So, I got the latest issue of This Old House magazine (I only purchased it to help my grandson go to a band clinic), and it has the yard guy who calls it a “yaad,” who suggested the following three reasons for getting a new lawn mower: 1.Your current one doesn’t start well, 2. Your current one isn’t as fuel efficient, and 3. Your current one has higher emissions. I suggest that the first one can probably be fixed, but the latter two are pure BS. So I use three gallons of gasoline during the summer with my older, less fuel efficient mower instead of maybe 1 and a half with a new one? Payback? Maybe 40 years or more for the cost difference. I’m already 62. Just how much global warming does a lawn mower contribute in a summer’s use? No data, of course. I’m not allowed to have sheep in the city, but that could resolve all three of those issues, plus provide meat at the table and fertilizer for the garden.
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He's fulla it
Another reason, and I think a pretty good one, to get a new lawnmower is to upgrade to a self-propelled one. Our new house has a large lawn (1/4 acre minimum) that's on a pretty good slope. Pushing the old Honda (which always starts easily) up and down, back and forth gets pretty tiresome. The lawn isn't large enough, nor am I lazy enough for a riding mower. So... do we get another Honda, a Toro, or what? What's this old house got to say?
Not to mention the carbon footprint created by disposing of the old one and manufacturing and shipping the new one.
So, how many acres of yard are you mowing - 1/4 acre or 4 acres... that fit into that equasion too.
There are places in the country (like S Cal) where people mow 3 times a week year round. (Of course, if someone cut off the Colorado River water they wouldn't need to mow so often, but that's another matter.) Apparently mowers in such places contribute a substantial fraction to pollution since the older mowers have a fuel efficiency about equal to a badly tuned Hummer. (The issue is smog more than global warming.)
Where we live (3-week growing period), on the other hand, it's not such a big deal -- snow-blower efficiency is a bigger worry.
>>>snow-blower efficiency is
>>>snow-blower efficiency is a bigger worry.
>Chuckle<
Sad, but true.
Originally posted by DanH:
"There are places in the country (like S Cal) where people mow 3 times a week year round. (Of course, if someone cut off the Colorado River water they wouldn't need to mow so often, but that's another matter.)"
Now THAT was funny.
No, DanH, even in SoCal, we do not mow three times per week. In my neighborhood, almost no one mows their own lawn anymore. They have all hired a Guatemalan of questionable immigration status to do their mowing. He "owns" the entire neighborhood's mowing business*.
What I would like to see (or, more accurately, "hear") is a QUIET! leaf blower. This Guatemalan guy and his son and employees have their leaf blower going all day long as they do one lawn after another around my entire neighborhood. If you are foolish enough to take Friday off, you will not get a minute's peace and quiet.
* Just for reference, I mow my own lawn and do my own weeding. I refuse to contribute to the flood of illegals out here. This isn't racist, it's a principaled decision.
Tell him you are with the INS and you would like a "real good deal" on your lawn.
mowing
I grew up in L.A.
We moved to Wisconsin and everyone in my neighborhood mowed their own lawn.
If you didn't something was wrong.
I mean, what else are you going to talk about at parties?
Well, besides the Packers. Duh!
>>They have all hired
>>They have all hired a Guatemalan of questionable immigration status
Has anyone asked (questioned) him?
Old Lawnmower Story
Many years ago, I lived in a NW suburb of Chicago, and I commuted in the mornings 45 minutes from west to east to my job at Ft. Sheridan. I would go through some very affluent neighborhodds, with lawn services at each house. I wanted a new mower, and I noticed that all of these lawn services used the green Lawnboys. They must be good, I thought. I took the time on one of these commutes to stop and talk to the person who seemed to be in charge of the lawn mower brigade at a large house. " So, why do you use Lawnboy mowers?" I asked. He answered, " None of the guys you see out there speaks English. Lawnboys are two cycle, and it's just easier to have them refuel out of one can when they need to than to ask them to also check the oil. We mix the fuel for them ahead of time." So that was that. Lawnboys have always been about twenty years behind in their deck design, so my next one will be a Honda Model (add twenty randomly mixed numbers and letters) self-propelled with a blade brake.
#1 reason
The single most important issue for ne is the right mower for the yard.
Each yard I've has has had different requirements. Having the wrong mower is a pita.
>>the latter two are pure BS.
>>the latter two are pure BS. So I use three gallons of gasoline during the summer with my older, less fuel efficient mower instead of maybe 1 and a half with a new one? Payback? Maybe 40 years or more for the cost difference. I'm already 62. Just how much global warming does a lawn mower contribute in a summer's use? No data, of course.
I didn't see the article, but I suspect that not all TOH readers are 62.
