Kitchen Garden Forum

Well done Allan.
Even a Benassi must be more user friendly than an Allen, but which language do you have to address a Benassi, do they understand Anglo Saxon !! Allen scythes have not grasped good old Anglo Saxon as they do not seem to respond to the simplest of expletives !!!.

Mayfield Scythes understand every command and act accordingly !! UNLESS YOU KNOW OTHERWISE.

Can't understand you anti- allen wimps. I bought one as a knacker off Ebay & rebuilt the engine so it fires first time, put my running shoes on & off we went ! ! Just make sure there's no dogs or children around though. Elf 'n safety ?

Forgot to say that it does the job at low cost, how much are your fancy Benassi's or Mayfields ?

I admire your courage Mr Gloworm, are your shrubs still standing tall and your saplings still upright following your speedy trip around the garden?
For your information Benassi costs mega lire but Mayfields are as cheap as chips, built in good old
Great Britain and still going strong. I hardly dare to admit that Allen and Mayfield amalgamated in the 1970s, I hate to see the two names together but they became ALLEN/MAYFIELD.

Happy grasscutting!!!

Actually Hortiman you still haven't found the answer, I recently bought an Austrian scythe from the Scythe Shop, pure beautiful motion, no noise, no polution and free exercise. Go on treat yourself.

http://www.thescytheshop.co.uk/

Hi Gloworm
Those Austrian scythes look very interesting, do they really scythe for pleasure?
I have a couple of 1940s English scythes which i admit i do not use, also a Turk scythe which i find useful for certain jobs, these must be similar to the Austrian version, heve you used your Austrian one yet, or are you still in shock from chasing the Allen !!! ?
Mayfield motor scythes are greener than Allen 2 strokes!
Hortiman

My Allen is a 4 stroke, easy to start. The Austrian scythe is the way forward, have you watched the vids on the website? There's a report of a competition between power scythes & hand scythes where the hand model performed well against the powered ones. I've used an English scythe for years but these Austrian models are a real pleasure & enjoyable to use.

The Austrian handscythe looks to be a good tool, obviously much greener than motor scythes, maybe we should convert our machines by fitting diesel units and run on bio diesel.
Do we have any other forum users with experiences of using hand scythes ? Austrian or indeed any scythes.

Hortiman ( in green mode )

Happiness is a well tuned Austrian scythe ! !

Hortiman,
How can you claim the mayfield to be greener than an allen?
Most Allen scythes are all green apart from maybe a red fuel tank and yellow lettering on the wheels.
And I know for a fact that Mayfiels have a red chassis
Tell you what we could have a longevity trial.
Park an Allen and a mayfield in a damp barn for say 50 years then get them out and see which is in the best condition.
Kev