My channel is all about smart and sustainable technologies, but I never thought that I\u2019d be wanting to talk about … a lawn mower. But here we are. I\u2019ve been using an EGO LM2001 lawn mower for the past 5 years, but just upgraded to the newest self-propelled model. How is it? And why should you consider going electric over gas? <\/p>
Going electric is kind of a slippery slope. I knew I wanted to go with an EV a long time ago, but with the features I wanted until the Model 3. But once I got my EV it was a huge motivation to get solar installed on my house. It\u2019s really cool being able to charge my car off of sunshine … which makes you want to electrify everything in your life. Like mowing your lawn with a battery charged by sunshine.<\/p>
I\u2019ve been mowing lawns since I was old enough to push a mower. Most of that time has been using various gasoline push and rider mowers, with different horsepower and features, but in the end it\u2019s always been a headache to maintain them. So what\u2019s the benefit of going with something like one of these EGO mowers? Well the pros are pretty straight forward:<\/p>
I\u2019ve always worn ear plugs when I use gas mowers, but with the electric mower , I\u2019ve never felt the need to. They aren\u2019t silent, but it\u2019s not a disruptive noise, so you can actually mow your lawn at times you may have avoided before to not tick off your neighbors. I still wouldn\u2019t advise mowing at 5:00am, but you won\u2019t bother your neighbor\u2019s with an electric mower compared to a gasoline mower.<\/p>
But what I think will win most people over is the maintenance. Just like my Tesla there\u2019s really not much maintenance required, which can save you time and money in the long run. The only things you have to do are clear out the deck from grass build-up and sharpen the blade. That\u2019s pretty much it. <\/p>
Both of these EGO models fold up for easy storage, which was a big selling point for me. You just unclip two clips on the push arm to collapse it, and then push in a lever to swivel the entire arm over the top of the mower. Stand the mower up on edge and wheel it up against the wall. I\u2019ve got a small garage, so being able to tuck this away after each mowing was a big plus. One downside with the design of my original EGO mower were the clips. They never had a strong click or grasp, so as you mow they can sometimes work their way loose. My wife and I ended up using a little tape on there to stop that from happening, so not a great user experience.<\/p>
Along the same lines was the \u201ckey\u201d that you had to insert and press down as you pulled the activation lever to make it run. The pull bar works in the same way as a gasoline mower for automatic shutoff if you let go of the mower while it\u2019s running. But you also need a safety mechanism to prevent accidentally starting the mower, which I get. I just never understood why it was a removable key, which could get lost. It came tethered to the handle when I bought it, and I\u2019ve never removed it … or felt the need to.<\/p>
The older EGO also isn\u2019t self-propelled, which I had some concerns about in the beginning, but it turned out to be somewhat manageable. It\u2019s dramatically lighter than any gas mower I\u2019ve used, so it doesn\u2019t take much effort to push. However, we do have a bit of a steep slope in our front yard that can be … challenging. If your yard is more level, then the lack of self-propulsion shouldn\u2019t be an issue at all. For my wife and I, it was a bit of an annoyance. <\/p>
The only other issue, if you can call it that, was that it could sometimes get a little clogged up if the grass was too damp. Most of the time this didn\u2019t cause a problem, but when it did, it was very annoying to have to stop and clean it out a couple of times during a mowing session. I\u2019ve encountered that on gasoline mowers too, but less frequently on mowers with a high horsepower. <\/p>
Those may sound like really annoying issues, but they were manageable and the trade offs were worth it to have a mower that had almost no maintenance, ran off of sunshine, and didn\u2019t make you go deaf from mowing the yard.<\/p>
That brings me to the new model, which is the 56-Volt LM2130SP (rolls right off the tongue) with a 7.5Ah battery. It\u2019s been a few years between the models, and it shows. EGO has clearly been learning, iterating, and improving their design. This model has erased pretty much every issue I had with my previous model.<\/p>