Rotary mowers have a cutting deck with rotating blades on a singular vertical pivot point. Rotary lawn mowers cut your lawn with fast rotating blades, usually with 2 but sometimes more. The blades chop at the grass as they rotate. Rotary mowers will work best on a medium to high cut. The alternative cutting mechanism is a reel-based system which has blades that cut your grass on a horizontal axis. There are two main types of reel mowers. There are push reel mowers, which require a little extra grunt work as they are manually driven by human force only, without any additional form of power for propulsion.
Push reel mowers, push forced cutting blades on a horizontal axis. Reel mowers generally have somewhere between five and twelve exposed blades at the front of the mower that rotate around trapping and slicing the grass against a fixed bottom plate, much like a pair of scissors.
The more blades there are the better the cut. This cutting action works best on a low or short cut and will not be able to cut long grass. Dealing with all the gas, oil, and noise associated with regular mowers seems like overkill for such a small space, right?
There is, however, one regular mower-maintenance chore necessary with reel mowers: sharpening the blades. You can buy kits at Home Depot, for example to help you with this job, but it's still a hassle. In fact, just finding a kit in the first place that's compatible with your unit they're not one-size-fits-all is a hassle. That's why an even better choice than reel mowers for those who have a small lawn to mow is battery-powered mowers.
The idea here is to keep mower maintenance to a bare minimum since it doesn't make sense to trouble yourself too much over such a small patch of grass killing the grass and putting something else there is another possibility.
We have found a good battery-powered mower to be the very best option for small yards mowed by owners who want but a small maintenance burden to bear. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Use precise geolocation data. Select personalised content. Create a personalised content profile.
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For this reason, manual reel mowers are practical only for yards of 8, square feet about square meters or less [source: Reel Mower Guide ]. That's approximately 0. You also have to consider whether you're up to mowing the lawn frequently -- generally once a week during summer months. If you let your grass grow too tall, pushing a reel mower through it can prove difficult or impossible.
Let the yard go for a few rainy weeks, and you may wind up borrowing a gas mower or buying a swing blade. Since the gears in a manual reel mower make the blades turn faster than the wheels, you don't have to run to keep the blade speed up. Still, the person pushing a manual reel mower supplies all the power, and a steady, reasonable pace is required to keep the reel spinning.
Other than that, mowing the lawn with a reel mower is much like using a gas-powered push mower. Knowing what kind of grass you have and what mowing height and care that grass requires will help you to mow your lawn properly. Taking care of reel mowers is easy. If properly cared for, reel mowers can last for decades.
There are no oil changes or tune-ups required. The only steadfast rules for maintaining a reel mower are:. To sharpen the blades, all you need are a grinding stone , grinding paste and some newspaper. The stone is little more than a rough file made of rock, and the paste has the gritty consistency of wet sand.
Reel mower sharpening kits typically include both these items. First, use the grinding stone to file out nicks and burrs. Then, apply the grinding paste to the reel blades and cutter bar. By turning the reel backward, the gritty paste files away at the blades, sharpening the edges.
The last step is simply to clean off the blades and test the cut on some newspaper to make sure the reel and cutter bar are close enough. If not, just make a few manual adjustments to the blade settings. Thanks to concerns about pollution and rising gas prices , reel mowers seem to be popular once again.
Today, new and used models are readily available at most hardware shops, lawn care stores and online. Sign up for our Newsletter! Mobile Newsletter banner close. Mobile Newsletter chat close. Mobile Newsletter chat dots. Mobile Newsletter chat avatar. Mobile Newsletter chat subscribe. Lawn Care. How Reel Mowers Work. Cost less than gas mowers.
Are less dangerous than rotary mowers. Require little maintenance. Are environmentally friendly. Scoop and cut the grass blades, instead of tearing them like rotary mowers. Produce little noise. Are easy to transport and store.
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