Period petrol lawnmowers

[JoceAndChris]

I would really welcome any tips or advice on using one and running one as this is my first, it arrived yesterday!

https://www.lawnmowersdirect.co.uk/product/honda-hrd536qx-petrol-rear-roller-lawnmower

I'm really worried as I killed our Hayter ride on and I don't think Chris has forgiven me yet
I had a little go with this new one last night, there's no variable speed (because there is a roller), it drags you along at a fair old lick and before you know it you've hit the bushes that border the lawn.

My house sits in the middle of a lozenge shaped garden so as you can imagine there are lawns outside the North, East, South and West bays. I'll need to make many short turns to get the stripes running vertically from the bays. The ride-on did long horizontal sweeps and I hated the effect.

I want no weeds and perfect stripes! What have I started??? :roll:

I'm really interested to know about your lawn mowers, what you've got and what kind of effect they give and how much maintenance they need to get max life out of the mower. Thanks!

 

[Flyfisher]

Here's my main lawn mower




More seriously, I also have a Honda mower very similar to the one you've just bought, though with two rear wheels instead of a roller, and it has two speeds. I don't understand why having a roller should mean it can only have one speed but perhaps that's just the model type. Maybe they think the slow speed is not required for rollered lawns and only necessary for fiddly bits where a rolled finish is not so important?

Wanting no weeds and perfect stripes will, I suspect (because I've never achieved it!) require a great deal of lawn care work. Our previous house was in a wood, so not really conducive to good lawns, but one neighbour was fastidious about his lawn. Unfortunately, it was a lost cause (mainly because of moss) and he ended up re-turfing his lawn a couple of times in the 20 years we lived there. Not that you're likely to have that problem but I still reckon it'll be hard work. Perhaps you should visit the local bowling club and chat up their groundsman for some tips :wink:

None of which is particularly helpful I know, but I think I can offer better advice regarding the maintenance of the mower itself. My Honda mower is over 20 years old and still going strong and the main thing is to change the engine oil each year (and oil filter if it has one - mine doesn't) and keep the air filter clean so the engine can breathe easily. Both very easy DIY jobs and probably described in the operating manual. Sharp blades are also important for the quality of the cut and can also be DIY if you have a bench or angle grinder. Or pay for an annual service of course. Otherwise, just keep the mower reasonably clean, especially underneath where the cut grass can accumulate and trap moisture against the bodywork. I have an air compressor and use an air-gun to blast away grass and dirt but a decent brush down is just as effective, if a little more work.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Thanks ever so much for your thoughtful post FF! I'm so jealous of your tractor! :lol: That's next on the wish list! It looks like it's doing a very nice job of it.

Interesting to read about what I should be doing regularly - thanks. I know if I don't learn it it won't happen as Chris hasn't got time! I didn't actually consider you have to brush the grass off regularly, would you do that every week after the cut? I have an air gun too. It sounds great that all these things can be DIY jobs, I know Chris knows how to do them, I just need to make him show me, as he'll never think of it unless prompted. Or the lawn at all.

Dad has been saying today that surely adjusting the throttle will adjust speed. I'll speak to Chris tonight about that, I have no idea about throttle really. I never understood it on the ride on, except to know that if you did not move the lever into the notch the machine would conk out, and you had to start it in a low throttle :? :? :?

Yes I think it will be hard work but I read that scarifying the lawn and fertilising it regularly eliminates weed. I need to buy a scarifying attachment for my ride on and some way of distributing fertiliser.

 

[Flyfisher]

I don't generally clean underneath the mower every week (tractor or Honda mower) unless I've cut the grass when wet.

As for using the throttle to control the ground speed, it might work to some extent but the downside is that the cutting blades will also run slower. This might not matter too much if the blades are really sharp but most of the time they won't be and the cut will suffer as a result. Also, the grass collection (if you're using it) won't be as efficient. I guess there's no harm in experimenting but in general there will be an optimum engine speed for the best cut and collection (probably stated in the manual).

