Mulching leaves: Is the motor powerful enough to handle them and grass?
292713
Yes, it works fine for that as long a pile is not super high. If you get it into a foot high pile of leavs the leaves, it will stall out and there is a thermal protection circuit that will keep the mower off for about 60 seconds and you can restart it after that time is up. You did not mention if you planned to bag the leaf pieces for mulching or mulch on the spot. For mowing leaves on the lawn and pulverizing them into tiny pieces in the mulching mode, it works fine.
36709
It will definitely mulch and chop up dry leaves. I tried some slightly wet leaves and it worked so so depending on how wet and heavy the leaves were. I trimmed my shrubs and tried to suck up and mulch the clippings. If the clippings were short it worked just fine, even tough they were still green. The bigger twigs with sticks and leaves would get sucked up but NOT mulched and eventually plugged the input. Thus I would like to modify / sharpen the blades to cut up small fresh cut and still green shrub clippings. I will need to research this option further.
980444
It does mulch leaves well... Unfortunately it has the plastic blades (as do most of the blower/mulchers) so you want to avoid sticks. It also does not do well with wet leaves, but none of them do. Make sure you give the engine a rest if you feel it getting warm or if the turbine starts whining. It is a a good idea to give it a rest every hour or else the bearings can burn out. Our lawn person used our last blower/mulcher to blow the autumn leaves into 4 huge piles, and then sat on the ground and fed the leaves into the the tube until the engine burned up. It took 4 hours to do it, but you get the picture. One word of precaution... this unit is EXTREMELY HEAVY, so if you don't have strong arms your going to be sore after an hour of use.
2169542
It does seem that the motor is not a strong as it should be. It only cuts grass up to a short level. If you miss cutting for a period of time it will shut off. And this was in the first few months last year.
2115833
I use mine for mulching and cutting grass. You may need to go over some areas a few time to get them all but it works great for me
1457471
Sorry, I have not had a chance to do much leaf mulching with the CH5, but from past experinces with several differant machines I have found that really wet leaves when processed too quickly can pose some problems unless mixed with dry ones. It's not that the flails cannot pulverize, but that screens can become clogged on almost all machines when really wet marerial is fed too quickly. If mixed with dry leaves most can handle them, but you may wish to check with the Gxi folks that build this machine to see if they have any further info. They can be located online, and have been very helpful regarding most questions I have had. If there are many wet leaves then some raking to loosen them up and allow to dry a bit; which doesn't take too long; can help avoid clogging most chipper/mulchers.
530685
Love mine! I use it to clear the sidewalk after mowing and getting leaves off the deck. It's not great for piles of leaves though not enough power. I have the weed eater and the blower and batteries are interchangeable. For lots of leaves you need a more powerful blower.
2104677
This style of mower does not create suction like a rotary mower and therefore will not pick up leaves. The cutting action is created by the rotating blade contacting the straight blade in the back. Great for cutting a consistent heigth grass.
164904
I have been very satisfied with the BV6000. It works well with leaves and small debris, either on grassy surfaces or sidewalks. Good luck!
1516357
I have a L110 John Deere. The mulcher will require some muscle because there is a rubber extension with a hook on it. The hook must be physically stretched and connected to a hole in the frame. If you are a strong woman, it should be no problem.
1766533
I can't imagine the problem as we shred over a thousand pounds of leaves each fall. The unit will mulch at almost any speed, the only difference being the amount being vacuumed. It slows the process of work if the unit is overloaded, so, it is important to find the balance between the load and the speed. Then too, we use a 32gal. garbage can with a 40 gal. plastic bag and Toro's accessory hose and cloth cover. We learned that the cover blows off, so we threaded a 1/4 inch rope through the string slide at the top and use bungee cord under the lip of the garbage can and above the rope -- no more problems. I hope this helps as we bought a new unit this past fall, but are still using the 5 year-old Toro as well, mostly for the vacuuming, saving the new unit. Good luck, the Toro is likely the most dependable 120 volt AC unit made.
838468
I would rather buy a blower/mulcher in 1. It will be faster. Just vacuum the leaves and empty the bag into a pile or the trash when full.
838474
The real answer depends on you and how much time you want to spend mulching the leaves. Essentially you have to feed the leaves by hand; i.e., a handfull at a time. You cannot dump a bag of leaves into this machine. First of all, it will not let you. I have a similar situation and am building an adapter to widen the top so that I can more easily put a tub of leaves on top and tip them into the machine. I like this device because it is quiet and easy to start; just flip the switch. If you are doing up to a half dozen bags, I think you could be happy. If you are attempting to do 20 bags you will be disappointed; it will take a long time. T.
1154907
I can't answer your question directly, but let me say that this unit should not be called a leaf blower. It is quite ineffective at blowing leaves across a lawn. What it should be called is a "sweeper". It is excellent at blowing leaves dirt and light objects off our sidewalk and wooden deck. My wife loves it and uses it daily. If you have chairs, rugs, planters etc. to "sweep" around, you can't beat this tool. The battery lasts for a week to boot...
2136772
Great blower, not so much for vacuum. It does not mulch much, most leaves stay intact. It just sucks the leaves in a very small bag that fills up fast. It never clogged though, I used a different bag from an older mulcher that attached to a trash can and it helped. Would definitely recommend for the blower, not the vacuum.
1636985
In response to Aaron's question, my experience with this machine is really more to do with blowing autumn leaves off driveways and other garden areas, but I imagine that the blower would be powerful enough for what you have in mind. Plus it's small enough to get into tight spaces, but as I have not used it for this purpose I don' to give you incorrect information.
1126467
We absolutely love the mower- it's the best we ever had. As for mulching, I cannot comment on that as we bag everything it picks up and put it in a mulch pile in the corner of our yard, so never really used it as a mulching mower. As a bagging mower it works fine, vacuuming up even small stuff.