Ride on mowers.

[Tigger]

We've not had much luck with mowers - number 2 is about to be scrapped, so we need some help in chosing number 3.

Can anyone recommend something that likes orchards and slight slopes?

[oldherbaceous]

Dear Tigger, i use two different Stiga ride on mowers, they are very manoeuvrable due to being articulated steering and having the deck in front of you. They leave quite a good finish on a good lawn, but will also tackle fairly tall rough areas.
The only thing that doesn't suit everone, is that they are a mulch mower so you can't collect the grass.

[Tigger]

That's helpful OH. I don't mind about it not collecting the clippings - they just become a problem to compost as there's so much of them.

[richard p]

it depends how deep your pockets are and how big an area you have to cut. one place i go we use a normal 28 inch 8 hp honda it takes 2 to 3 hours to do the lawns some of which are on such a slope that i only cut up and down, in bottom gear it chugs up and occasionally if wet slides down . (going accross in the wet is plain silly and only just possible in the dry)its side dischage with a chute up to two rear bags which clogs up unless the grass is dry. my own mtd lawnflite is rear discharge under the seat to a rear box which if the engine/ cutter drive belt will cut it will collect the cuttings .
to me the choice is either a rear discharge domestic mower liker the mtd 604 or something more proffesional like oh's stigas

[peter]

Available in cream, brown and cream/brown combinations.
Copes with the roughest terrain.
Leaves no clippings.
Composts all clippings into neat garden friendly blocks.
Does not always stay where you leave it though and does have a propensity to make odd noises.
What you need is a ...



















sheep!

[Tigger]

Thanks Richard. As for you Peter......been there and done it. the trouble with sheep is they're skipping about one minute and doing dead fly impersonations the next. They also do lots of damage when they get into the veg plot. We're surrounded by them and every now and again they get in.

[Geoff]

I've had two at the cheaper end of the 30" cut types. I compost a lot of the grass so have chosen ones with lift off bags that I can tip straight into the bins or fill barrows for adding later. If you can use a lift up type and tip it convenient to the compost I suppose it doesn't matter. The first one was a Lawnflite and although it annoyed me from time to time I suppose it did a reasonable nine years service considering how I treated it and used it to break in new areas. I am now in the third season of a Hayter 13/30 Heritage Tractor and it is doing pretty well - cut the orchard this afternoon. It has some annoyances. You can't get off it without the engine stopping, the Lawnflite you only had to disengage the cutter. As it comes you can't lift up the bag to tip (if you want to use it that way) without the engine stopping, but if you disconnect the rear micro switch you can. The way the bag fixes on if it is very full you can't get it off without spilling some, I've done a mod for that too. It is reliable so far and I use it on some pretty steep slopes, ones I can only cut downwards as it won't go up them! I have found the traction a bit disappointing on both of these but I think you pay an awful lot extra to improve it. I was surprised to find I could trade the Lawnflite in against the Hayter, it was running but wasn't very well, £300 off £1200 so don't scrap your dead one.

[Tigger]

Thankyou Geoff.

[Geoff]

So what did you get?