£400 budget. Petrol. Push propelled. Thinking a specialist mulching mower as opposed to a collection unit as would be nice to start and not stop till I’m finished and have no clippings to dispose of. Has anyone got experience of the mulching machines? I know you can get 3 in 1 machines but I’d rather a dedicated one. No compromises that way.

Bought a Husquavarna about 10 years ago and it gets little use these days but it’s been faultless. Starts first time everytime, mulches, has a bag if required.
Worth a look and only cost about £300 back then.
Sorry I don’t have anything more up to date to add though!

Late edit!
Older version of this I think

http://www.husqvarna.com/us/products/lawn-mowers/7021p/961330030/

I bought one of these on eBay for £30 spares or repair. Turns out the exhaust valve seat had come off the head so no compression at all – fitted it back in with a bit of help from youtube and it’s been great since.

It’s not our main mower but used for bits the big mower can’t get to.

If it was looking for just one mower I’d be looking at one that can do bagging as well as it’s fairly easy in this country to have a prolonged spell of wet weather and by the time it’s dry enough to mulch the grass is too long.

I had a petrol Mountfield multiclip, it was as end of season bargain at B&Q for £150, it was ok for about 6 years but I have gone back to an electric Bosch, I would of loved one of THESE though. The cut & finish is much nicer & I don’t have to rake loads of crap out of the lawn all the time.

Cheers.

Found one of these on gumtree a few weeks ago. Now my kids mow the lawn 🙂

Hi I bought an oleo Mac from mowdirect.
I went for top one with variable speed control plus 4in1.
The multch use is fab. Just don’t take too much off each time.
I have slope and approx 650m2 of lawn.
Saves stopping every two stripes!
Matt
Neighbour has sit on mower. Envy, but he is 80!

Do you mean push propelled? I’m not sure on the terminology, but there are some where the engine only turns the blade, then there are some where the engine turns the blade and drives the wheels.

I’m guessing you mean something you walk behind but where the engine drives the wheels?

For that money you should be looking at something with a B&S, or better still a Honda or Kawasaki engine. I’d also advocate an aluminum or ABS deck/ shell rather than steel. We did a comparison and went for the biggest engine quality in the width cut we wanted.

Lots of the generic ones share parts. if you will be doing any required work yourself: make sure you can get parts easily, this is something that has caused us issues: we have to go via. a dealer and can’t find the parts easily on the internet.

I think unless you go top-end most with mulching facility will be a combination, I think the only difference is really the blade, but most mulchers seem to discharge to the side: not really sure why.