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Off-Topic Electric vs gas mowers....

MedleyCane

MedleyCane

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Just bought a house with smaller yard.
Not much lawn to cut and whilst the Cub Cadet we have is nice...I think it's too much for small yard.
Thinking of getting push mower.
Is the electric mower worth it?

Should I post this on the football board?

Lol
 
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MedleyCane said:
Just bought a house with smaller yard.
Not much lawn to cut and whilst the Cub Cadet we have is nice...I think it's too much for small yard.
Thinking of getting push mower.
Is the electric mower worth it?

Should I post this on the football board?

Lol
Click to expand...
How small is your yard? My son in law has an Ego 7.5 amp hr mower with dual blades and it handles his quarter acre just fine.
 
JD08 said:
How small is your yard? My son in law has an Ego 7.5 amp hr mower with dual blades and it handles his quarter acre just fine.
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.35 acres yard. There really isn't much lawn, tbh.
I saw some good reviews on Ego.
How is it, maintenance-wise?
 
Electric. We made the switch to electric years ago, because my parents yard isn't the biggest either and it was the right choice.

Doing the same as @JD08. Gets cleaned out every once in a while and batteries get charged after every use. We have two, because it can get difficult to get it down at once, especially when grass is a bit higher and sometimes even a little damp, but overall, it's really easy to use and maintain.
 
My yard is small enough I've done the whole Ego eco system. No problems with it. If you play the batteries right you can have multiple tools with only a couple batteries. I do have one of the blowers and it works pretty good for blowing off the driveway or the pool area but I still have a gas blower for full leaf cleanups. The blower is the only gas action I have and I'm not giving it up until it dies. The quiet is a huge plus.. I put my buds in and it's easy money from there. My buddies tried to talk **** but when they borrowed the chainsaw or the pole saw they were impressed. If I'm being picky I don't like that the mower only adjusts in 1 inch increments.. I'd rather half inch increments. To replace my 3 batteries would be close to $1k. It's not cheaper but I'd probably do it again.
 
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MovingZen said:
To replace my 3 batteries would be close to $1k. It's not cheaper but I'd probably do it again.
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>$300 each? **** those things probably make a killing lol.

Pretty sure they do 56v with 14 18650 cells in series and just increase the Ah of the cell and also amount in parallel to increase the Ah. You can probably build their highest capacity pack for like $125 in 18650 cells. Could buy a spot welder and practice, and replace every single cell in those - just reusing the bms and case, and save legit like $500 lol



**** even that green casing (paraffin wax) that they call their self cooling material is replaceable lol. It's just wax after all pretty sure. Probably legit like 10x worse than just putting in a tiny *** fan to air cool it all though. Probably possible to install a tiny *** fan in there though that would do the same cooling job. Or just do nothing tbh.

@gabednconfused you do battery ****, you think this would be safe to diy? Seems like it'd be decently easy too tbh... Charging unattended would probably be more risk than worth though lol.
 
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Calinative said:
>$300 each? **** those things probably make a killing lol.

Pretty sure they do 56v with 14 18650 cells in series and just increase the Ah of the cell and also amount in parallel to increase the Ah. You can probably build their highest capacity pack for like $125 in 18650 cells. Could buy a spot welder and practice, and replace every single cell in those - just reusing the bms and case, and save legit like $500 lol



**** even that green casing (paraffin wax) that they call their self cooling material is replaceable lol. It's just wax after all pretty sure. Probably legit like 10x worse than just putting in a tiny *** fan to air cool it all though. Probably possible to install a tiny *** fan in there though that would do the same cooling job. Or just do nothing tbh.

@gabednconfused you do battery ****, you think this would be safe to diy? Seems like it'd be decently easy too tbh... Charging unattended would probably be more risk than worth though lol.
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I'm gonna watch the video and see what I can learn about diy batteries.. appreciate the video. The batteries I have: 7.5 ah for the mower is $440, the 5ah is $330, and the 2.5ah is $200. I use those to run my blower, mower, string trimmer, edger, pole saw, chainsaw, and hedge trimmers. The mower came with a 6ah which is $380 to replace but when I do need to replace it I'll go to the 7.5 ah. I also have an inverter to run my gas on demand water heater if the power goes out. It's all pretty expensive but so far it's all done the job really well.
 
