Manual lawnmowers

Does anyone use a manual lawnmower? Need to buy a new lawnmower and am wondering if it’s a good option as I have a small area of grass and I can’t help thinking I could get a much better product for the same price and save energy too! Do they work as well as electric ones?

Can’t say I’ve tried one but the Worx electric cordless mower is £200 at the moment from Homebase and Amazon. I’ve got one and it’s great.

I have a vintage one. Its good at cutting grass thats regularly cut. Its shite at hacking back the undergrowth I promote as a gift to the wildlife.

havign said that its nicer than dicking about with a shitty two stroke or a bloody cable so its less of a chore to actually do the grass cutting.

Had one for a small flat garden. Worked well but you need to cut very regularly. They don’t do long grass well.
Now it’s useless for a bigger garden and tougher/ thicker grass. I should sell it. Webb something.

I have two small patches (biggest size 5 by 6m) both relatively flat. Can’t say I’m that good at regular cutting though

I’ve got two. One is vintage and a lovely bit of kit but very heavy and not great at tight spaces.
The other is a basic Bosch thing which feels quite flimsy when assembling but is in reality is solid and gives a great cut. It’s light and manoeuvrable too.
Neither are good with long grass so regular cutting is a must.

Mine is a ransomes I think.

They are quite common on gumtree etc for an old one with oak rollers. if you fancy a work out your other option is a scythe…

Manual should be fine then. Just don’t forget to cut every week in the growing season.
If you are likely to leave it and miss the odd week then get electric.

I’ve got two – a Ransomes Ajax Mk4 (heavy) for my garden, and a cheap modern one (ridiculously light) for the allotment paths. Both work well, don’t disturb the peace with a hideous noise, give you a bit of exercise and cost nothing to run.

Not really very helpful as I haven’t used it yet, but I picked one up off Freecycle in the autumn to (hopefully) replace our cheap cast-off electric one. Small garden, so assuming it does a decent job, I can see a lot of benefits: less space in the shed, more pleasant to use, no faffing with cable, will probably last longer, easier to fix.

Also use shears rather than a hedge trimmer for much the same reasons.

Agree, always find cables a faff, and to be honest without that I’ll probably remember to do it once a week

The cylindrical ones work well but as above it works best on shorter grass, little and often is the way

I have a bosch one, it is pretty good to be honest, and actually quite enjoyable

As has been mentioned, cut regularly and it is a breeze. Once it gets too long you will be reduced to using shears first or whatever. Mine lives in the garden outside, I just give it a quick buzz over when I get home from work

Secondly only cut when dry. If you cut wet the grass tends to jam the blade which in turn stops the wheels rotating. The wheels then skid and rip small divots of lawn up. Very annoying

I have a small lawn and a push along manual mower, it’s great if you use it a couple of times a month.

If you buy one make sure drive for the cutters is from both wheels, gives much more power and better manoeuvrability on muddy lawns.

I’ve got one for my tiny lawn, cheapo one from Argos and it’s fine. Just watch for any sticks or twigs in the grass, they will jam it.

I have a Bosch one that I use to cut the verge at the front. It’s very good once adjusted.

Brother and someone at work has the Husqvarna push mower and rates them.

I had this: Husqvarna push mower
Sold it on eBay after a couple of weeks.
My lawn is on a slope, is bumpy, mossy, usually wet or at least damp and maybe 20m sq so I’d say it’s no good for that.
I’ve got a cheapy electric one from Homebase now which is great.

I have a manual one. Left it for 3 weeks at a time quite regularly last summer without problems. Just need a bit of momentum to get through longer patches.

I have a small lawn and a push along manual mower, it’s great if you use it a couple of times a month.

Bloody hell, my petrol mower struggles if I miss just a week in the ‘growing season’ – do you also bench press 300lbs?

Maybe get some shears?

https://www.spear-and-jackson.com/products/garden-tools-outdoor-living/razorsharp-cutting/shears/razorsharp-steel-lawn-shears

If its orugh an manual you want like i said previously… scythe.

you can propercut grass nicely with one.

Mower came out for the first time today. Any tips on the best way to sharpen the blades? The blade assembly doesn’t come out very easily, if at all, but it’s not like I could use the bench grinder if it did. Dremel with a stone wheel on it seemed the best way, but a bit tiresome.

you lap the blade using sndpaper on the shear plate (I made that name up, hopfully it makes sense)

ITs pretty reliant on the blades being well matched, attacking it with a dremel sounds like a disaster

I’m guessing the shear plate is a bit that the blades pass close to, shearing the grass… will have a closer look tomorrow. So attach sandpaper to the shear plate, perhaps with something to fill the gap, and spin the blades past it?

Dremel definitely helped, but they were pretty blunt.

Can’t say I’ve tried one but the Worx electric cordless mower is £200 at the moment from Homebase and Amazon. I’ve got one and it’s great.

Yeah, right! £200 against £35-50 for a manual cylinder mower for cutting a tiny patch of grass – seems like the way to go to me.

#rollseyes.

you lap the blade using sndpaper on the shear plate (I made that name up, hopfully it makes sense)

Tried that on my Bosch, was a waste of time and just ripped the paper. One of these actually:

What did work was brushing lapping paste onto the cylinder then driving it with a drill. Keep light pressure on it using the bed knife and it sharpens up a treat. Also a good excuse to use power tools!

Like this:

Bit more in depth:

Cutting performance was night and day, they don’t come anywhere near sharp from the factory.

On the Ransome gang mowers and triples, we just called them a bottom plate, even a Ransome’s rep referred to them as the bottom plate.

If you’re just cutting a lawn it shouldn’t need much maintenance or adjustment, on the gang-mower I drove I only adjusted the cutters once or maybe twice a day unless I hit something and that was cutting uneven rough parks and that was cutting between 80-100 acres a day.

A cheap electric is really much more versatile eg it works fine when the grass is wet and long. You can pick up dead leaves and smarten up the lawn in the depths of winter. And less maintenance (sharpening). IMO.

Maybe the hand mower fans live in areas with dry summers, cold winters and light soil but in the west of scotland the grass grows all year, thick and wet. I grew up hand-mowing my parents’ lawn and it was a tough job. Eventually they went powered and my 80-yo mother can do it herself.

“Only cut when dry.” Lol.

Yeah there’s a slight difference in power though, the manual mowers need to be sharp or they won’t cut shit. You can cut grass with a powered flail.