As for weeds, simply mowing regularly will kill off many of them. I seem to recall from A-level botany that grasses grow from a point below their tips whereas most plants grow from their tips, which is why grasses can cope with regular cutting. Much of the grass we now have (I hesitate to call it a lawn!) used to be a wilderness of weeds about two feet tall, mostly nettles and cow parsley. I've never bothered with chemicals and just a couple of years mowing turned it into the grass in my photo above because most of the weeds simply couldn't survive regular mowing each week. It's not pure grass though and there are still weeds but it looks good enough at a distance. Besides, I quite like the daisies and dandelions

 

[a twig]

Re: maintenance

Follow what it says in the manual - in particular, the first oil change after the first few hours of mowing. That's the most important one as it removes any swarf etc left in the engine from the manufacturing process. After that a yearly service will do you fine, this can easily be DIY'd or done at a local shop for not too much money. Hondas are pretty bomb proof through so don't worry too much. FF's advice is spot on in this regard.

The reason "professional" mowers don't have speed controls is that for a given rpm of the blade, there is an optimum speed to cover the grass. To slow and you waste time and petrol, too fast and you don't get the best cut. You will definitely get used to the speed, as per my post in the "Cheer" thread.

For your first effort, set aside a day when it's dry, cut, then scarify, then cut again. That will get the worst out, particularly moss etc. Some larger bits (oversize dandelions etc) are best dealt with by hand. Alternatively, if you are happy using chemicals there are various sprays that will kill weeds but leave the grass.

I think FF's suggestion to talk to a bowls club groundsman was slightly in jest, as they use very different equipment due to the perfectly flat and level nature of a bowls green. If you know a green keeper from a golf club however, and are prepared to aerate, sand, spray, and then cut twice a week, then get recommendations from them and go for it!

 

[steveb]

If you can see through the clutter you can just about make out my baby in the background:

https://goo.gl/photos/MHTEisU8nR4GyGw66

1959 Suffolk Punch, back in the days before people were concerned about safety mechanisms, noise or getting caught by moving parts. It is considerably older, but in much better condition than it's owner..

Does a lovely job on the lawn though, which would be better if the lawn were anywhere near flat or grassy.

This one basically has one control - the throttle - and it has a centrifugal clutch. Speed it up and the clutch engages and the rollers power the drive, cut the throttle and the clutch disengages as the engine slows and the power comes off. There is an art in doing so - cut too early and the thing runs out of momentum before the end of the run, cut too late and it ends up in the flower bed. It weighs about as much as a grown man so once it is going there is no stopping by pulling. With the whirling blades of death exposed at the front, it will basically rip everything up in its path until it hits a wall or falls into a ditch.

On one occasion the throttle cable snapped leaving me with a jogging pace killing machine. Fortunately I had the presence of mind to run round in circles and work out a plan - but that involved pulling the spark plug cap off which is not an easy maneuver on a machine with no safety guards. Luckily I still have the same number of fingers today than when I started

Annual maintenance consists of an oil change with "real SAE 30" oil, pump a bit of grease into the nipples and make sure you empty the fuel tank before putting it away for winter. Simple engineering, started first pull this year after 6 months in the shed.

-Steve

 

[Me!]

I killed our Hayter

How did you manage to do that? Are you sure it isn't fixable, I always thought they were indestructible!
I have a Hayter that I inherited from my Grandfather, and it is still in regular use.

 

[JoceAndChris]

:lol: :lol: :lol: You did make me laugh Steve with the jogging pace killing machine with the whirling blades of death! :lol: It is time for this clip of you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNUINPxEuVg

In all seriousness though the garden looks lovely (what clutter?) and keeping a machine going that long, particularly a machine with those quirks, displays great fortitude and loyalty! I do wonder if they made more long-lasting machines back then as Joss Plummer was also saying her machine has given decades of service.

Re: maintenance
If you know a green keeper from a golf club however, and are prepared to aerate, sand, spray, and then cut twice a week, then get recommendations from them and go for it!

