Imagine relaxing on your porch with your family instead of mowing the lawn. With the innovative Friendly Robotics Robomow RL850, you can turn your dreams into an eco-friendly, wallet-friendly reality. This fully automatic lawnmower cuts grass all by itself, so you can get a vacation from mowing--forever! Just drive the Robomow to the edge of your yard and press 'Go' for a beautifully manicured lawn. |
Robomow RL850
At a Glance:- Automatic lawnmower mows entirely by itself
- Cuts up to 10,800 square feet in a single charge
- On-board sensor and bumpers to avoid obstacles
- Grasscycles for a healthier, greener lawn that requires less water
- Quiet operation means you can mow day or night
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Robomow does all the work so you don't have to. | 
Operates without gas, oil, or spark plugs. |
Automatic Lawnmower Does All the Work for You
The Robomow RL850 is an innovative lawn mower that works automatically, so you won't have to spend another weekend pushing your old gas guzzler around the yard. It mows on its own within a boundary that you outline with a thin wire (included). Once you handle the initial wire setup, this mower does all the work for you--simply press 'Go', sit back, relax, and mow!Powered by exclusive drop-and-go 24-volt batteries, the heavy-duty Robomow RL850 is an eco-friendly 53-centimeter, 21-inch mower/mulching system. With its three blades spinning at 5,800 RPM--double the speed of a typical gas mower--the Robomow RL850 travels across your lawn in a crisscross pattern, covering up to 10,800 square feet on a single charge. Easy to set, the Robomow RL850 delivers a 1.75- to 3.25-inch cut with high-cut blades and a 1.0-2.5-inch cut with low-cut blades. Eco-Friendly, Wallet-Friendly Choice
Unlike conventional lawn mowers that pollute as much as 40 late-model cars in just one hour of use, Robomow RL850 offers a way to keep your lawn looking great without sacrificing the environment. The Robomow RL850 doesn't simply cut your grass--it repurposes the clippings through a patented process called grasscycling. The mower cuts grass into fine clippings and disperses the cuttings over the ground. These clippings quickly decompose and release valuable nutrients and water into the soil, resulting in a better-looking lawn. Grasscycling also leads to a deeper, healthier root system that increases your lawn's resistance to disease, drought, and insects, and it reduces the amount of water your lawn needs by as much as 85%. And because the eco-friendly Robomow RL850 doesn't require gas, oil, tune-ups, or spark plugs, it will save you money. Multiple Features for Safe, Quiet Operation
In addition to its environmental benefits, the Robomow RL850 offers several user-friendly, neighbor-friendly features. First, a user-controlled theft protection system guards the mower from unauthorized use, and a child lock provides peace of mind. An on-board sensor and bumpers identify obstructions like trees, rocks and obstacles, and truly quiet operation means you can mow your lawn at any hour without disturbing your neighbors. Dimensions and Warranty Information
The Robomow RL850 is WEEE and RoHS compliant, measures 26.0 x 12.5 x 35.0 (WxHxD), weighs 50 pounds (without battery), and is backed by a two-year warranty. What's in the Box
Robomow RL850; 500-foot perimeter wire and 200 plastic pegs; sealed batteries and charge pack; 2007 Generation software; instruction manual.
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 RL1000 Unreliable |
| Review Date: August 23, 2009 |
| Reviewer: J. Blakely, |
Many of these reviews seem to be from recent purchasers. I've owned a RL1000 for 2 years now and I thought people could benefit from a more experienced owner.
In 2 years I've had to replace the power supply 3 times and the docking station board 3 times. Both these components are about $100 once you get done with shipping and such so you'll need to budget about $300 a year in maintenance costs. This isn't including the 2 sets of blades I also bought. (By the way, don't bother with the "deep cut" blades, they don't mulch any better than the regular blades.)
None of the components on this system were designed with durability in mind. I had 1 of the docking station boards fail after 2 (count 'em 2) days. The service for these units is terrible, simply terrible.
Finally, last week, one of the drive wheels failed and it just kept driving around in a circle. I'm not going to spend any more money on it, so I bought a lawn tractor.
Even when things are not breaking down, its operation is problematic at best. It is not something you can let run unattended. The first season the unit kept leaving the perimeter area. Had to call 3 times before anyone could tell me how to correct that issue (sensor needed adjustment). The unit would also get stuck a lot. More often than not, I would have to go out and move it away from an area that is was bogged down in.
