New Lawn Mower

[Tom M King]

This thing goes on the short list of stuff that ended up being better than I thought it would be, when I bought it.

I ordered this back in April, during a 15% off sale. It just came.

It's going to save me a Lot of work. No more string trimming on the shoreline, and it's Fast too. Previously, there was 1100 feet of shoreline that had to be cut with a weedeater. No more.

I cut the acre and a half field in front of the house in 15 minutes. It's pretty smooth, so a 6 foot swath at 14 mph goes pretty quickly.

I drove it a couple of miles to the nearby store, to fill it up. They have a slope on the road front that's steeper than any I have, so I tried it out there. The small crowd of working men were hooping, and hollering. The guy I handed my phone to, for the pictures, said the pics didn't do it justice. At the end of that run, I turned, and went straight up the slope. I forgot to tell him which way to hold my phone, so the pictures would be right side up in these forums.

The rear is a standard zero-turn drive, but the front wheels are steerable, and linked to the rear drive units. The 35 hp Kawasaki seems plenty strong, and it has an air ride seat, and power steering.

Best toy I've bought in a good while.

[Lee Schierer]

Nice but you already got it dirty. :)

[Warren Lake]

thats cheating. A Martin Lawn mower.

Wholly crap that is nice.

[Keith Outten]

Nice mower Tom.

Commercial mowers are a joy to own and operate. I have a Dixie Chopper zero turn with a 72" deck that is 25 years old and still cutting about 2.5 acres every week. It is showing its age but that is to be expected after so many years of service.

[Zachary Hoyt]

My new lawn mower is one of these (though I paid a little less for it than is shown) and I'm pretty happy with it too, though it's not nearly as impressive as yours.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/144081400485

[Jim Becker]

I agree with Keith...different brand as I have a SCAG, but a more commercial focused mower really feels and cuts differently than the consumer versions. I had to use my neighbor's brand new Toro two weeks ago to cut our old property that's up for sale because my machine was in for maintenance. The Toro cut fine, but it really felt like a toy; lightweight, over sensitive and not equipped with ROPS/seat belt. The SCAG is heavy, rooted to the ground, operates smoothly and has the safety features, too. While my machine is technically too big for our new property, I own it, so it's staying. :) It was purchased in 2005 and has not required much to maintain it over the years. I did need some minor welding up front because there are a few places on the old property that really "beat" on the right front corner due to turns on a slope and the effects of gravity. The alternator was just replaced, too. But otherwise, it's a tank.

[Ole Anderson]

My son had an old Cub Cadet commercial 54" Zero Turn, twin gas tanks. His new property had too many hills as that is not the forte of a standard zero turn. I told him about the ones with front wheel steering, a bit out of his price range, so he sold the old mower for about the same price he bought a new 42" Cub Cadet tractor. Works better for him. I have a 48" Deere Z425, so I am familiar with the issues of side slope steering on a zero turn.

[Ronald Blue]

Looks like a sweet unit Tom. My terrain is almost totally flat so zero turn works fine for my needs with no necessity for being front wheel steerable. One thing I discovered last year and would recommend anyone try is the "Gator" brand blades. Grass here especially in the spring is always quite juicy and tends to cling to the deck. When I switched to the Gator blades made by Oregon I rarely have to clean the deck out. The other benefit is how evenly the grass discharges. The park right next to me is being mown by a high end John Deere ZTR and it clumps and looks like crap basically. I was going to suggest he give the Gator blades a try. They are also heat treated and hold the sharp edge very well.
oregonproducts.com/en/professional-products/lawn-and-garden/mower-blades/gator-mulching-blades/c/g6-mulchingblade-p

[Tom M King]

Thanks for that tip. I ordered one set of extra blades, but will try some of those the next time I buy some. Blade speed is pretty high on this one, so it shreds, and slings grass pretty good.

[Jim Becker]

The higher blade speed is a benefit of most decent ZTRs....both for the "chop chop" and because these suckers can often mow at a pretty high ground speed...

