Are you sick of your Hover mower?

fatmarley

fatmarley

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Matt
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We have quite a large garden and our Hover-mower was doing my head in. It's very hard to push because the garden in uneven and being a top-of-the-range hover mower, it's heavy and doesn't really hover at all. If it gets stuck in a dip, I sometimes have to push with all my weight to get the bl**dy thing to move.

The thought of mowing the lawn last weekend filled me with dread - so I found a local shop that specialised in lawn mowers, got in the car and went to the shop.

I was thinking about buying a Bosch rotak 43 but was a little concerned because I read some stuff online about the motors burning out. The guy in the shop didn't have any Bosch lawn mowers in stock but suggested I try an Al-ko 40E.

Our lawn was quite high in places because some of it is new grass and grows far, far quicker than the old grass. The new mower is so much better than the old hover mower. It's very powerful and flew through the high grass like it wasn't there. It's also light'ish and really easy to push (because of the four wheels).

I did a bit of searching online and found this:

Quote: "Universal motors (i.e. with brushes) have to be geared down
to driver mower blades - they spin too fast otherwise.
Universal motors are used in cheaper low grade mowers of the
type you'll find in the sheds. Universal motors are dirt cheap
but are completely wrong torque profile for grass cutting,
which is why they slow down under load just when you need more
cutting power, and deliver much less.

Induction motors drive mower blades directly.
You'll find these on higher spec mowers, but you may have to
go to a mower specialist. The torque profile of an induction
motor is much more ideal for grass cutting - max torque at
nearly full speed (so it will maintain speed and cutting
power under load), rather than at locked rotor. Expect to pay
more, but also expect longer motor life. Also, the induction
motor is significantly more efficient, and unlike the cheap
universal mower motors, IME induction motors in mowers don't
waste power heating themselves up way too hot to touch. As a
result of this, don't be surprised to find they are lower power
rating for same width cut, because they manage to use more
of the power for cutting and less wasted in the motor.
No motor brushes to wear out either."

The Al-ko uses an induction motor and comes with a 2 year guarantee. The reason for posting this is because if it wasn't for the guy in the shop i'd probably have some crappy mower that would only last a year or two. I thought a mower was a mower but I guess there's more to it than that. And before you suggest it - No I don't want a petrol mower!
 
I bought an atco cylinder mower a few years back. Great mower, will last years and does a lovely cut.
 
I've got a Bosch Rotak, makes a grand job and works just as well on wet grass as dry, something my old petrol mower just would not do. Still on my first moter here, no sign of it burning out.....
 
cambsno said:
I bought an atco cylinder mower a few years back. Great mower, will last years and does a lovely cut.
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I looked at those but read somewhere that the lawn has to be pretty flat for a cylinder mower. They are supposed to give a very good cut though.
 
Steep said:
I've got a Bosch Rotak, makes a grand job and works just as well on wet grass as dry, something my old petrol mower just would not do. Still on my first moter here, no sign of it burning out.....
Click to expand...

I've heard people say flymo hovers don't last long but we've had ours for years too. I guess it's part luck and partly how you treat them. Or maybe maybe it's the ones with the smaller motors that burn-out more often?
 
fatmarley said:
I've heard people say flymo hovers don't last long but we've had ours for years too. I guess it's part luck and partly how you treat them. Or maybe maybe it's the ones with the smaller motors that burn-out more often?
Click to expand...

We've had our flymo for 3years and broke last month. Only cost us £40 in the sale and was very light and easy to swing about. It had a hard life too!
 
I have a large rough field grass lawn and have to use one of these and even then it is tedious and monotonous
a-series-b.jpg

time to get some sheep lol
 
I bought "er indoors a petrol electric start petrol with power drive which works well for our private garden area.

Link

http://www.gardenlines.co.uk/lawn-m...ebb-r20es-self-propelled-electric-start-mower

I use a Countax C600H with a 16HP honda engine which suits my 2 acres of paddocks just fine.Its far far better than Lawnflite range in every respect. Lawnflite is designs for the USA market (I had 2 different ones) and the drive belt kept breaking on both, its too long and thin do do the work (avoid). My current Countax C600H is so easy to remove the cutting deck say to sharpen the blades it even has a tension drive belt release lever. It can so easily be fitted with different decks be it mulching or cutting. Well worth considering for up to a couple of acres of land

DSC_2192.jpg

My Countax

Realspeed
 
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of all the self propelled mowers I have had over the years the best one was my little old mountfield made of plastic with a rear roller
the others I have had were 3 times the price made of cast aluminium and had wheels on each corner
they were heavy and hard work
the little old mountfield was light and was much better with the rear roller for rough lawns
 
Get yourself a petrol powered cylinder mower, one with a built in roller at it's rear, and you can do it like this . . .

Grasscutting.jpg


Anyway, being serious, I, too, have switched over to using a smallish sized petrol rotary mower fives years ago after years of getting through silly little electric flymos at an alarming rate. Flymos seems to have the life span of a fruit fly after they conk out after only a couple of seasons, but this petrol one (a mountfield) has already practically paid for itself!
And they cut better than flymos, even though they are push-wheeled.
 
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It is worth looking at a small petrol one such as the mountfield or honda.
We only have a smallish area to cut so the electric hover used to seem ideal, but having had the petrol one several years it is considerably quicker than messing about with dirty cables and actual running time is far less too.
The petrol used is trivial really, the tank only holds about half a litre and that does the job three or four times.
 
we have a gardener
 
roflol at the ride on hedge trimmer
flymo got sued many years ago as someone injured themselves using the flymo as a hedge cutter and flymo lost as it didn't have a warning label advising not to
 
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Our lawn is fairly uneven/rough but the Flymo hover mower has been coping for at least 6 years. I have absolutely no interest in gardening, and it's fine as far as I'm concerned.
 
I have an ancient flymo, at least 20 years old. I sharpen the blade about twice a year and that is it.
 
wildsam90 said:
We've had our flymo for 3years and broke last month. Only cost us £40 in the sale and was very light and easy to swing about. It had a hard life too!
Click to expand...

My late Dad had flymo's and I used to cut his lawn for him. If the grass in the back was long and overgrown, (which it usually was, I reckon it could win medals for how quick it grew:lol:) I used to lift the flymo up, use it as a strimmer to get down to a manageable height, then use it in the conventional method to finish off.
 
Took me long enough to work out what a strimmer is. We called them weed eaters in SA.
 
fatmarley said:
I looked at those but read somewhere that the lawn has to be pretty flat for a cylinder mower. They are supposed to give a very good cut though.
Click to expand...

Thats right, too many lumps and bumps are no good, it does give an very good cut though. Rubbish at cutting very long grass however.
 
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