I can't recommend this product to anyone. Which is really a shame because when it does work, it kept the grass looking very good. |
25 hours of use and dying (battery?)
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| Review Date: April 26, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Discriminating shopper, Kansas |
I had basement work done that involved digging up my entire yard, so I had no yard until reseeding in the fall. Anticipating that mowing would begin that fall, I bought the RL 850 Robomower in June. Seeding took place in September, and I eagerly began to try out my new mowing toy in October. I'll describe the entire process I went through to date:
Laying the perimeter wire was a major project, since I have a large size yard with several trees, a shed, and a rock garden island. I think that even if I simply laid out the wire around a rectangle box of a yard, the provided pegs and wire wouldn't be enough. I ultimately ended up ordering one extra roll of wire and four bags of pegs to get my front, back, and sides of the yard securely wired. (You'll want more. Trust me. See the very bottom of this review for more information...) I also ended up buying a 3-inch edger to get this job done without killing my knees and back. At that, it took three weeks of evenings to get everything in place and securely pegged down, with dirt wheeled in to fill in the edging.
Once all wiring was in place, we eagerly watched the mower do its thing. It was quite a spectacle to the neighbors and even the UPS man, watching this little mower do its thing in the front yard. Sure enough, it zoomed this way and that, back and forth, staying within the wire and fairly well covering the entire front yard. It does seem to be less generous with cutting tighter quarters. I have a tree that's about 5 feet from my sidewalk and driveway, and that area invariably gets neglected by the robomower. I just manually run it over that area, which doesn't seem like a big deal -- except that I have a few areas like that between the front and back yards. Anyway, it mows, and does a decent job of getting most of the area cut.
Right away, though, we noticed that the cut wasn't as short as I'd like. My neighbor was chatting over it and agreed that it hardly looked like it removed any grass last fall when we first ran it. We adjusted the height, which made no difference. An online investigation indicated that the mower comes with high-cut blades, and if you want a closer cut, you have to order the low-cut blades separately. So, we ordered and they arrived a couple of weeks later, and the yard was cut more to my liking.
If my robomower continued as it did last fall in October when cutting my lawn, I'd indicate we're happy with this purchase. It isn't holding up, and it's only April of the following year -- 6 months after I began using the mower. To put this in better perspective, I mowed my tender new grass 2-3 times in late October just because I was eager to use my new electric mower gadget. Living in Kansas, it got cold and even snowed, so the mower was safely stored in my garage through the winter months in early November and not in use...
I got it out three weeks ago for the first mow of the spring, and right away, I noticed it running somewhat sluggishly when manually moving it to the yard to start mowing. I set it up, turned on the perimeter switch, and let it do its thing, and the robomower nicely cut my side yard, which takes all of one hour. No problem so far, I thought.
Then I moved it to my front yard and let it mow that zone. It got about half way through the front yard before it died entirely and I had to literally drag the mower to the garage to plug it in -- only a half hour after it began cutting the front yard. When it died, it died completely. There was no juice left to move it to the garage or even to turn it on and begin to head in that direction.
I thought, maybe the poor thing is just sluggish from having been stored for the winter, etc. I recharged 24 hours, babytalked to the thing, and set it out on the front lawn to begin mowing again. It finished the front lawn, which takes 80 minutes, and then I moved it to my back yard to start in. It died within 20 minutes, although this time it had enough remaining juice to limp along to the garage for recharging.
Today, I brought it out to the back yard to try again. Just over an hour into the mowing process, after a full day's charge, it died again. This time completely. I had to drag the power charger cord and an extension cord out to resuscitate it before I could move it back to the garage again for recharging. Grrrrr!
I checked my battery stats setting on the mower, and it looks like the mower got all of 24 hours of use from the original battery it came with before it essentially wasted away. Given the size of my yard, it'll probably take four days of single hour-long mowings before I can get hte entire back yard mowed. Unfortunately, it's not like the mower can tell where it died out and quit mowing each time, so when I return it to eh yard to restart, it ends up going back to places it had already mowed.
