For the past couple of seasons, I have worked for a client who has 12 acres of land, including a wood. I spend about 10 months of the year working at the property and do a wide range of jobs. The chief source of income during the summer is mowing the grass. There are about 6 acres to mow and it takes me around 8 hours to mow all sections. We have a great arrangement and I cannot fault the clients generosity. Further, he pays the invoice within 48 hours. Prior to working for him, I had always contemplated buying a ride on mower, but, simply did not have the work to justify it. When this job came along, I knew that a ride on mower was required and he allows me to keep it in his storage area, where he has a compact tractor that i can use when the need arises - which is quite often. My concern with this is if I damage it in any way.
As the client did not require the grass to be collected, I opted for a side discharge mower, with a 48 inch deck. This has proven invaluable and the hours are clocking up quite quickly. One of the issues with the property is that it seems to attract lots of mole hills, rabbit warrens and badger Setts. When the ground is excavated, it tends to throw up a lot of stones. Quite often, I hit the stones and am forever sharpening the blades. I do wonder sometimes if it would be more beneficial for me to have my own compact tractor (which I would use most of the year on the property) and a flail mower, rather than the current arrangement. Although more expensive, I feel it would be more versatile as I could also put a front loader on it.
My business has become more established and I have received a couple of calls that require a ride on mower, but, the customers want the grass collected. This is not possible with my current mower. It was suggested to me by the local John Deere dealer to buy an X300 series with a collector and a deflector so that when I work for my customer, the grass could be discharged via the deflector. This would give me the best of all worlds.
Therefore, the question is, should I sell my current mower and buy the 300 series? Sell my mower and buy a compact with a flail? Sell my mower, buy a compact with a flail and another ride on mower with a collector? Or, stay as I am?
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cannot realy answer your question but would somthing like this be any good tow behind flail mower - Search (bing.com)
James - if you are used to mowing with a rotary, a flail will seem VERY slow as due to the way they cut you can't cover the ground anywhere near as fast.
Also you will need Y blades and need to keep them very sharp (all fifty to a hundred or so of them in a fine finish flail) to get a cut approaching that possible with a rotary.
I run compact tractors doing mowing (including flailing) and they have both advantages and drawbacks in equal measure.
Personally I wouldn't put a front loader on anything under 30hp as smaller than that the loaders are tiny, don't lift very high and they make the tractor inherently unstable.
Good 30hp 4wd tractor and decent loader would set you back £10K plus used.
Trouble is a tractor on agricultural tyres is great for loader work but not great for mowing decent grass as you will leave 'tread marks' all over it.
Also as the sector is no longer allowed to use red diesel, its got double the cost to run a tractor on mowing - a hard days flailing on the 35hp will chew through approx £40-45 of diesel.
Another option could be to get the client to invest in a 'finishing mower' for their tractor, depending on its HP as this may let you cover the ground faster and the blades are heavier and stand more abuse than standard ride on mower blades.
Happy to discuss further in PM or by email if you prefer?
I would Echo what Adam has said above. I used to run compact tractors and flails and they are a nightmare.
Heavy, difficult to transport and greedy on fuel. I guarantee you if you hit something like a small-ish stone with a flail there is a good chance your day is over. You will break two flails and the whole drum will be out of balance. It is probably a return to base repair and that is if you have the spare parts. I basically had a repair almost everytime I went out - sometimes that was welding....
I don't really understand this customer wants a large area collected thing that keeps turning up on here. Fair enough if you are a wedding venue I guess.... Collection basically takes about twice as long. It should make much more sense financially to cut and discharge twice as often and is lots easier on the guy doing the cutting. I point blank refuse to collect anything over about a quarter acre - I would be terrified that the customer then asked me to take the bags and bags of clippings away. I side discharge. I used to mulch but find rain and dampness over the last few years has made that a bit lower quality and I also started to notice a slight build up of mulched grass on the outside few passes of the lawn - centre was perfect. Vic575 swears by mulching and cuts mostly large areas, he is much farther south than me and likely has a bit more dry weather to explain the difference. The thought process is exactly the same but side discharge works better for me than mulching.
I currently run a Toro Z Master 48" configured to side discharge - I would expect to cut the 6 acres you mention in about 3 hours to a good standard. If you get your height of cut correct and are cutting frequently enough you should not be aware of significant clippings. I would however drive around any mole hills- to protect my blades, and for sure stay WELL clear of any badger setts to make sure I was not infringing the wildlife and countryside Act. Mole control around here is winter work 😉 How do you handle thrown object hazards in your risk assessment? The stones excavated by moles should be covered by it so you should be avoiding the molehills or raking them flat and removing the stones.....
Having a lawn mower stored and only used at one customer also seems like very poor asset utilisation. If I am spending several thousand pounds on a piece of equipment I am for damned sure going to try and make as much with it as I possibly can.
I suspect this customer is actually your "400 lb gorilla" and you don't really have the relationship you think you do with them.
Can't say that I have ever broken a flail (not too sure how that could even happen with swinging 'y' blades).
Can say that horse electric fence tape or old 'bale wrap netting' in long grass is a definate 'day spoiler' though... Lesson learned now, always carry bolt cutters, a hacksaw and a stanley knife and LOTS of blades in a box on the tractor - always seems to happen the wrong end of a ten acre field from the truck!
I keep saying this but mulching is the way to go. This can be used on both types of work. I use both of my ride on mulching machines on both the fine finish jobs and on the old churchyards that only require eleven cuts per year. Even here the finish is far better than cut and drop/side discharge.
It would be interesting to know what make and model of machine you already have in order to get the full picture. Eight hours for six acres seem a little slow on the face of it.
As always, thank you for the replies. There are quite a few things to take on board. When I say 6 acres, it is about this size. Could be slightly more. I use a John Deere X166 with a 48 inch deck. Most of the cutting is on a hill. Going down is fine, going up can be a little slow.