Battery Power for Lawn equipment -- is it time?

Gonna need a cup-holder count before I weigh in.

 

For mowing a lawn you want wide tires and light weight to avoid soil compaction.

JeffD

 

i don't think so, but now you have me concerned

 

The mower could have a DC to DC converter.
Those batteries aren't very big though, so finding space for them probably isn't an issue.

 

i cannot find anything online for the 30", but the 38" model with 100ah shows four batteries. this guy has a pretty good review after 5 years. i will look in the o/m.

watch

 

The battery is one commonly used for mobility scooters and wheelchairs. A very quick search finds one such scooter uses two 12V, 48amphr ones.

 

i mean how many are there? i think you're right with four though, judging from a battery replacement video for the 38" 100ah model.

 

Connect batteries in parallel; you add up there amperage.
Connect them in series; it's the voltage that is added.

Four 12V's will give you 48V, and probably for less than a DC to DC converter. Plus, you get longer run time, and/or longer life. It does mean the replace cost is going to be about the Li-ion estimate made here. If you go through Home Depot. They seem to be a standard size, so you can likely find cheaper. You could even go with less amp hours.

 

now i'm hoping to get 3 years out of them, so i'm back to my $200./year i originally thought. so much for the due diligence i'm always preaching

 

I like the way LawmowerMan suggests just ripping the battery pack out of a car and ganking it onto his mower. Think we'll see any videos of him driving his zero turn mower at 60 MPH on the highway?

 

Going on 4 years with my 80 Volt Kobalt mower. Love it. Still using the same battery. Its a 6 amp & very expensive. I have 4 other 2 amp 80 volts for blower and edger. Have not lost a battery yet. There all Li.
There's many cheap knock off's but have not tried those yet.

The trick to these is never let them sit discharged and don't store them out in the garage. Store them inside cool. At least down here in Florida.

Same with Dewalt. I have 20 Dewalt 20 volt haven't lost one of those yet either.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Kobalt-80-volt-6Ah-HC-Battery/5000884705

 

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This weekend I picked up some battery powered lawn equipment. Riding mower, weed eater and a pole saw from Greenworks. They all use the same 60v Li-ion batteries in different amps but you can mix and match. The mower has a bay to plug in 6 60v 8amp batteries that it came with.

The mower works great. I didn't even consider an electric one until I walked by a display of a couple of EGO Zero turns at the hardware store. They claimed to be able to mow 2+ acres on a charge and equivalent of a 20hp mower. I thought they looked cool as hell. I was looking around at the other alternatives like cub cadet and Ryobi but I ended up liking the Greenworks mowers because they both had cargo space for up to 200lbs and came with all 6 batteries (the EGO didn't come with all the batteries it was built for which was an odd choice IMO). The Ryobis still use older batteries that some reviewers mentioned lost capacity in just a year or 2. At least if my batteries degrade they're easier to replace.

I had a heck of a time just getting an order through tractor supply. First few orders were unceremoniously cancelled because the selected stores didn't actually have them in inventory. Then one was declined because I had multiple holds from the earlier attempts. I even ended up changing my mind and going with the more traditional riding mower version because I called a TSC an hour away and they did have it and it was less expensive for the same stats as the zero turn.

It did a great job on my overgrown, weedy, wet yard. The weed eater and pole saw are easily better than the gas versions in my garage. I did the whole side by the house and still had charge left. The trimmer came with a 2.5amp battery that lasted the whole time I used it around the house, porches, trees, fire pit. Even so the 8amp ones in the mower will also work in it. These are really nice to have because for the last few years I'd been tackling the yard with the 6' brush attachment on my 40hp tractor which is both overkill and a pain to maneuver. It seemed like a good time to give electric a go.

 

I wonder why these companies use such low capacity batteries for something as power hungry as a riding mower?

my wheelhorse has a 3 gallon gas tank, even considering for efficiency improvements your talking a good 10 kwhr + to become comparable

If I were to want to spend the day blowing leaves and moving the little trailer I carry the truckloads of them out with I would probably need 10x battery swaps

 

For that Greenworks mentioned above? Cross-compatibility. That company has a very strong ideological push to make their batteries interchangeable parts of a system, so you can use the same battery in a chainsaw or leaf blower. The rider just happens to be capable of carrying several simultaneously for fewer reloads.

Extra advantage: the riding mower owner has the option to charge some packs while using others, rather than the whole pack being in for charge or out for use.

Extra advantage: if one battery pack fails prematurely, the rest keep the system in service while the owner deals with replacing the one module. This probably saves the manufacturer a bundle on warranty claims, plus the owner isn't trucking a dead tractor all over the place.

Extra advantage: WHEN the packs get old and start to fail of old age, the owner can replace them one at a time for more manageable maintenance costs.

 

Yeah all of this. The chargers that came with the mower can recharge all 6 batteries in 90 minutes. If you've only got an acre you can plop in 3 or 4 of the batteries and keep the other 2 bigguns for your leaf blower. Heck between the mower, the 2 tools and a free battery promotion at tractor supply I have more batteries than I'd probably use in a day. Got the 6 bigger 8amp ones with the mower and then 4 2.5amp batteries that came with the pole saw and weed whacker.

My wish list would be onboard charging on the mower instead of lugging those big batteries in and out to recharge (the EGO has onboard charging. it's slower than the stand alone chargers but I'd be fine with that). Oh and some type of inverter to plug in a bunch of batteries as backup power for the house if you needed it. I already have something like 2 kw of batteries why not have a big thing to recharge them all together and use them for power if I needed. Put it on wheels. And a solar kit too.

 

4 grande for a 42" greenworks garden tractor? that's a great price!

 

Some companies have power supplies for their battery ecologies.

 

Just ran out the extension cords for our venerable Craftsman corded electric mower yesterday, finished with corded B&D leaf blower. Appreciate that’s not going to work with acreage.

 

I have 3x50ft 12 gauge power cords for my wired outdoor tools (Sawsall, hedge clipper, leaf blower, lawn dethacher). I retired my 2-wire 14 gauge cords.

JeffD