Obviously, I'm an unhappy camper. Based on the many reviews I'd read prior to buying the robomower, I opted for a second battery which was purchased at the time that I bought the mower itself. I had envisioned that I could charge one while the other was on the mower. Unfortunately, I didn't buy the special external cord to charge it. It's still in the box as I type this. Looks like it was a good thing to have prebought, since the old battery will be going back as soon as I can reach tech support for a warranty claim.
I'll keep you posted on how Friendly responds to my inquiry about a warranty claim. At this point, I've socked a lot of money into a mower that fizzles after a single hour, and whose battery died after 24 hours of total use. Clearly, this product is not ready for primetime. Unfortunately, since I invested all of my mowing dollars into buying this thing in good faith, I'm going to have to go through the warranty folks to get this resolved so it's up and functioning right away.
About the need for more pegs: Because my back yard grass came in with a patch-type pattern, it didn't make sense to use the robomower all over the muddy dirt segments in order to get the patches of grass as well. So, my son and I went out and set up three temporary "zone" type areas for mowing efficiently until the grass filled out elsewhere in the yard. Because these were temporary patches, we used a minimum number of pegs to secure the wire above ground -- a perfectly acceptable practice in the manual for the mower. We also added an extra peg or two along each perimeter stretch for extra securing effort. By the second time the mower was out there cutting grass in the zones, it had a tendency of catching the perimeter wire in its wheel and dragging it along in stretches -- essentially reshaping the zones we'd set up. If I was going to use those perimeter wire setups permanently, I'd have to set up more pegs to secure the wiring. A decent rule of thumb: one peg for every 5-7 feet of straight stretch of wire.
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Very useful tool
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| Review Date: August 11, 2008 |
| Reviewer: Xiaoyan Chen, |
| I purchased RL850 in July 2008. I have beening using it almost every afternoon except when it rains. So far, I am pleased with this purchase. The instruction is easy to follow and the operation is very simple. |
Stopped working in three hours - lawn not finished
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| Review Date: May 28, 2008 |
| Reviewer: Vince Faltesek, |
In writing this review I have very mixed feelings and buyers remorse.
First I would say that if you expect great customer service from the the manufacture, your not going to get it. I expected a vendor return with my product as it is defective, but the vendor is absolute in me sending it in for warranty work. After dropping a buck and a half you'd think they'd be concerned about reviews and such, but I guess not. Their stance is that it has a two year warranty and that how it should be handled.
The reason I have mixed feelings is that my mom has the mower with no issues, in fact she is the reason I purchased it, but I see a train wreck coming and things for me usually only get worse with defective product..............I THINK I GOT A LEMON.
Thank god for Amazon as they are taking a return!
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Love it!
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| Review Date: September 4, 2007 |
| Reviewer: M. Woody, Pennsylvania |
It is just about the end of my first summer spent watching Mo cut the grass in our zone 6 Pennsylvania yard. It is a delight not to be doing the work myself. If Mo misses a spot I do not care because I AM NOT MOWING. Yippee.
Yes, it takes time and perserverence to lay the wire. I make my own pegs from wire coat hangers and I use 14 gauge wire from Home Depot because the supplies from this maker are just too high priced. The blades will probably have to be replaced (too many stones were hit this year) and the battery still seems fine after one summer of mowing 1/3 acre every week.
I have learned to use Mo only in dry weather - comments made by other reviewers are true, he does make a mess in mud and the deck does indeed get clogged with wet grass. But so did my big old gas powered Toro, which I do not miss.
You will like this mower if you are opposed to feeding and coddling lawn. MY "yard" was mainly weeds and turfgrass last May. Mo is set to mow high - 3" - and I can already see the improvement. The higher cut is allowing grass to crowd out weeds, with the result that there is more grass. The robot does a good job, costs over a three year period will be less than I would have paid the lawn service, and as for the edges, who really cares whether they are the neatest in town?
