It is self propelled. It took me a quarter of the time to do our lawns as it normally does, so I had time to trim the hedges…
It is self propelled. It took me a quarter of the time to do our lawns as it normally does, so I had time to trim the hedges…
My lawn is not that large, its just on a 30° incline, and pushing the mower up that hill in 40°C days, while brutal, was manageable.
We’ve had torrential rain periods for the last few months, so instead of the lawn growing 2-3cm a week, it’s been growing 7-10cm a week. This meant that I’ve had to progressively mow it 4x to get the job done.
New lawnmower has twin blades, so it makes it through the length much more easily, and I can set the front wheels 1/2 a setting lower to help the mower get through the crazy growth.
The cross cutting and cloth bag means it doesn’t clog the catcher instantly and I don’t need 4x passes to return the lawn to useable.
The self propelled bit is rather magical though. It takes itself up the hill.
It does use a little more fuel that the last one, but I’m ok with that.
We’ve had a ton of rain the past few summers too. Not only does the grass grow quickly, it also means the lawn stays wet longer making it tougher to mow(especially on your own schedule).
Interesting putting the front wheels lower helps, I would have thought the opposite. I’ll have to try that.
The old guy that runs the mower shop I went to (had to drive 25kms) suggested it.
He said that all the Australian mowers with a “flat” deck already have this tilt built into it by default, so I had to manually do that on this one that let’s you set each wheel height independently.
Apparently, if I remember correctly, it helps with the length as the grass is cut earlier and is then above the blades sooner, rather than clogging it from underneath, and the rear of the cut path isn’t fighting grass as much and can create the vacuum to get the clippings into the bag.
As the model I chose has a “Blade Brake” that lets me stop the blades but keep the mower running, the only thing he suggested to me was not to start the blades mid path, and if I had to, to lift the front up as I engaged the blades, as they lift just a little as they come up to speed.
I forgot a few times, and I can see the few little areas where it cuts a little bit shorter than desired, so it was good advice.
I chose that shop as they had the models I wanted to compare in stock, and the guy who owned the place and his wife both seemed to know the models inside out on their short YouTube videos…
The other places I rang just told me they didn’t carry any stock, and that everything I needed was on the Honda webpage, so you can probably binder stand why I drove the extra distance.