I am looking for a new tiller/rotavator for use on my allotment as I am now finding my 29kg petrol one difficult to work with and to fit in our new car.
On Googling I have found out that many companies are now selling cordless ones with 40v batteries. I am a great fan of cordless and and we have a cordless lawn mower, hedge trimmer and strimmer which all do everything I ask of them.
Has anyone any experience of using cordless rotavators/tillers?
What mainly concerns me is battery life (I have a standard sized allotment) although if needed I could also buy an extra battery ti take with me to the allotment.
Any recommendations?
With most cordless tillers you will get less than 30 mins of use and that's on nice soft soil and then upto a couple of charging afterwards, have you considered a mantis they only weight 12kg and are now 4 stroke so no mixing fuel, they also do a cordless version.
I have always found my mantis 4 stroke very economical. Sorry, never used battery type
I bought a Mountfield cordless tiller to replace my Mantis 2stroke when it finally bit the dust. I looked at the newer Mantis 4stroke but it was outside of my budget and the one thing I hated with the 2stroke was that hateful noisy whine, so the battery one is a blissful dull rumble in comparison. Before buying I did worry about a battery one not being up to the job but I find it great, it's surprisingly gutsy or that's my opinion. It's not going to plough up uncultivated ground but it will turn over beds beautifully.
Battery life could perhaps be better, I think it's around 35 mins for the bigger type battery. But as I can only manage to do stuff for a limited time before needing to stop and rest awhile, it works well for me. I use it then plug it in and while it charges, which to be honest is fairly quick with the fast charger, I take a break and crash out and then perhaps do a little more. Having a spare battery I think would give better scope for getting jobs done if away from an electric supply. I'm sure other brands are good too I just went for this as the battery is interchangeable with several different units and as the batteries are nearly as expensive as the gadget it made sense to have one battery that fitted several handpieces.
I better warn you against the rotovator head you can get for some strimmers. Very hard work and it only tickles the top soil. If you need to have a lighter machine it will only do the same as a good hoeing and raking.
Thanks for all your advice.
I bought a two stroke mantis many years ago and it took ages to rotavate the plot. It's now feeling its age (as am I!) and as time went on I seemed to spend more and more time coaxing it to work than actually using it.
We don't have electricity on tap on our site which is why I was thinking of using a spare battery.