New lawn mower advice...

[Kainz]

Hey all,

I require a lawn mower for a small garden. In the past my father has always stuck with Flymo, despite me knowing they're absolutely useless these days. I purchased a Flymo Glider 330 'Hover' mower last May (stupidest purchase ever by yours truly...) and just a month ago in April the drive belt shredded itself. I thought mowers were still direct drive so my dad and I were surprised.

Bought a geniune flymo belt replacement, installed it perfectly and managed just one successful mow of the lawn. The second mow today saw the belt shred itself again. Upon inspecting the mower, the motor had not slipped on it's 4 screw mounts, which suggests the belt was just useless.

I had read about flymo drive belts being of poor quality but took the risk anyway. I am at a loss about what to do now. I've got a year old mower that my dad and I have no confidence in.

I don't know what the state of mowers is like these days but I could do with help finding something suitable. We would like an electric mower with grass collection and something that doesn't rely on a belt - is there such a thing?

 

[Kainz]

Ok. After discussing this with my father as I had mentioned the Bosch Rotak series - he's instead started looking at petrol mowers like the Mountfield HP164 since our budget is £150 tops. Petrol is overkill for our garden but it means no wires at least.

 

[Kainz]

I had a wheeled Flymo which I persevered with for years despite it having several design faults.

When I moved house, changed to a Bosch Rotak, and it's a massive improvement. Lighter, more powerful, much better design.

I would have though if your lawn is small then a petrol one is a bit of a waste. And I imagine much more involving to maintain.

Any idea if that Rotak is a belt driven machine? Having spoken with my father he has stated that the garden is 60ft. I don't spend much time in it unlike he does

 

[Kainz]

Consider stretching the budget and going LiON, I just bought a £200 Greenworks 40V mower and its fantastic.

Hmm I am not a fan of cordless appliances I confess. Surely the power draw on a cordless lawn mower will be high, therefore requiring the battery be recharged a great deal. Over time the capacity of said battery will dwindle and a replacement would be costly I'd imagine?

 

[Kainz]

Thank you gents, looks like you've all given me enough information to go on.

I do think the LiON route is just well out of our price range and that Einhell Sparx mentioned looks quite tempting. I've been told by friends to look out for a machine that has a Briggs & Stratton engine but those seem out of our max £150 budget from the looks of things. I'll spend a few hours this morning looking around but that Einhell PM46 has my eye at the moment.

 

[Kainz]

Thanks all for the replies. I hadn't checked this thread in a few days (forgot!) and in the end my dad and I went for a Bosch Rotak 32R over the Einhell I mentioned earlier. The latter my local Toolstation were being odd about for their delivery dates (citing July!) and I was tiring of looking at mowers in general at the time. Grabbed a 32R for £75 and it did a good job on our lawn on the first cut after some much fiddling around with the cutting height. I just didn't want to spend £150+ on something we'll use a few times a year on a medium sized lawn.

I remember when I was a kid, back in the 80's my dad had some light blue steel/square deck bladed electric mower from Qualcast. That thing was an absolute BEAST and lasted until the mid 90's before it's motor packed up. It had no grass collection but it would chomp through anything and was so robust in construction. They really made superb mowers in the late 70's and 80's. My Flymo experience has hugely disappointed me - I've had lego builds less flimsy than my previous mower.

 

[Kainz]

Great choice, I don't even find the wire much faff, just plug into an extension lead and cut from right to left, the wire never gets in the way.

Which setting did you go for? I cut on 4 at the moment, as had no rain all month, so shorter grass will struggle.

Ours is on the lowest setting, I think that results in a 2cm cut? I just hope we have no issues with this guy, however build quality is a lot better than the Flymo.