Thanks for your helpful advice a twig! Do they really do all those processes twice a week I wonder? I suppose they have a much greater footfall, my lawns only have ducks and cats and rabbits! I bet if I did those things even once a month I'd get amazing grass! I'd say it's 40% daisy now. The odd ragwort and dandelion. No moss. It's very dry, very free draining stony soil and on a hilltop so blasted by wind.
Thanks for your reassurance I will get used to the speed. Chris is saying my Dad doesn't realise these petrol power tools have an optimum speed and they won't run at half measures. Which I guess is in line with what you all are saying.

FF - thank you! Yes I notice the amazing difference cutting makes. I've now mastered the petrol strimmer and I do 5 hours of strimming a week. The orchard, the verges and pond banks, along the ha ha. It has all gone from thick nettle to lovely grass in a year. Actually better than my 40% daisy lawn which is odd.

Me! I have just read your post - fabulous yours is still going!! What happened is that Chris, after two years of not really bothering to cut the grass, said "here's the ride on Joce, off you go" And in the first cut I mowed the path as he did not say I would need to disengage the cutting deck for the path. To be fair to me our woodland path is soft earth mainly, but there were some lumps of rock on it, and it did not like it. The whole thing made a horrendous noise and died. It had to go off and be mended but they said I had twisted the cutting deck so badly they would ideally like to have got hold of a new cutting deck, but Hayter did not make that model anymore. They hammered the cutting deck into shape, but after that it was never really happy, and sometimes the blade would angrily strike into the lawn, and the machine conk out. Then three weeks ago I hit a tree stump that was sawn off at ground level that I had mowed over many times with no difficulty. But on this occasion the angle must have been different and the blade struck violently into the wood and the machine conked out. I got it started again, but it was so unhappy, and as it went along the lawn it was spitting out huge pieces of plastic from its underparts and smashing the blade into the lawn and scoring out huge gouges. Now my lawn looks as though it has been attacked by an angry monster. Chris said " I think you've killed that ride on" and we've put it in the garage and tried to forget it's there as it's just so stressful.

Today is the day for the new one though! Ill let you know how I get on and post a pic later. Thanks so much for the support and advice.

 

[JoceAndChris]

"I wonder what evil b***d in a marketing dept decided that an essential feature should become an optional extra. I bought a newish Hayter six years ago, it was a push mower but the pointless high speed of the engine soon got on my wick, along with the silly dead man's handle (that at least I was able to eliminate) and after a few weeks it was resold."

Ivor I'm sorry to read you didn't get along with your Hayter! I didn't like my Hayter either for different reasons! I believe this speed is essential.

Glad you have something you like though! As for chickens, oh heavens, chickens are my life, I have 25, they do get let out onto the lawns and they do make some difference but then they get eaten by foxes so they go back to their electric poultry netted orchard and wood and I vow never to let them onto the lawns again, and then the cycle repeats itself, a year later.

I don't really get long grass as if it isn't cut it becomes 95% daisy.

 

[steveb]

:lol: :lol: :lol: You did make me laugh Steve with the jogging pace killing machine with the whirling blades of death! :lol: It is time for this clip of you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNUINPxEuVg

In all seriousness though the garden looks lovely (what clutter?) and keeping a machine going that long, particularly a machine with those quirks, displays great fortitude and loyalty! I do wonder if they made more long-lasting machines back then as Joss Plummer was also saying her machine has given decades of service.

yes, that clip pretty much sums up what was going to happen - probably a very similar type and age of machine to mine.

I think you know the answer to that last question though.. modern stuff is not built to last but to be fair neither are "modern people" seemingly wired to maintain anything, we live in a throwaway world. Takes 30 minutes a year to maintain it - an oil change and a quick grease with a gun - yet I bet that most people haven't touched their mowers since they were bought from new and wonder why they fail after a few years.