[Bruce Wrenn]

Thanks for that tip. I ordered one set of extra blades, but will try some of those the next time I buy some. Blade speed is pretty high on this one, so it shreds, and slings grass pretty good.


Tom, check with Agrisupply for your blades. Great company to do business with, IMHO.

[Tom M King]

They know me by name at Agrisupply. I don't know what I'd do without them. We have horses, dogs, chickens, tractors, outdoor cooking, and a mechanic shop on our place. I've been dealing with them for as long as I can remember. I used to have almost all of my tractor implements from there, until I graduated in tractor sizes 30 years ago. They don't sell implements larger than Category 1. I built our farm with their stuff, back then.

edited to add: We're a little less than an easy hour from the one in Petersburg.

[Brian Elfert]

You must have purchased the Pro Z 972 S. I came close to buying the Pro Z 960 S with 35 HP engine, but I ultimately went with the Grasshopper diesel front mount mower. I don't really need the diesel, but I like the torque. I also have the snow blower for the Grasshopper and I have found that 48" wide snow blowers need a lot of power for heavy wet snow.

[Tom M King]

Yes. That's it. No need for a snowblower here. I thought if the single rear wheels weren't enough sideways traction, that I would add the dual wheels. Turned out I don't need the duals anyway. The rest of the drivetrain is the same in both mowers. The duals tear up the ground more, in sharp turns.

[Ronald Blue]

The higher blade speed is a benefit of most decent ZTRs....both for the "chop chop" and because these suckers can often mow at a pretty high ground speed...

I believe that you are correct Jim. Blade tip speed just under the speed of sound. They say bad things happen when they exceed it. I think Dixie Chopper was one of the first to use the high blade speed for maximized mowing speed. I had two before I purchased my Simplicity Cobalt with 4 wheel suspension. The other thing I did on the first one because there was a owners forum that recommended it was run two blades per spindle. Increases the vacuum action enough the cut height had to be increased but it also took almost all the horsepower reserve too. I've not done it since though. As I stated before the Gator blades are game changer. A friend/co-worker bought a JD X740 and it had them on it. He agrees that he will never use conventional blades again.

[Keith Outten]

25 years ago Dixie Chopper advertised a 400 mph tip speed on their blades. If you have a diesel engine running dual blades is the hot setup, you definitely need the torque though.

[Malcolm McLeod]

... tip speed just under the speed of sound. They say bad things happen when they exceed it. ...

I'm guessing LOUD will be the first bad thing you notice. Short term hearing loss might be 2nd??:eek:


25 years ago Dixie Chopper advertised a 400 mph tip speed on their blades. ...

400 mph is humming to say the least. Some back of napkin math says a 24"L blade needs 5600 rpm to hit 400MPH at the tips, or a 36"L blade needs 3750 to hit 400 mph. Spindles better be, technically speaking, 'honkin'! ;)

My old Hustler ZTR advertised ~18,500 fpm tip speed IIRC.

ANSI limits US mowers to tip speeds of 19000 fpm (from a quick Giggle look), and same napkin says that's ~215mph. Maybe a little marketing department stretching going on... or maybe ANSI wasn't quite as aggressive 25 yrs ago?

Add: Speed of sound on standard day (60*F @ sea level - - ish) = ~761mph (or ~67,000 fpm) for comparison.:cool:

[Keith Outten]

I can't believe the words "Speed of Sound" are in any post discussing lawn mowers :)
We have truly come a long way.......

[Tom M King]

Whatever the tip speed is, the blades are the loudest part, and the motor is not really quiet. I'm wearing foamies, under muffs.

[Malcolm McLeod]

I can't believe the words "Speed of Sound" are in any post discussing lawn mowers :)
We have truly come a long way.......

I'm holding out for over-the-ground speeds in ^this^ range.:rolleyes: ("Want skid marks with that mulch??")

[Jerome Stanek]

I'm holding out for over-the-ground speeds in ^this^ range.:rolleyes: ("Want skid marks with that mulch??")

My Gravely only goes 13 MPH with the Yamaha 33 HP engine. The nice thing about that engine is it is stingy on fuel and a lot quieter then the Kawasaki that I had before.

