A well-kept lawn near the house is a natural decoration that will never go out of style. Neatly trimmed grass pleases the eye in any weather - lit by the bright sun, in the rain, with drops of dew, even peering out from under the snow. But a real lawn requires regular maintenance, the most time-consuming part of which is mowing and cutting grass.
Hand braids have long gone out of use, you can see them only with real retrograde lovers and antique lovers. Moreover, with their help it is quite difficult to mow grass perfectly on a lawn - skill is a thing of the past with a tool. Replaced by motorized trimmers and lawn mowers - electric and gasoline. Mechanical lawnmowers occupy an insignificant niche, they are not equipped with an engine, but they are not particularly popular.
Despite the huge number of models, the main types of lawn mowers are no different. They can be divided into two large groups - trimmers (scythes) and mowing machines - wheeled lawn mowers, riders, tractors. Most of them use one principle of mowing by a rotating rotor equipped with a cord cutting part or metal blades. When rotating at high speed, they cut grass at a given height, chopping the mowed part.
They differ in design features: size; type and power of the engine; set of features; cost; ease of use.
Content:
Trimmers
The easiest to use are trimmers, they are also the most universal. You can not only smooth grass on the lawn with a professional-quality motor-scythe, but also harvest hay for the winter, mow weeds on roadsides and courtyards, and remove shrubbery in gardens and lawns. Some models of trimmers are called brush cutters - they can cope with young trees with a trunk diameter of up to 3-4 cm, without losing the opportunity to care for the lawn.
But on large flat areas of lawns where grass cutting at the same height is required, they are not very convenient - it is very difficult to achieve a stable position of the cutting part. Motokosa, especially powerful, the tool is quite heavy and bulky. It is indispensable in hard-to-reach places, on difficult terrain, near fences, borders, on rocky soil.
By design, the trimmer is a fairly simple system consisting of an electric or gasoline engine (usually a two-stroke engine) and a rotating head, in which there is a fishing line or metal string wound on a reel, the ends of which are extended 15-40 cm from both sides and perform functions as they rotate knives.
The cutting part can be mounted directly on the motor shaft, with its lower location.
Or connected to it with a metal cable or rod (with the top location of the motor). It should be noted that motor-scythes with a top engine are much more convenient to use - they are balanced in weight and allow you to work for several hours in a row without much operator fatigue.
Wheeled Lawn Mowers
Such garden machines are more convenient and easy to use. They practically do not require physical efforts, a person of any physical constitution can cope with them. The lawnmower's base is a wheeled trolley equipped with four support wheels that can be connected to the engine by a drive system (two or all four), or rolls freely.
Self-propelled types of lawn mowers driven by an engine are very convenient in large areas of lawns, in parks and squares. If you have to work for several hours or even a whole day, then lawn mowers with drive wheels are indispensable. In small areas and areas of complex configuration, clipping machines without wheel drive are more convenient.
The fact is that they are much easier to maneuver and move forward or backward. Not all models of self-propelled mowers are equipped with a reverse system, their speed is also regulated in a rather narrow range and, for example, for an elderly person, it is sometimes difficult to hold the machine in hands, even when driving at a minimum speed.
Structurally, wheel mowers consist of:
- decks (frames with wheels);
- an electric or gasoline (two or four stroke) engine;
- horizontally rotating blade knives;
- handles;
- governing bodies;
- a box or bag for collecting mowed grass.
Lawn mowers with and without grass catcher
Lawn mowers are equipped with a grass catcher, but some models of lawn mowers are not equipped with grass catchers - they chop the grass to a state of dust and leave it on the lawn as mulch and natural fertilizer. Many gardeners consider this method of mowing the only acceptable option for lawn care, which allows you to fertilize it without using mineral and other fertilizers and maintain the natural state of the soil, without drying out and compaction.
Rotary and drum mowers
According to the design of the cutting part, the wheel lawn mowers are divided into rotary, which has already been mentioned, and drum (cylindrical). The first are equipped with horizontally located blades with sharpened edges that rotate in a horizontal position, relative to the vertical axis, and cut the grass very cleanly and evenly - the rotation speed is high enough so that even soft grass is not crumpled but cut off. The height of the knife is adjustable in a fairly wide range, usually from 2 to 7-10 cm.
