Still struggling with the starter cord on your dirty old gas mower? It's time to recycle that loud and polluting contraption and move into the future with a quiet, cheap, and easy to use electric mower. The same is true for other lawn tools. Electric bush trimmers, leaf blowers and even chain saws are amazingly good now and you can use them all without going deaf. Still not convinced? Read on to find out more.
Incredibly janky port of comments from my old WordPress site:
Andrew
2021-11-10 at 9:58 pm
We just moved and our 0.8-acre urban homestead in the making was too much for my beloved Fiskars reel mower and corded string trimmer. I’m committed to owning only the one engine in our van, so this article was very helpful in navigating the battery tool options. I’d intended on getting the Kobalt 40V mower, but they have been unavailable for months, so I ended up with the Ego 56V (bought at full retail…my grass was knee-high!). It powers through tall wet grass at least as well as a gas mower. I’ve since added a string trimmer and hedge clippers. Acme tools sells refurbished Ego tools with batteries for the retail price of just the batteries. With a 5ah and two 2.5ah batteries, I can now mow continuously, at least enough to finish the yard.
Incredibly janky port of comments from my old WordPress site:
Dan
2021-04-28 at 3:04 am
This is so well written up, thank you for the analysis. I just wanted to chime in with our reel mower experience and a couple of points you may not have considered.
One easy way I like to do research is to find the most expensive product in a category and analyze it very carefully to see what features it has (I only look at functional features not like “dipped in gold” or anything). For lawn mowers in general, not just reel, I believe the state of the art would have to be Swardman: https://www.swardman.com/en/electra-55-reel-mower/ These things run upwards of $3000! Their claim is that if you cut grass with a reel rather than a more common blade, it clips the grass in a way that’s healthier for it and the general lawn ecosystem. Since I never believe marketing I dug around and it does look like golf courses use reel mowers for precise and healthy cuts, and that in general people agree reels are better. With that in mind, we looked for an electric reel mower that didn’t require us to get a second mortgage, and found a couple. But with limited options we found short battery lives and reports of “what’s the point, just push it yourself”.
We used the Fiskar for a couple years on a small lawn and loved it. But it is VERY heavy. The Gardena is a welcome replacement on our larger lawn. We mow our front and back yard, probably somewhere around ~4000 sq. ft., in about 40 minutes or so. I’m not in stellar shape and I don’t really get exhausted doing it, but it’s work. On hot days I definitely sweat a bunch, and if I run instead of walk, I’m gasping by the end of it. So this is my second point: I actually *like* that it makes me move and gets my heart rate up a bit. We’re way too sedentary these days, I’ve learned to appreciate any way I can trick myself into moving some more.
Electric Lawn Tools Rule
Incredibly janky port of comments from my old WordPress site:
Andrew
2021-11-10 at 9:58 pm
We just moved and our 0.8-acre urban homestead in the making was too much for my beloved Fiskars reel mower and corded string trimmer. I’m committed to owning only the one engine in our van, so this article was very helpful in navigating the battery tool options. I’d intended on getting the Kobalt 40V mower, but they have been unavailable for months, so I ended up with the Ego 56V (bought at full retail…my grass was knee-high!). It powers through tall wet grass at least as well as a gas mower. I’ve since added a string trimmer and hedge clippers. Acme tools sells refurbished Ego tools with batteries for the retail price of just the batteries. With a 5ah and two 2.5ah batteries, I can now mow continuously, at least enough to finish the yard.
Incredibly janky port of comments from my old WordPress site:
Dan
2021-04-28 at 3:04 am
This is so well written up, thank you for the analysis. I just wanted to chime in with our reel mower experience and a couple of points you may not have considered.
One easy way I like to do research is to find the most expensive product in a category and analyze it very carefully to see what features it has (I only look at functional features not like “dipped in gold” or anything). For lawn mowers in general, not just reel, I believe the state of the art would have to be Swardman: https://www.swardman.com/en/electra-55-reel-mower/ These things run upwards of $3000! Their claim is that if you cut grass with a reel rather than a more common blade, it clips the grass in a way that’s healthier for it and the general lawn ecosystem. Since I never believe marketing I dug around and it does look like golf courses use reel mowers for precise and healthy cuts, and that in general people agree reels are better. With that in mind, we looked for an electric reel mower that didn’t require us to get a second mortgage, and found a couple. But with limited options we found short battery lives and reports of “what’s the point, just push it yourself”.
And so that’s what we did, we tried two push mowers. One was Fiskar’s top of the line: https://www.fiskars.com/en-us/gardening-and-yard-care/products/reel-mowers/staysharp-max-reel-mower-362050-1002 and another was Gardena’s pricey but not fancy alternative: https://www.gardena.com/int/products/lawn-care/cylinder-lawnmowers/classic-cylinder-lawnmower-400/967302501
We used the Fiskar for a couple years on a small lawn and loved it. But it is VERY heavy. The Gardena is a welcome replacement on our larger lawn. We mow our front and back yard, probably somewhere around ~4000 sq. ft., in about 40 minutes or so. I’m not in stellar shape and I don’t really get exhausted doing it, but it’s work. On hot days I definitely sweat a bunch, and if I run instead of walk, I’m gasping by the end of it. So this is my second point: I actually *like* that it makes me move and gets my heart rate up a bit. We’re way too sedentary these days, I’ve learned to appreciate any way I can trick myself into moving some more.