[Tom M King]

Yeah, this Kawasaki loves gas, and is loud, but that was my only choice. I needed what this mower can do, and a regular zero-turn wouldn't do it. They only put this one motor in it. I'm very glad I chose this one. It's even better than I expected it to be.

The other side of our point is steeper than the side I showed in the pictures. I thought we were just going to have to plant shrubbery over there, but I tried it yesterday, and was able to cut every blade of grass. The 72" deck overhangs the edge over the rip-rap enough to eliminate absolutely all of the string trimming down there. That alone will make this mower pay for itself.

I gave the old zero-turn to the guy that used to cut grass for us, today. I had to go pick him up, feed him lunch, and carry him back home when he finished before, but we decided to stop doing that when the Pandemic started. It was a lot of work for me to do it all by myself, but have cut the time down to easily managed level with equipment.

[Brian Elfert]

It seems strange that Cub Cadet doesn't make a steering wheel model in their 700 series with a 72" deck. They do make a lever steer in the 700 series with a 72" deck.

[Jerome Stanek]

It seems strange that Cub Cadet doesn't make a steering wheel model in their 700 series with a 72" deck. They do make a lever steer in the 700 series with a 72" deck.

I had a Cub Cadet Tank. They could not fix a problem that I ended up taking it back 6 yime to 2 different dealers. They finally gave me my credit back and I only had 3 mowers to choose from as it was the end of the season 1 was a 700 72 inch with the steering wheel and the others were a Exmark or Gravley I took the Gravley.

[Warren Lake]

Im in kindergarten with the 15 year old Cub Cadet I was given 42".

speed is limited by my bumpy lawn, drinking coffee from a sippy cup as i cut the lawn had to slow down to not loose too many teeth. Now i want to be like those guys on you tube that put sand down and drag heavy stuff over to make their lawns smoother, or maybe drink the coffee first.

[Malcolm McLeod]

... speed is limited by my bumpy lawn, ....

462793

Grab one of these. Just retract the wheels and 'hover-cut'. Ideal for bumpy lawns! :cool:

OK, OK, so maybe it's not intended as a mower ...... but it could be!:D

[Tom M King]

Bumps will be a thing of the past here. It will probably take me several years, because it settles in low spots, so I'll have to keep building them up. I built this drag just for the purpose. Some people use short things, and even old bed springs, but I made this one to work more like a jointer plane. It works great. It's 12 feet long, and 7' wide.

I have a mountain of the richest topsoil, if I can ever get an excavator to come pile it up, and sort the stumps out of it, so I can get the guy with the screen to come, that I already have lined up. It's a place I've been letting people dump leaves, and we've dumped stable cleanings there, for 35 years. It's almost black, and full of Earth Worms.

I built it out of 3x3x3/16 angle iron, but could have gone to 4x4x1/4. It won't even knock the tops off growing Dandelions, but spreads dirt nicely.

I dug up some of it with the front end loader, but it really needs to be screened because it has some rocks in it. I just filled in some dips down by the lake, to see what it would do. That is grown up in grass now.

The new mower cuts all that grass that you see in the left of the picture. My previous mowers wouldn't hold that hill.

[Ronald Blue]

462793

Grab one of these. Just retract the wheels and 'hover-cut'. Ideal for bumpy lawns! :cool:

OK, OK, so maybe it's not intended as a mower ...... but it could be!:D

I think they are only available as a walk behind but check out the hover mower.
https://thehovermower.com/HM19H4-OP.html

[Brian Elfert]

I had a Cub Cadet Tank. They could not fix a problem that I ended up taking it back 6 yime to 2 different dealers. They finally gave me my credit back and I only had 3 mowers to choose from as it was the end of the season 1 was a 700 72 inch with the steering wheel and the others were a Exmark or Gravley I took the Gravley.

My understanding is the Tank was a bad design and the product has been totally redesigned since then. Cub Cadet may have made a 700 series with steering wheel and 72" deck in the past, but I can't find one on their website today. It might be I just missed it.