, and then pull the roller back down quickly to turn the pump off before too much paint is applied. Many times the paint would drip because I could not get to the roller at the end of the pole fast enough. Very frustrating, especially after the previous Power Roller designs worked much better in this regard.I started to think about alternate ways to turn the pump on and off and came up with a solution. I purchased a wireless remote control outlet.I purchased this one from Amazon: Wireless Remote Control Outlet, Fosmon Outdoor Electrical Outlet Switch Weatherproof Heavy Duty, 3-Prong Plug-in ETL Listed (Battery Included). I plugged the remote control outlet into the wall, then plugged the sidekick into it. I then turned on the main power switch on the base of unit and pressed the button in the handle connected to the top of the pole. After that, I taped the remote control switch to the bottom of the pole and used it to turn the unit on and off. Never had to take the roller off the ceiling (except when my arms got tired...)With that fix, the unit works great. Again, I would not recommend it for small jobs because of the cleanup involved, but if you are doing a lot of painting, this unit will save you time and paint.

This is by far the worst designed product I’ve ever bought. Not just paint product, general product. It sounds like a cool idea, but the mechanism for filling this is just like filling a syringe. You pull the plunger back to suck up paint. Except there isn’t a good seal at the end of the plunger, so now the entire length of the plunger is covered in paint and dripping as you load and start painting. Additionally, it pulls more air than it does paint. I never could fully fill the thing after having painted one full 11x14 ft bedroom with it. It’s also quite heavy which gets tiring fast. The longer I used it, the more I disliked it. Then I went to clean it and became fully enraged with it. I did the bucket of water as per instructions but when I went to take apart all the pieces to wash them individually, I got more paint on my kitchen floor than on the bedroom walls I painted. Not only did I waste all that paint, I made a huge messs. It took me twice as long to clean the product and my kitchen as it did to paint a single coat. Please, please do not waste your money on this awful thing.

Will make quick work of larger painting projects. It does take a bit of time to clean after use so I would not recommend for a single wall. However, if you are painting multiple rooms or large area's this is an awesome DIY tool to have. No more bending over 1,000 times to fill the roller. Once you master the paint flow you will paint for hours without having to pause to load a roller.