MovingZen said:
I'm gonna watch the video and see what I can learn about diy batteries.. appreciate the video. The batteries I have: 7.5 ah for the mower is $440, the 5ah is $330, and the 2.5ah is $200. I use those to run my blower, mower, string trimmer, edger, pole saw, chainsaw, and hedge trimmers. The mower came with a 6ah which is $380 to replace but when I do need to replace it I'll go to the 7.5 ah. I also have an inverter to run my gas on demand water heater if the power goes out. It's all pretty expensive but so far it's all done the job really well.
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I hear the secret is to buy a tool that comes with a battery, then sell the tool on Marketplace.
 
JD08 said:
I hear the secret is to buy a tool that comes with a battery, then sell the tool on Marketplace.
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Yeah, that's how I leveled up.. buy a tool that comes with a larger battery. The rest of the stuff I just buy tool only. @Calinative has me looking at other options now lol, including generic. I don't need any batteries yet but the info is good to know.
 
MovingZen said:
Yeah, that's how I leveled up.. buy a tool that comes with a larger battery. The rest of the stuff I just buy tool only. @Calinative has me looking at other options now lol, including generic. I don't need any batteries yet but the info is good to know.
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Cheap generic ones almost certainly are just the similair bms and case with super cheap low amp 18650s put in in basically the same way the video shows with nothing special ... If you opened it and tested the cells they'd probably be less than advertised I'd bet... Like 7a would actually be 4a type thing...you could quite literally go to home depot or Lowe's, go to their battery recycling bin and take those and open them up and put a bunch of replacement cells in, and then have like 6 batteries that you just lightly use each of them and swap before they get super hot...

You can buy 18650 in bulk for pretty cheap. Definitely useful for like lanterns/flashlights, power banks (smallest being like a phone charger, biggest being a legit home stationary storage power wall type replacement even with grid tie in to solar)...

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MovingZen said:
I'm gonna watch the video and see what I can learn about diy batteries.. appreciate the video. The batteries I have: 7.5 ah for the mower is $440, the 5ah is $330, and the 2.5ah is $200. I use those to run my blower, mower, string trimmer, edger, pole saw, chainsaw, and hedge trimmers. The mower came with a 6ah which is $380 to replace but when I do need to replace it I'll go to the 7.5 ah. I also have an inverter to run my gas on demand water heater if the power goes out. It's all pretty expensive but so far it's all done the job really well.
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Btw the 2.5 ah pack for $200 is actually insane. That is literally like 14 18650 cells. Literally you can buy that for like <$50. 5ah is 28 cells so <$100 in cells. 7ah is like 56 cells I think? So like <$150 in cells lol. All in those 3 battery packs would need like 100 18650 cells which would cost maybe $250... $300 max. And more you buy the better volume deal you get. And a machine for the welds/sauntering maybe like $100... So $400 for all this basically. In the big one I'd look into a way of adding a small fan inside... Or you could just cover them in candle wax or some **** lol.

If I were actually gunna do this myself I'd 100% start with the 2.5ah pack. I can't imagine that gets such sustained usage that the heating would be super high in it. Set whatever charger to the lowest charge rate possible... But like even if you had to replace them 4x due ******* up A) its practice and B) still cheaper lol.
 
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Wow, appreciate everyone's information. Thanks for sharing. My wife inherited a Cub Cadet rider which has been in the shop a couple of times. To me it is too much of a machine for a relatively small yard and it takes up space in our garage which I want to keep relatively clear. Anyways, thanks for contributing to this discussion. I am learning a lot!
 
JD08 said:
I have a Ryobi that was a hand me down. It stays charged enough to walk around the house, but not to do the whole yard.
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Think Ryobi is supposed to have some of easiest cells to replace.

Some tools make it now so when you open them up and remove the 18650 cells the bms dumps the energy into a capacitor and kills the bms and is irreversible. So like a dead man's switch and very anti-consumer imo. I'm sure it's sold as a safety feature I guess, but That is usually for more newer high voltage packs. So like sometimes it matters the exact order you remove/disconnect things.... But older lower voltage packs should be decently easy (if you can sauter/spot weld)...

 
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