Founded in 2008. The Landscape Juice Network (LJN) is the largest and fastest growing professional landscaping and horticultural association in the United Kingdom.
LJN's professional business forum is unrivalled and open to anyone within within the UK landscape industry
LJN's Business Objectives Group (BOG) is for any Pro serious about building their business.
For the researching visitor there's a wealth of landscaping ideas, garden design ideas, lawn advice tips and advice about garden maintenance.
Replies
Well how long is a piece of string really...what you don't want is a tool letting you down while on a job and no backup machine either with you or back at base. What I have found is that the efficiency of some tools reduces gradually with mechanical wear and tear, blades become chipped or blunt, spark plugs foul up, filters clog and fuel systems get dirt in or pipes deteriorate or come off, levers and buttons break through being actuated thousands of times...if you can do a bit of servicing yourself it helps prolong the useful life span, as it can make the tool uneconomical to repair if you have to pay a workshop to do it.
Our previous Honda four stroke strimmer lasted 6 years my Stihl multi tool is 6 years old and my Honda HRD 536 is about 5 years and still going strong.
I have two Etesias, one bahia 2007 which does almost all our ride on work from village greens down was bought secondhand last year and has been brilliant. We have a variable speed Etsia Pro 46 PBE which is 2010 also bought second hand. The variable speed is down to who is pushing it!
Everything gets a basic service twice a year i.e fuel filter, oil, plug and air filter that's it. (blades are done weekly) The multi tool is on its second set of blades and occasionally has fuel issues usually down to dirt getting in via the stupid fuel cap which is designed to trap as much dirt as possible! Keep you air filter clean and the fuel clean and you don't seem to get much hassle.
Hope that helps
We are a fairly small company employing four people and i don't keep things if they get unreliable.
The cynic in me says if your equipment lasts past the commercial warranty you're quids in ;)
Longevity is so specific down to individuals, type of work/site and mechanical sympathy hence difficult to forecast.
The business view (IMO);
The text book & fincial business way (and ensuring you can replace with new/updated tools) is to get the spreadsheet out and do some Return-On-Investment calculations. That would give you the 'cost per month/week/day' to pay, service and repair that peice of kit.
Then take that figure and use that in your Overhead recovery part of internal charging rate.
If it last less than that time, you've either chosen bad kit (not fit for purpose) or abused it and you've lost/wasted money.
If it lasts more than that time, you've benefited and can run that piece of kit longer and effectively 'make money' off of it OR sell it at that date, bank the cash and re-invest in new kit.
Almost treat it like hired-in kit ;) which is akin to PCP car contracts etc.
p.s. looking at the amount of ex-LA kit around on eBay etc, I'd say many sell their kit off while still running and had gone past it's ROI date.
Strimmer heads as well but I don't really class that as a broken machine!!
I think I've changed the plug twice.
As Billybop says....... if you can do the work yourself, the lifespan can be prolonged............ sometimes almost indefinitely. It largely depends on whether you have the inclination, time and mechanical aptitude. Certain items will always fail in the end and these can be replaced fairly cheaply...... thoroughly check these items during the winter on a rainy day and replace anything showing the slightest wear/damage. Check the bottoms of handles for the telltale cracks of impending failure. I've found bearings lasting many many years through just repacking them with grease once a year. Gearboxes can be a pain.... Kaaz etc. Again, a dealer can charge you several hundred pounds when you can replace the usual 3 parts that cause the drive to jump/slip for about £90. Engines...... the Honda engines rarely fail though even they can be replaced for a few hundred pounds...... cheaper on Ebay. Its also surprising how many "pattern" parts can be used for a fraction of the price............ I'm using pattern ignition modules for a couple of Stihl hedgecutters........ £20 from China against £100 for the genuine...........they work fine and have been in use for considerable time. In many years work, I've never actually worn a machine out............. they just get nicked!! Personally, I enjoy looking after my machinery however If you can't do the work yourself, a machine can rapidly become beyond economic repair.
As lots of the engine, starter, and even throttle triggers tend to be the same.
I'm going to have to look through our kit, but I do have a strimmer that we've had 'for ever' I think it's a Zenoah. I want a nice shiney new one, but it refuses to give up and it's been hammered for 10+years now!
In general the professional kit is intended to be serviceable and designed to last longer, when I first started I would buy a cheap mower from focus d.i.y. (remember them lol) and run it into the ground, by the time the blade needed replacing it was new mower time, these days I am into the cordless which so far has proved utterly reliable, I know that it will work every time as well as the first day I got it, however, I have learned not to leave any batteries in the truck overnight at this time of year as they can get too chilled...Its a different discipline, takes a few seconds inserting into the bank of chargers when I get back to the yard after work....Apart from that, only one maintenance issue, blade seized up on cordless hedge cutter while in winter storage, just needed the blade bar bolts slackening off, lubricating and re-tightening, working perfectly now, its nice to be freed from the vagaries of the internal combustion engine, to the point that pouring petrol into a tool every hour or two just feels odd and wasteful
But I don't agree that they are better for the environment (noise excepted) as the power and therefore emissions have to be created somewhere never mind the mining of exotic materials for the batteries!
-
1
-
2
of 2 Next