Allotments 4 All

sorry its not edible, but was thinking of buying a black and decker cordless strimmer, cost £60 ish.  It is in the argos catalogue.

I wondered if anyone has one or has used one and knew if the 3 hour charge means 3 hours to charge it or 3 hours to discharge it ?  And it doesnt say if there is a spare battery with it or not !
??? ;D

Hi,

In my experience battery powered garden tools are a waste of money. The strimmer might be ok for very light work when it's new. As the battery gets older you'll get less strimming time per charge. 

I was lucky enough to buy a really good petrol strimmer on ebay a couple of weeks ago. I got it for 80 quid - brand new - still in the box. It might be worth a look there.

I inherited a battery powered chainsaw at my cottage in France. Charge for 12 hours - cut three logs - dead as a dodo!

All the best.

Stork

I agree we tried one from argos then from B+Q both tore at the grass
and then ran down before it had gone around our plot get a petrol one
a bit more expence and trouble but worth it

Mine is a petrol one, bought it from B*Q online for about 80 quid and it's great :) The brand name begins with "M" and it's big and yellow, if that helps!! ::)

This has been said B4 but I love repeats ;D If you have a domestic electric strimmer then consider a generator, someone on here bought a brand new light weight genny for as little as £50, you can then make good use of all your domestic power tools up the lottie like mowers, drills, power saws, strimmers, even rotovator if electric. ;)

I tried looking in the search facility for similar posts but it is under stress, whatever that means? ???

I have a rechargeable hedge trimmer, it's superb but on the other hand my hedge is only 12 feet long and 3 feet high.

Battery powered garden tools are OK for a 10 minute job but at the moment are not seriously challenging mains electric or petrol powered equipment, give it another 10 years and the technology will be much better

I bought an electric cordless strimmer first.

It couldn't strim thick grass or nettles from the off, and ran down very fast (less than 30 mins total, but at a usable speed less than that). It prgressively got worse in holding charge and eventually only kept going for 5 mins (after about 7-8 months) and sounded like a mournful goose.

I bought a petrol one the following season for £85 new and it's light years better. I suspect cheaper too. And I can strim my whole flipping lottie and often a couple of others too while I'm at it.

Don't waste your money on cordless - go for petrol! Even the cheap ones are miles better!

moonbells

That was my experience of cordless ones as well, plus the transformers for the recharger kept burning out. If it had stayed at a 30 minute charge I coud have lived with that, but it didn't.

We bought a battery operated strimmer and thought it a waste of money.  It didn't last very long and my OH burnt it out by leaving the battery charger on too long.  It wasn't up to very heavy jobs which defeated the purpose of getting it.  We just got rid of all the grass on our plot, so we didn't need one. We have an electric home one, but like others have said it just tears the grass and looks a mess, so I would rather trim the lawn by hand.  busy_lizzie

Popular post this one! I bought a battery strimmer from Aldi for 40 euros (about 27 pounds) and while is great for light work (strimming grass around raised beds), the battery lasts about 10 minutes. Fine for what I want it for, but it sounds like petrol ones would be the way to go in general.

Niamh

I concur with previous comments about uselessness of rechargeable strimmers. I've got a lot of grass on my plot and need to strim on every visit as I can't cut enough from just one trip. It's like painting the Forth Bridge!

Quote from: Sprout on May 25, 2006, 15:17:08
I've got a lot of grass on my plot and need to strim on every visit as I can't cut enough from just one trip. It's like painting the Forth Bridge!

Grow veg not grass ;D ;D ;D

the purpose was just to use it for edging (we have miles literally), to save hours with edging shears, but it sounds as though it wouldnt be up to the job.

Could the battery be uprated or hav 2 for longer usage periods ? and arent they the no memory lithium batteries now ?

i grow veg and grass !and lots of them. beat that one !

by the way the model id seen was the black and decker glc 2500, but still nowhere mentions the discharge length.

i know that the 3 hours is the charging time

I can't be sure but the official B&D spares website lists the battery at £34.99 so I very much doubt it's even a NiMh battery let alone a lithium job, much more likely to be a NiCad 1.8ah ot there abouts at that price I'd think

i had two batteries for mine, it didn't save the situation. If the batteries had been up to the job, there wouldn't have been a problem.

Hi all,

One lone voice in favour of cordless strimmers! I just bought a posh Bosch Art 23 Accutrim from Argos (£50) which uses a plastic blade instead of line (MUCH easier to cope with), and also has the kind of "intelligent" battery you can leave in the charger for storage so it's always fully charged. Seems brilliant so far. I have bought a more flimsy one in the past that had all the disadvantages mentioned but this Bosch one seems OK. Less messy and (possibly) "greener" than a petrol model..??? But let's not get into that!!!

Chrissie

Let us know how it gets on. If they do make one with a reliable battery, I'd be interested. If.

Are there no petrol strimmers that turn round for edging purposes ?

We have two larger strimmers that we can use on edges, but we wanted one specifically for edges, lightweight and handy.

I guess we are hoping for something that doesnt really exist !  If only the batteries could last for a couple of hours !