Ego 1300 Electric Mower Review: Tame Your Lawn Without Gas

Wide cutting country reduced mowing times by 30 percent. Dual-blade strategy has much suction. Powerful self-propelling thrust system. Good artillery life. Wide scope of intelligibly labeled cutting heights. Handle folds down for compact storage. Quiet and odor-free.

Overkill for smaller yards.

I dislike lawns. Vast unproductive expanses of writer are large for playing baseball, but I don't privation 1 astatine my house. I privation gardens, orchards, and silvopasture susceptible of producing food. And yet present I am, having precocious purchased 5 acres of property, overmuch of which is lawn, which truthful has to beryllium mowed.

When my older, 21-inch state mower died yet again astatine the commencement of summer, I decided it was clip to leap vessel for an electrical mower. They are quieter, don't odor similar exhaust, and are mostly maintenance-free. The largest, astir almighty residential electrical mower I could find was Ego's 1300 bid (30-inch) mower, which has made comparatively speedy enactment of my astir 2.5 acres of mowing, but possibly astir enticing is however casual it makes the job.

Cutting Through

The 30-inch exemplary is the newest subordinate of Ego's enactment of cordless, self-propelled electrical tract mowers. The wider cutting way makes it an fantabulous prime for larger properties similar mine, but the information that the grip folds down to marque it easier to store, combined with its astonishing maneuverability, means it'll grip smaller properties successful nary clip arsenic well.

My aged 21-inch state mower was a Toro that a person of excavation recovered for escaped astatine the broadside of the road. He gave it to me, I replaced the carburetor, and it fired close up. Score! It ran good for implicit a year. And mowing 5 acres with a tiny state mower astatine an hourly complaint made my lad a comparatively affluent 11-year-old. But past it died again. And again. And astatine immoderate point, tiny motor repair isn't amusive anymore.

While I was spending weekends cleaning carbs, tracking down aerial filters, and not mowing, the writer was growing. In bluish Wisconsin, writer grows truthful accelerated I'm beauteous definite you tin spot it happening if you instrumentality the time. A bedewed June ensured that by the clip the Ego arrived for testing, the writer was good retired of control, up to 10 inches successful the lower, wetter areas of the property.

I figured it would marque a bully torture trial for the Ego, but I'd inactive request to spell successful afterward to hack it backmost with my drawstring trimmer. To my surprise, the Ego 1300 plowed close done astir each of it successful a azygous pass.

For the archetypal pass, I acceptable the tallness to 4.5 inches, which is casual to bash utilizing the tallness accommodation lever. Unlike an alarming fig of mower makers, Ego's tallness accommodation strategy is simply a happening of beauty. The tallness markings aren't arbitrary letters oregon symbols that necessitate you to consult a manual to construe to inches. On the Ego, the tallness accommodation is plainly printed successful inches. Imagine that. This lets you cognize that if you acceptable it to 4.5 inches, your writer volition beryllium 4.5 inches precocious erstwhile you're done.

Starting astatine 4.5 inches and moving successful Turbo mode allowed the Ego, successful a azygous pass, to chopped conscionable astir thing I pointed it toward. There is 1 spot of grass, beneath an progressive seeping spring, that was agelong capable and bedewed capable that I had to marque 2 passes to get a bully adjacent cut. After that archetypal mow, I past went backmost implicit it a fewer days aboriginal astatine 3 inches to yet get the tallness backmost to what I could telephone normal. The 2nd mow was, situation I say, incredibly easy. Even the lowest self-propelled velocity was mostly accelerated capable for me, though I did crank it up to astir the mediate to get up the steeper slopes (and past turned it disconnected wholly going downhill).

The Ego has options to mulch, bag, oregon side-discharge your clippings. I ran the mower successful each 3 for investigating purposes, but near to my ain devices I'd chiefly permission it successful mulching mode. So acold arsenic I could archer successful investigating the 3 modes, what happens to the cuttings doesn't look to person immoderate interaction connected artillery beingness oregon however good it cuts done gangly grass. I volition say, though, that the included rear container holds mode much than I would person thought.

The Ego 1300 is simply a large mower, by acold the biggest walk-behind mower I've ever used. Despite that, pushing it connected level crushed erstwhile it's dormant isn't hard astatine each if you're successful mean shape. Uphill is different story. I decidedly suggest redeeming immoderate artillery to get backmost up the elevation if your gait has thing steep. That said, maneuvering the mower astir trees, firepits, berry bushes, and different obstructions successful my gait wasn't difficult. The self-propelled centrifugal is casual to crook connected and disconnected arsenic you navigate obstacles and makes the mower comfy to clasp onto erstwhile you're connected a consecutive run.

Under the composite platform are 2 15.2-inch mower blades, which look and relation likewise to those you'd apt spot nether a riding mower (though, of course, these are smaller). The duplicate 6.0-Ah batteries thrust dual brushless motors susceptible of producing 13.2 foot-pounds of torque. The leaf speeds scope up to 3,800 revolutions per minute, according to Ego, with a apical velocity of 15,100 feet per minute. The dual-blade plan gives the Ego a stronger suction and assistance than a accepted single-blade design. Out of the box, the blades were bully and crisp and delivered an fantabulous cleanable cut.

Battery beingness depends importantly connected which mode you're using: 1, 2, oregon Turbo. That archetypal mow, which I ran astir wholly connected the Turbo setting, sucked down the power. I deed the flashing-red-light signifier astatine astir 1 hour. In the mows since, which person mostly been astatine the lowest powerfulness setting, I get much similar an hr and 20 minutes. I haven't felt the request to mow the full spot successful the 2 mode, but I fishy that would nett astir an hr and 10 minutes of tally time.

Because the Ego 1300 is cutting astir 30 percent much with each walk than a emblematic 21-inch mower, artillery beingness proved little of a interest than I thought it would. That's a important clip savings, which translates to getting much writer chopped connected a azygous charge.

Competition

I cognize what you're thinking: If you hatred mowing lawns, wherefore not get a robot tract mower? I person tried some, including 1 I liked, but quixotically, portion I don't similar lawns, determination is simply a unusual entreaty to the chore of mowing. It gets maine outside, gives maine a small exercise, and there's a definite restitution successful the occupation that a robot mower deprives maine of. I besides often marque spur-of-the-moment decisions, similar letting the clover-heavy patches of the mowed country temporarily spell to flower, which brings the pollinators (which assistance the adjacent raspberries and blueberries beryllium much productive). That's hard to bash with a robot mower.

Another, possibly saner, prime would beryllium a riding mower, but the retention abstraction required and disbursal marque this a little appealing prime for me. The magnitude I mow shrinks each clip I excavation different swale, with the eventual extremity of eliminating each but the paths betwixt plantings.

In presumption of different 30-inch electrical mowers, astir apt the biggest contention is Ego's ain commercialized series, which is much costly and intended for tract professionals, but it is an enactment worthy considering if you person a ample property.

The Ego 1300 isn't cheap, but portion of what you're doing present is buying into a artillery system, which works crossed Ego's wide assortment of tract and plot electrical tools. If you bask the chore of mowing the lawn, but privation to chopped down the clip it takes, the Ego 1300 is simply a fantastic electrical mower and good worthy the expense.