Grass trimmers: How we test grass trimmers
How we test grass trimmers
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Three testers of different heights and levels of experience used all the trimmers in the following six common situations:
● Vertical lawn edge along a soil border
● Horizontal lawn edge – representing the 15cm or so strip the mower can’t reach easily
● Grass growing along a fence, wall or other hard edge, which is tricky to reach with a mower
● Grass growing sideways across a path or paved area
● Long grass up to 15cm high representing areas cut less frequently or not at all with a mower
● A patch of coarse weeds and nettles
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Each tester recorded the time each task took, and rated how well the machine coped and the quality of the finish. This was used to rate the overall performance of each machine.
Next, all three testers rated each machine for ease of use, assessing factors such as how easy it was to carry around, adjust handles and shaft length, how easy to change from vertical to horizontal cutting, comfort of handles and operating position, noise, vibration and replacing cutting lines.
Total test score
We assigned 60% of the total score to performance and 40% for ease of use.
For the electric trimmers we put more weighting on the lawn edging and trimming tasks, and less for cutting rougher areas and vice versa for the petrol machines.
For the cordless machines we awarded an additional 20% for battery life as this is such an important consideration - it varied from 16 minutes for the best to 6 minutes for the worst in our tests.
Starting a petrol mower can be equally frustrating, so we allocated 10% of the ease of use to this.
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