I love this thing. |
Not perfect, but saves me a lot of work
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| Review Date: August 25, 2007 |
| Reviewer: C. Andersen, Houston Area |
| I've had the robomower for a few months now. Laying the wire was the hard part; I had to get additional wire and stakes and was sore for a couple of days from all the kneeling and standing -- if I had to do it over again I would come up with some means of placing and pounding the stakes from a standing position. The first few times I ran it in my front yard it was a big attention getter, with neighbors and passersby stopping to watch and ask about it, and some kid even offered to buy it from me (I referred him to Amazon). Understand though, it is not perfect, and you likely won't be able to throw away your regular mower. It takes a LONG time (2+ hours) to mow a section of lawn, and it doesn't handle long narrow sections like the sides of the house or areas behind obstacles very well (it's really not very smart). I have given up on having it mow my front and side lawns as not worth the time it takes, so I let it go in the (large) back yard for a couple of hours, then get out the manual mower and quickly do the front and sides with it, plus the necessary trim in the backyard in areas where it has trouble (I have a lot of obstacles - trees, flower and vegetable gardens, pond). Overall I am pretty happy with it, as it saves me from the really heavy work on those hot summer days, and I barely break a sweat on what's left. I have only had one problem which required a call to customer support (it wasn't charging properly), and the response was prompt and helpful, even if it did presume that I owned a voltmeter and knew how to use it, and the mower was back to work a few days later. Oh yeah, it doesn't handle wet ground well, even if the grass is dry, so bear that in mind; I've seen it wedge itself against a tree root and just sit their spinning its wheels obliviously, until I freed it. In my fenced back yard I can let it roam relatively unsupervised, with the exception of an occasional check to free it from some minor problem or other (sometimes it gets confused and calls for help). One issue - as a software developer with some relevant expertise, I am a bit irked at being unable to modify the mower's embedded software, as I have little doubt that I could vastly improve its performance - an inquiry to this effect to the company has gone unanswered. While I can appreciate their presumed liability concerns, it would be to their benefit to mobilize the user community to develop and improve upon it - this sort of thing has been a big boon to the iRobot. |
Will it last? I don't think so and here is proof
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| Review Date: July 10, 2007 |
| Reviewer: kcobra07, USA |
Make sure you read all of this review before making your decision. Anyone can buy a new car, toy, or appliance and be happy the first few weeks. It's the time factor that you need in making an intelligent decision about a product. Just how long does it last. That's why I try to make sure I update my review throughout the life of the product.
I have had my robomower for 3 weeks now and I love it. No more taking allergy medication before mowing for me. You put it in a dry place, let it charge and then set it out on its own. It took a good 2 days to install and it includes everything to get you running. The kit includes 200 stakes, charger, 500 feet of wire (if you need more you can use 14 guage - 500 feet - $20 from hardware store), signal unit and two signal unit connectors.
It's controlled by the installation of the wire around the perimeter of your yard. The mower will only run inside the wire. You can also break your yard into sections and put it in that section, moving it from each section when it finishes. The wire can be buried or installed with the small stakes included. Once you install the wire you connect the signal unit to the two ends of the wire from the perimeter to a small unit that sends a signal around the wire. Once the wire is installed you simply use the hand unit that looks like a ninetendo controller to drive the mower to it's starting position. Starting the mower is even easier, just press the "Go" button on the top of the unit. The mower will start by cutting around the perimeter of your yard following the wire. Then it will stay inside the wire and go back and forth cutting the grass. It makes a shape like a bunch of W's connected (WWWWWWW) when it cuts.
As you can see from the picture it looks like a little toy space ship. Little toy!? Don't let this fool you. This thing weighs in at a little over 100 pounds and it has some torque to go with it. If you have holes in your yard you may have to fill them in, but they will have to be pretty deep before the mower will get stuck. The wheels are adjustable and the higher setting does make it easier for it to pull out of tough situations. I was worried that my yard might be a little steep, but the mower really surprised me. The cut was clean and my lawn has never looked better. The neighbors are trying to keep up with me now.
As I mentioned, it has a small removable control that looks like a Nintendo game controller that you can use to drive it around your yard. I did find the controls to be a bit sluggish and if you are not careful you will find yourself pressing on the controller pretty hard. This may lead to unusual wear on the control and I could see myself taking it in for a repair.
I guess you may be wondering what this thing uses to cut. Well, there are three tungsten blades that make a low humming noise, but it's so low that you can carry on a conversation while it passes you in the yard. I had one neighbor comment that it was great that it was so quiet. I have put robo out late at night before to cut until 1a.m. The neighbors didn't even know that I had it out. So far it's cut the yard nicely. Although I imagine that you will have to buy a set of blades every year. I'll update this on the price later.