"Each weekend, about 54 million Americans mow their lawns, using 800 million gallons of gas per year and producing tons of air pollutants. Garden equipment engines, which have had unregulated emissions until very recently, emit high levels of carbon monoxide, volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides, producing up to 5% of the nation's air pollution and a good deal more in metropolitan areas.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), a traditional gas powered lawn mower produces as much air pollution as 43 new cars each being driven 12,000 miles."
http://www.peoplepoweredmachines.com/faq-environment.htm
You quoted "a traditional gas
You quoted "a traditional gas powered lawn mower produces as much air pollution as 43 new cars each being driven 12,000 miles."
I find that impossible to believe. I also can't find where the US EPA says that, although it is said in numerous publications that the EPA said it. That would be over 8000 hours of output from a car driving at 60 mph. Now how many hours is this mower supposed to be running? Sounds like a made up figure to me that is endlessly repeated. I have seen blurbs by local EPA offices quoting this figure also, but no place have I seen how they came up with that figure.
I know that most lawn equipment is a major polluter, but I personally do not run any of my equipment very many hours a year. And let's say we eliminated all pollution from yard equipment, that would be a 5% reduction overall. That's not a very big figure to me.
Look at this: http://www.epa.gov/oaqps001/community/details/yardequip_addl_info.html
It says: The exchange of 1,000 gasoline-powered lawn mowers for electric mowers has the potential of reducing volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions by 9.8 tons per year, which is equivalent to removing 230 cars from the highways
And: Operating a typical gasoline-powered lawn mower for one hour produces the same amount of smog-forming hydrocarbons as driving an average care almost 200 miles under typical driving conditions.
(And they did say driving a care, not a car.)
This is vastly different from the 43 cars driving 12000 miles. It's more like 1 car driving 3000 miles a year.
>>Now how many hours is this
>>Now how many hours is this mower supposed to be running?
I have the same question, although your quoted info ells us "Operating a typical gasoline-powered lawn mower for one hour produces the same amount of smog-forming hydrocarbons as driving an average care almost 200 miles under typical driving conditions." (I don't knw if the difference between "new car" and "average care" [sic] is an intentional distinction.
And I couldn't find a current EPA page which gives that "43 cars" figure, either, although I'm pretty sure I've seen it on the EPA site in tha past. (Keep in mind, though, my memory mileage may and does vary <G>)
The fact remains that the typical gas lawnmower is many times worse, on a per-horsepower basis or some other similar measure, than the typical car. Not in terms of carbon (which is fairly proportional to gallons used), but in terms of hydrocarbons, NOx, etc. Typically the mower runs fairly rich, and often it's out of tune, has a bad spark plug, etc. (Just think of how many people have trouble starting their mowers, when a well-tuned mower should start easily on one or two pulls.)
No evaporative cannister, no engine computer, no catalytic converter, and many older units still have mechanical magneto ignition.
I'm sure, depending on which specific measures you use, you can come up with a number of different "worse than NNN cars" analogies, but they all trend in the same direction.
outlook on polution
I moved from LA, to wisconsin, to rural Kansas, to ft collins co.
People who live in more rural areas (even if they aren't that rural) tent to look at polution differently.
When you live in close quarters with many sources of polution your outlook changes.
Right now in Ft Collins there are very few smog conrtols on anything.
Last summer for the frist time Ft collins air polution went above a certain standard.
I can't remebr which on it was. But there is talk of raising the auto polution restrictions.
I would like to see more restrictions on autos here.
LA had a huge polution problem and in order to bring up the air quality they had to look at every source.
I have between
a 1/2 and 3/4 of an acre.
I mowed my lawn for the first time this season the first Saturday in April. I'll mow it for the last time in Late September or early October.
During that time my 5 year old, 190cc MTD yard machine will not burn thru 2 1/2 gallons of gas. My string trimmer empties it's tank about once very two seasons.
2 1/2 gallons of gas can only make so much pollution, no matter how you figure it. Yes, it will be more than my car would make burning 2 1/2 gallons of gas..............and yes it will be less than my Kawasaki dirt bike makes burning 2 1/2 gallons of gas mixed with $12 a quart Motul two stroke oil.
I have an electric leaf blower, hedge trimmer and even a small electric chain saw for jobs that don't require the Husqvarna.
But guess what? Around my way they make electricity with COAL.
I'm all for electric lawn mowers and even city cars if that means that Camaros and corvettes will be around a little longer.........but before anyone jumps on that band wagon, or even the new lawn mower band wagon?
No one EVER seems to do the NET GAIN/NET LOSS analysis.
What is the net gain or loss over your old mower when you consider manufacturing the new one, disposing of the old one, shipping the new one in a nice new cardboard box to the big box store where you buy it, throwong away all that cardboard and styrafoam that was in that shiny new box?
I'll be keeping my 5 year old mower another year or two..................and I'm betting it's zero loss/gain for me doing so.
One thing that should be mentioned is that new EPA regs for lawn mowers, etc, took effect in 1997 (with two updates since then), so reasonably new units are much cleaner and more efficient than the old ones you inherited from your grandfather.