I bought that mower from someone who himself had bought it second hand in 1961 and then used it to mow 2 acres for over 50 years - he only sold it due to "downsizing" to a retirement cottage.

I won it on an ebay auction and paid £20 for it, such is the perceived low value of these things - and he threw in the "world's most temperamental grease gun" for free. I suspect he is happy to be rid of the gun but not the mower.

 

[d49xc]

Just to add to the list that modern machines are also not designed to be repaired in the first place.
I'm currently rebuilding my pro-quality chainsaw where the crankshaft bearing has partially failed.
So I'm doing a general overall plus new piston and rings: all easily obtainable
As well as bearing pullers which I have, I need a special tool to withdraw the oil pump worm drive off the shaft - which will cost me the same amount as all the rest of the spare parts put together.

As we know its even worse with cars - the curse of the special tool required without which the job is impossible.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Good luck d49xc. Doesn't sound easy! Hope you can fix it!

Jury's out on my new mower. It has given me 14,786 steps on my Fitbit (9.39 km) which is good and is truly a workout. On the uphill, its nice and steady. Making the turn on the uphill is ok. On the downhill after that, I'm forced into a jog and have to have my wits about me to get my hand off the lever before I crash into the bushes. Then I have to make the turn to go uphill again and I found it impossible. I know it can be done, because it was done by our last gardener who was female and not immensely strong, though strong enough. She always got nice stripes. So it must be about technique  :?

Anyway, I had to abandon the stripes and do long horizontal sweeps. It's cut nicely, but I'm not sure I've made the right choice, if I can't manoeuvre it for the turns.

 

[Me!]

Are you doing a couple of rows first at each end of your stripes to give yourself turning room like this? -
https://www.lawnandmower.com/i/Mower-Stripes.jpg

Then once you get to the end of each stripe and onto the edging rows that you have already cut, you release the drive lever so the mower stops moving forward, then press your weight down on the handlebars so the front wheels lift off the ground and the mower is pivoting on the rear roller. Then, you pivot the mower around 180 degrees so it would be pointing straight back up the stripe you have just cut, except the trick is to just feather the drive lever very slightly during the turn so that the mower will just nudge forward enough that you are next to the row you have just cut rather than actually going straight back up the same one again.

Ah, just reading a bit about your actual model of mower, apparently they are available with two different versions of drive. There is the single speed version (which several people seem to think is too fast) and there is a three-speed version which allows you to manually choose which gear you would like to use.

 

[Feltwell]

:lol: :lol: :lol: You did make me laugh Steve with the jogging pace killing machine with the whirling blades of death! :lol: It is time for this clip of you!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNUINPxEuVg

Reminds me of:-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KvxOuC7Bhc The commentary is priceless!

We had an old Suffolk Punch mower when I was a kid which my Mum steadfastly refused to even contemplate using, it scared the life out of her! I used to mow the lawn with it as an 8 or 9 year old kid though, not quite sure what that says about parental care, though I have still got 10 fingers and 10 toes! (Despite being from Norfolk, before anyone says it....... :wink: )

I've a cheapo B&Q own brand self-propelled petrol mower now that was given to me that I keep expecting to die, but it just soldiers on and on - I really don't think you need to spend a lot on a mower. All the cheaper ones seem to use one of the Briggs & Stratton engines, there's not much to them to fix if they ever do go wrong.

 

[88v8]

Gosh that takes me back. My father had a Suffolk Punch. It had to be bumped down a steep flight of, ummm, a dozen stone steps onto the grass, then back up again to be put away. That was a cylinder, fine for a fine lawn - it wasn't although he liked to pretend - but on rough grass such as we now have a rotary is much better, as it will deal with long grass and the results of Mr Mole and his evil empire.

As I said in that other thread, wouldn't have a powered mower. Too hard to manoeuvre anywhere fiddly. Our 1984 Mountfield push rotary, bought new, has totally variable cutting speed and I generally run the engine pretty slow. Only time it gets revved is when the grass is wet, otherwise it clogs up.
The mower itself goes as fast as I push it, or not at all if I need to reach ahead to lift up plants while pushing the mower with the other hand.