The first couple of weeks I had to put the mower out almost everyday for the whole week so it could get all the grass cut. It has to run over the tall grass a couple of times, but it eventually got it all. I do wish they would put a sensor on the mower so it knows when it hits a clump of tall grass and would cut in a square or circle for a few minutes.
I would also recommend robo owners to put their mower out at least once a week. I noticed that the dandelions, which are usually a pretty tough weed, were only cut if they were less than 4 inches tall. Dandelions will grow pretty fast and can be 7 inches in no time.
I also had a little trouble with the charging mechanism. It has an LCD window on the controller that tells you when the unit is fully charged. I put the unit on charge and checked it again after 24 hours, it was still telling me that it was charging. I checked with the manufacturer. They told me that it was known to happen and that it could be considered fully charged after 24 hours. After I unplugged the mower it showed on the controller that the battery was full, but the mower did not run the full 4 hours. Since my grass was completely cut I let it charge over the weekend. This time when I checked it the Ready indicator was showing in the window.
If you do not like mowing your yard, get a robomower. I would recommend it to anyone. You may want to hurry since they are discontinuing the 800 series. The new 850 & 1000 are almost double the price, but they do charge themselves which makes not mowing even better.
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June 24, 2004 -- Well into mowing season in NC.
The mower is doing great, although I have noticed a few sqeaks as it's running. I put it out every other day and let it run. I have noticed it being a little sluggish in thick bermuda grass, but I would have trouble pushing a mower through that stuff myself.
I also found out that you can replace the controller. It seems here is a small cover inside the controller tray that is removable. The controller plugs into the unit with a small plug that looks like a phone jack. Now I can replace it if needed.
The only other thing that I've noticed is that the charge time is around 36 hours instead of 24. The charger that comes with the mower is a trickle charge and doesn't put out much power. There is a fast charger but I don't think it's worth it.
Sept 16, 2004 - Hope this isn't a sign of the future
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Had to take the mower in for service. There is a sensor on the front wheel that detects if the front of the mower has been lifted. Mine is saying that the front wheel is off the ground when it is not. I just talked to the repairman the other day. He tells me that he put a new front wheel sensor in and it wasn't the problem after all. Now he is replacing the main motherboard. It's been 2 weeks now so my grass is getting pretty high with all the rain we have been having. I hope this is just a fluke of my luck. I would hold off on buying one until you see how my story ends. I'll post an update when I get the mower back. I only have a couple more weeks of mowing.
October 1, 2004
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Just got off the phone with the rep from friendly. He is telling me that the part for my mower should be here by next Wed. Today is Friday. They knew at the first of the week that the main board was bad. It looks like it's going to be a month before they can get my mower fixed. I understand that they are working with the local shop to make sure I get the part even though the shop should be going through their parent company. I also understand that it would have taken longer had it not been from Robomower company stepping in.
Final words: It's a good tool, but you better hope it doesn't break down. If it does it will take you a month to get it back depending on your area. Do your homework. Ask how long repairs should take. Also, my riding mower broke down once after 15 years of service. That was when I decided to buy a Robomower. I used to think that I wanted to sell Robomower's, but now I'm having my doubts. I will not sell a product that I feel will not give someone good service and they will get excellent service from the company.
My status on this product has gone from 5 stars down to 3 stars, those stars include the service you get from the company. I will always consider that in my reviews.
Service after the purchase always counts as part of the product.
October 7, 2004
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Finally got the robomower back. Lesson learned here. Make sure you know how long repairs will take. I did have a couple of issues after I got the mower back. Seems the repairman didn't reset the calibration settings so the mower would start in calibration mode. I talked with him over the phone and he talked me through the system settings. I had to play around with it a little while to get it to set the directional settings. Once it locked in it was fine. I let the mower cut for about 3 hours. The grass was rather high, so it took a while for it to cut. It's probably going to take a week for it to get all the high grass now.
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November 14, 2004
It's the end of the cutting season. I'm letting Robomower cut to test out the repairs. I've had it charging for a ouople of weeks. The last cutting seemed to do okay, but the mower would only run about 2 hours. Before the repair it would run for 3.5 to 4 hours. Also, the problem with the repairs seems to be with the shop where I bought the mower. I've been communicating with the home office and they are determined to make me happy. I told the representative there about my reduced battery time. He told me that if the time falls below 2 hours he would replace the battery. I'll keep this updated on the progress. If things work out I wouldn't mind buying their new mower that charges itself.