Cylindrical lawn mowers are equipped with a horizontal shaft that rotates clockwise and a horizontal fixed knife. The shaft is also equipped with cutting blades running along its entire length, their number can reach 12 pieces. Rotating along a horizontal axis running perpendicular to the direction of movement of the lawn mower, the shaft presses the grass against the fixed plate of the horizontal knife and cuts it off almost perfectly evenly.
In terms of productivity and mowing quality, the cylindrical types of lawn mowers are much superior to rotary mowers, but only on low soft grass. If the height of the grass cover exceeds 10 - 12 cm, it is better to use a rotary version of the mower. The possibilities of a cylindrical lawn mower also depend on the number of knives on the shaft - the fewer they are, the easier it is to cope with tall and stiff grass. It is optimal to buy cars with three to five knives for home use. Cylindrical lawn mowers are significantly more expensive than rotary mowers, so they lose out in popularity.
Riders and mini tractors
They can be attributed to the professional class of equipment for mowing grass and lawn care. They are appropriate on areas from 0.5 hectares - in the park area, on stadiums, gentle banks of water bodies and other places where working with a regular lawn mower will be very tiring.
Riders and mini tractors are distinguished by the location of the mowing unit - on the tractor it is located below, between the front and rear wheels, and on the rider in the front. In addition to the mowing unit, a number of other equipment can be connected to the power take-off shaft of these machines, which allows them to be considered a fairly universal technique, for which lawn care is only part of the scope of use.
Exotic Lawn Care Machines
Practice shows that devices, machines and mechanisms that seemed unusual, exotic, and even curious a few years ago very quickly become familiar and actively push traditional systems out of use. Perhaps today’s exotic types of lawn mowers will not be an exception, which are increasingly being used not only abroad, but also appear in our country. These include hovercraft mowers and robots.
Hovercraft Lawn Mowers
In this type of lawn mower, knives of a special design are used, which are, at the same time, propellers, creating a directed air flow and raising the installation above the ground to a small height. She hovering there on a pillar of air and mowing grass at a given level. Moving it over the lawn is extremely easy, as well as maneuvering.
Robotic lawn mowers
Robotic lawnmowers operate without human intervention, according to the principle of a well-known robot vacuum cleaner. It is enough to protect the site with ropes stretched at a certain height and run the machine inside the perimeter - perfect mowing is guaranteed.
So far, the spread of these types of lawn mowers has been restrained by some imperfect designs and a high price. But we are already used to the fact that progress is inexorable and there will not be a long wait for the active development of these areas.
Varieties of lawn mowers depending on the powertrain
Types of lawn mowers by engine type are limited by two options - electric and gasoline. Diesel engines in these machines (with the exception of some models of mini-tractors and riders) are not used due to the large weight, complexity of the design and low shaft rotation speeds.
Electric mowers
Electric trimmers and lawn mowers are very convenient in small areas close to home. They are productive, low noise, lightweight, do not require complicated maintenance. In operation, very few requirements are put forward. The main ones - it is not recommended to mow wet grass and not to overload the engine, it should work at stable speeds.
Under heavy loads and a frequent decrease in speed, the engine overheats, which leads to its failure, and repairing such motors is expensive and difficult. In addition, the cable stretching behind the mower or trimmer is not only uncomfortable, but also limits the radius of the working area. If you have to mow between trees, it is better not to find a gas trimmer.
Gas mowers
On the basis of two and four-stroke gasoline engines, a lot of models of trimmers and wheel mowers are produced. For trimmers, two-stroke engines are usually used, as they are lighter, quite powerful and easy to maintain.
Wheel lawn mowers are equipped with both types of gasoline engines, depending on the size and required performance. Gasoline mowing machines are characterized by a high level of autonomy, a significant resource (2-8000 hours), depending on the brand of engine, maintainability. They are quite economical - even if you use high-quality fuel and brand oils (it is not recommended to do otherwise), the cost of operating a gas mower or trimmer will not exceed the cost of one or two trips by car at a distance of 150 - 200 km.