Takes a couple of hours to cut all the grass, and that's without doing the edges. So as a rule I cut the back lawn one day, and the main lawn another day, and the grass up around the pond gets added to one day or the other.

An immaculate lawn is the most labour-intensive of all garden activities.
Cutting, edging, weeding, spiking, scarifying, sanding, levelling.
Pfft. :shock:
Until the lawnmower was invented only nobs could have anything approaching a lawn. Everyone else had chickens or a veg patch. We were told by a PO that when they bought there were parsnips growing in what is now our main lawn.

Lozenge..... our grass is irregular shapes. To avoid constantly having to make a 180 turn, I start by going right around the edge, then I turn round and go back the opposite way, but one stripe away from the edge. Then turn around and go back again, a further stripe inwards. So I have stripes, but they're in a reducing pattern that finishes near the middle.
Then I lift it onto the front wheels so as not to leave a stripe, and wheel it to the edge.

If I had a big drone, I could lift it out, then there would be no wheel marks. One day, there will be a web forum called Period Drone.

Ivor

 

[Flyfisher]

Speaking of drones (as in high tech) has anyone tried those robot mowers that, supposedly, roam around a lawn nibbling away at the grass like some sort of grazing animal before automatically returning to their docking station to recharge their batteries?

 

[Keith Bowman]

And speaking of stripes. Lord Fairhaven of Anglesey Abbey, Cambridgeshire, hated stripes and insisted on the grass on each lawn all being cut in the same direction. That doubled the exercise the gardeners got!

 

[JoceAndChris]

Are you doing a couple of rows first at each end of your stripes to give yourself turning room like this? -
https://www.lawnandmower.com/i/Mower-Stripes.jpg

Then once you get to the end of each stripe and onto the edging rows that you have already cut, you release the drive lever so the mower stops moving forward, then press your weight down on the handlebars so the front wheels lift off the ground and the mower is pivoting on the rear roller. Then, you pivot the mower around 180 degrees so it would be pointing straight back up the stripe you have just cut, except the trick is to just feather the drive lever very slightly during the turn so that the mower will just nudge forward enough that you are next to the row you have just cut rather than actually going straight back up the same one again.

Ah, just reading a bit about your actual model of mower, apparently they are available with two different versions of drive. There is the single speed version (which several people seem to think is too fast) and there is a three-speed version which allows you to manually choose which gear you would like to use.

Me that is very useful thank you. No I haven't mastered any of that. I did one lawnmower width edging, and it wasn't sufficient for the turn.I didn't really know I could "feather the driver" either, I though I had to haul the thing and it was exhausting!

I wonder if the roller version with the different speeds was the one that was £1600 that Chris thought we should buy. I said we are not spending £1600 on a mower!!!!

Ivor - your suggestion is also very useful - I hadn't really thought of cutting it like that but then there are rose beds very in the way. Still I might be able to do something like that!

 

[JoceAndChris]

Speaking of drones (as in high tech) has anyone tried those robot mowers that, supposedly, roam around a lawn nibbling away at the grass like some sort of grazing animal before automatically returning to their docking station to recharge their batteries?

Goodness me. Would like to see that live in action!

 

[fernicarry]

how much maintenance they need to get max life out of the mower

I have an HRX 476, smaller blade than yours. It came used from a local taxi driver who did gardens on the side so had probably seen a fair amount of action. He looked blankly at me when I asked him how it had been maintained... It was a bit tatty but the price was right. All I do is change the oil and plug once a year (err, forgot last year but just done it) and it runs perfectly well. I might occasionally hose if off.

The grass bag is starting to come apart and once the ride height mechanism collapsed (Dad! It keeps digging up the ground...) but that just needed a new rivet. It could probably use having the blade sharpened as it was struggling a bit on the long stuff yesterday. I think it'd be hard to break it mechanically but there will be some wear and tear to deal with.