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April 20, 2005
It's a new cutting season and Robo is doing great. The battery trouble that I had has been rectified. the manufacturer sent me a new battery after my time dropped to 1 1/2 hrs of cutting time. I took it into the shop with the battery and the repair was done in 3 days. Beats the heck out of waiting for the shop to order the parts. I have noticed some difference in mower. I noticed the first charging session that it only took 24 hrs to charge. then the next sesssion I unplugged it and then plugged it back in the "Keep Charging" changed to "Ready" right after I plugged it in. The mower only ran for 2 1/2 hrs. This time I let it charge for 48 hrs and didn't unplug it until it had "Ready" on it's own. I'm hoping it will run the full 3 to 4 hrs. I have new blades that were $58 if I remember correctly. I kept the old blades and may see if they can be sharpened.
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July 25, 2005
Looks like I'm having trouble with the battery again. I don't know if it was the shop repair that is causing the batteries to run low or if it is the batteries. I found a reputable dealer on the internet that seems to work good with people and he has a fast turn around on repairs. I may see if I can send him the mower for repair. Looks like this is starting to get a little out of hand, but at least it is still under warranty.
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August, 4 2005
I have my mower back and it looks like it will do okay. I still can't get the full 4 hours of charge like it use to do. After I got the mower back it ran for 3 1/2 hours, but the time started to drop going down to 2 1/2 hours. They won't replace the batteries until it goes below 1 1/2 hours cutting time. I'm starting to think that the mower isn't all it's cut out to be. If I can get my five years out of it then it will have paid for itself. I will keep this updated.
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Feb 2006
It is starting to get close to cutting season and I've dropped the guy that I got the new batteries from a line. From my understanding Friendly robotics made a mistake in telling people to keep the mower on charge all winter. That's what caused the charge to drop. I didn't have mine on charge all winter and didn't charge it until a day or so before I needed to start cutting. It's a good thing that their are a couple of kids in the neighborhood that will be looking for some summer work cutting grass. It looks like my robomower will be in the shop again.
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May 30, 2006
Here we are in may and I'm in full swing of grass cutting. The batteries won't last but 1 /1/2 hours. I have sent an email to the internet robomower sales and I will see if they will replace the batteries since they have a 1 year warranty. I would like to know if anyone else has experienced the drop in battery time on their mower. I will keep this updated.
I will also be changing my ratings on the mower as I really don't think they are ready for prime time. It is starting to look like an expensive car that is in the shop all the time. It's good when it works.
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December 2006
I believe this is it. My mower went out on me about August. The front wheel sensor is bad "AGAIN". They replaced the batteries, but then something else goes wrong. Seems like the distibutors are drying up as well. The distributor that replaced my batteries is going out of business. I bought a front wheel sensor from him and will be putting my robomower on E-bay for a deep discount. Watch for it and you can get a good deal.
April 2007
I sent an email today to offer Friendly Robotics a chance to buy the mower back for $75. They said they have no need for it. I guess they read my review. Don't make the same mistake that I did and end up with a money pit. I'm going next weekend to get my new X300 John Deere riding mower. Check out my reviews and you will see it posted.
To sum it all up:
Robomower is a good concept, but I don't want to put out $750 dollars every 3 or 4 years. the newer one has less trouble, but it is double the price. It would have to last 10 years to pay for itself. I may revisit getting a new one in about 15 years, but for now I'm done. The last mower I owned was a Craftsman from sears. It ran for 15 years with no trouble.
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Robo Mower delivers perfect cut ! First season's review added. Second season's review added
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| Review Date: June 11, 2007 |
| Reviewer: Turbo Tony, Cleveland, Ohio USA |
I just purchased my RL 850 from Amazon and installed the wire last weekend. I gave my lawn it's first Robo-cut.
The lawn looks like it got one of those professional haircuts. Looks like a golf course. No visible tire tracks anywhere.
It did take me 4-5 hours to stake the wire and adjust the edges by myself - and that was only the back yard (roughly 100'x75' with one landscaped island).
It took approximately 2 to 2-1/2 hours to mow a lawn I can cut in 45 mins. But I managed to get a nice sun tan on my lounge chair while IT was working.
