Ride on mowers

[Cogcog]

I moved yesterday to a place with a lawn about 60m x 25m. The obvious desire is to get a ride on mower for the spring.

I am not sure whether to buy 2nd hand and run the risk of repair bills, or buy new now while the sellers are keen to clear stock (and lose 6 months warranty) or wait intil the spring.


I am looking at the Hayter Heritage 10/30 new.

Any dvice on makes/models. new vs 2nd hanbd and collection vs mulching welcomed.

I quite fancied one capable of being used as a general tractor too.

[Murph7355]

After reading up on here and various other Googled sources I recently bought a Countax (I have a chunk more grass to cut than yours, but bought a 600H).

Bought it used as didn't fancy the 3.6k new price! Was sub-1500 quid.

They're pretty simple machines all told and am confident I could fix most things that go wrong with it. Spares also seem readily avaiable on the 'net.

Mine came with a normal cutter and grass collector. Works very well, though I'm not 100% sure how well the grass cuttings will compost down in time for when I next need to start cutting the grass. I think, had I had the choice, I may have gone for a mulching deck - can always buy one later.

The best thing about it is that I have a long queue of friends and family wanting to have a go with it, so I'm barely having to use it myself!

[caziques]

Mmmm.....about the same size as my lawn I reckon, and I've just come in from mowing to have the remains of last nights spare ribs, yummy.

Anyway, I'm of the age where I've gone for a new one. First one (secondhand) lasted 10 years but the water pump (yamaha engined John Deere) has always been a pain in the arse, so this one is air cooled (Husqvana).

It's always nicer to collect cuttings, but it takes longer and uses more fuel. The Husqvana only mulches, and with the grass growing so quickly at the moment I have a permanent covering of clippings which doesn't look that good.

Back to work, thankfully it's a cracking day.......and only a couple of hours until I can have some booze (it's the liquid content you know, mustn't get dehydrated)

[CunningPlan]

There was another thread about this quite recently. Kubota are the top but the most expensive. Countax are common and seem to OK. Be careful with manufacturer names, from another thread I think there is a lot of stuff sold under a "reputable" name that isn't made by themselves.

There is a distinction (albeit small) between a ride-on mower and a garden tractor. The difference being that mowers typically just mow where as the tractors are more rugged in build and transmission and can tow and have a PTO of some sort (like a belt) and can do other stuff.

It all depends on your budget and what image you want. My next door neighbour has a Countax and has endless electrical problems with it. Another neighbour has a John Deere and is happy with it (but it doesn't get much use )

I bought a 20yo Westwood garden tractor along with the house. It is indestructible and gets a lot of general use as well as mowing and tows a 1/2 ton trailer and chain harrows fine. When it was designed they thought more ladder chassis than monocoque which in an agricultural vehicle helps. When it reached 25yo I had to replace the bearings in the cutting deck - they are available on eBay and it was a 4 hour job. However it does look dated and tatty and drinks fuel - there's a reason there is a 5l fuel can holder built in I'll probably replace it with another second hand one when it dies because it has a rough life and a new mower would get trashed too quickly.

I do seem to find myself looking at second-hand Kubota ads a lot, tho

Edited by CunningPlan on Sunday 6th November 09:58

[Pvapour]

we bought a new Mountfield 2040 5 years ago, cost a bloody fortune for a lawnmower but we needed the torque of a twin to get up some serious hills, it shredded its clutch though & also seemed to struggle more than I would have expected for a 20hp twin cy. engine when cutting slightly wet grass at a fairly slow pace, we sold it a a couple of years ago as we thought we were going to be traveling, turned out we were to buy a huge farm

so we bought a budget 10 year old used 'Bernard Loisir', single cy. 13.5 hp tecumseh engine, 40" cut, it cost £600 & copes better than the £3.5k mountfield we had before + Its easy to fix & maintain ourselves which is very important for our self sufficiency drive, tech has moved on in these ride ons & like the TVR I prefer the simplicity of this older machine

[Tacagni]

If you are capable with spanners then get a second hand ride on, i have a countax with a mulching deck(cant collect have way to much grass to cut) its petrol with a 18hp honda engine very frugal, but im useless at repairing things if they do go wrong they can be expensive (had one bill over £400). Also it depends on what the area you are cutting is like, i have trees,stumps,roots,steep banks,ponds,verges to deal with its to much for the countax as i found out over the first couple of years, so i have bought a jcb zero turn diesel mower, this is a commercial machine, runs all season on one fill up of fuel and is twice as quick as the countax, but is bigger so i use them both now which seems to work well. Do look at all options first though, you can get a finishing mower that can be towed behind a quad bike. The garden tractor route is also one to look at if you have got a bit of land, the amount of attachments is amazing.

[Pique]

If it's all lawn I would look at a robotic mower - great gadgets and a good finish on normal lawn grass.

I have seen 2 in operation and they are amazing!