If not for the picnic table obstructing the path of the Robomower, it would have done the job all by itself. I had to modifiy its course to finish cutting an area the table kept blocking it from. And it did get hung-up once backing up onto some tree roots (lifted off the ground and didn't make contact - wheels kept spinning). I have a few trees it just bumped into and backed away from.
So I guess I can't let Robo do it's thing unattended - at least not yet - and the instructions tell you NEVER to do that anyway).
As I develop more trust in the mower, I'll probably get some other chores done while it does the back yard (if I can tear myself away from watching the silly thing doing its job - looks like a turtle).
I'm considering purchasing more wire and perimeter switch for the front yard - but crossing over the sidewalk and driveway seems a bit complicated and perhaps hazardous (blades over concrete).
Now I need a clever name for it. Any suggestions?
Highly recommended product for those who have better things to do than walk up and down - back and forth - across their lawns - once or twice a week. Get it on sale tho!
Turbo Tony
Robomower and Roomba vacuum - anyone invent the home car washing robot yet?
Updated Nov 6, 2007:
I just finished my first season with the RL850 Robomower. What a delight!
The minor problem I had with it getting stuck on large tree roots - fixed by pounding a few stakes next to the roots.
"Bobby" delivers a near perfect cut each time. It does miss a very small patch or two every now and then - but so what - it gets it the next time.
The only regret was spending the money to buy this thing so that I could get more leisure time - but as it turned out - my 16 yr old son is the one who got the extra time off! Now he only cuts the smaller front and side grass with the noisy old Toro. Did I mention NOISY? I really got used to the "sounds of silence", well, ok, sounds of humming - while Bobby cut the lawn. It's to the point where I throw mean looks at my neighbor every time he cuts his lawn with his loud gas mower while Im trying to lay-out back and catch a few rays. If only everyone ( or at least both of my neighbors ) had one of these.
Consider this an endorsement. The thing works. And it's good for the environment ( can I use it as a tax write-off ? hmmmmmm..... )
Updated August 24th, 2008:
"Bobby" is nearing the end of his second season of mowing my lawn (got maybe 1-2 months left). It's performing like new. I charged the battery last Winter per online advice - remove the battery from the mower and charge for 24 hours once a month. It still runs for over 3 hours in it's second season. Love the cut and my wife says I'm getting lazier every day. Gotta love it! Thinking about buying more wire and another perimeter switch for the front yard (probably only 1/2 the front since my driveway splits the lawn).
Tony
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mower of the future
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| Review Date: May 12, 2007 |
| Reviewer: Big Pumpkin, |
Having been using it for a month so far, I have no complaints about this mower. It just works beautifully! I encountered no problem when following the DVD instruction to set up the perimeter wires. All my friends who have seen it in action were wow'ed too. My 21-month-old son also keeps asking me to get "Rob" out.
One caveat: it can't handle the scope in part of my yard. To be fair, the slope would have been hard for regular walk-behind mowers as well. If you have a hilly yard, don't expect this mower to go where walk-behind mowers cannot mow. |
Pleased!
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| Review Date: May 4, 2007 |
| Reviewer: Matt, Ohio |
I just purchased and used mine for the first time.
I am so far happy with this mower.
I am writing this to help potential others with the setup. As they say a smart man learns from his mistakes, a genius learns from the mistakes of others. So let me help you become a genius.
The worst part of this mower is the setup. After I have done my backyard, still have my front to do. I have found a potentially easier way to do this.
First off I agree that the line should be slightly buried. Here is what I suggest to do this quickly and less painful.
1) Rent/borrow/steal a lawn line edger. (Kidding about the stealing)
2) Mark your lines in the yard for the perimeter with spray paint, or maybe a chalk line.
3) Run the edger over the lines, to make a nice 2-3" deep cut in the lawn.
4) Place the copper wire in the line, staking it every 5 to 10' or so. I'd use a few more on places with a lot of turns. (This should save money on stakes, especially if you have a big yard.). (I have had to purchase more, b/c I didn't start out using this method, but I will for sure on the front yard).
5) Step on the lawn where you placed the wire, so as to smoosh the lawn back together.
6) Hook up the perimeter device and you are off and running.
7) Grab a beer and watch it go!
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