Ego Z6 ZTR Practical Experience?

FarmerCharlie

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I have had a Gizmow 61" ZTR for a little more than 10 years, and I love it. It's fast and powerful, works great with mulching blades and a mulching plate, and it's very stable on the sloping back of my dam. If they started making them again, I would buy another one in a heartbeat. But it is getting a little temperamental, and some days it decides to take a rest. I am looking for a mower that I can use to cut the 2 or so acres around the house on those days and perhaps even use for the rest of my 7 acres over several days when I have to. I have an Ego 56-volt string trimmer, and it works surprisingly well. The Ego Z6 ZTR looks like it might work for me, and I'm wondering how it has worked out for others. The Gizmow with mulching blades and mulching plate works extremely well. I just mow clockwise and keep the clippings thrown to the right side, where I cut them over and over again until I am left with almost no visible clippings at all. Does anyone have any experience with the Ego mulching plate? Can the mower take mulching blades, and does it need them or the plate? How does the mower work when the grass gets really thick?

Any other comments would be helpful. I think I'm about ready to give it a try, but I thought I would see what others have experienced before I lay out $5000 for it. I know it will not be suitable for the back of the dam, but I can live with that. And at 81 years old, tinkering with temperamental gasoline beasts is not as much fun as it used to be. :)

Thanks,
Charlie
 

sevenhelmet

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I just got one two weeks ago. It's such a new product there is very little discussion to be found, and zero long-term ownership experience. So here's mine so far:

[tl;dr] Despite some teething issues with the new product from Ego, I think this is a good mower if you enjoy electric OPE and need to mow up to an acre or so of surburban-style grass. Definitely geared toward residential owners, not business users. If you're into high-speed mowing or have a giant plot to mow, it might not be for you. As long as it remains reliable, it's a keeper.

My experience so far: The first mower (yep, I'm on my second unit already) did a great job on my front yard, but suddenly died when I hopped off to open the gate to cut out back. Batteries were good, charge >90% power, but the mower just refused to turn on, like a fuse or relay went. Troubleshot with Ego on the phone (their CS was helpful and professional- a nice surprise!). This mower has its own customer service team, and they have a direct line to the product development engineers. Bottom line: My options were get it to a service location 2 hours away, or have it swapped out with another unit by the dealer (big box hardware store with a big blue sign... you know the one.)

I elected to swap it out, since I'd had it in my possession less than 24 hours. Lowes took care of me with minimal fuss, even dropped off and picked up the old mower, and now I have a working copy. Same batteries and charger as the original.

After that hiccup, all seems to be good! I've mowed twice with it so far, and it's easy to use, quiet and clean, fun to drive, and charges quickly. I find the seat very comfortable, and the controls are intuitive. Drives like my parents' old Dixon ZTR. The Z6 seems to have plenty of power- I mow my thick, tall fescue on a medium blade speed (2 bars out of 4), and get a nice cut. I haven't run into a power limit yet, and there are some impressive torture tests you can view on Youtube. However, a Bad Boy, this ain't. You won't be mowing at 15 mph and leaving stripes with a Z6. Top speed is about 8mph, and I estimate I mow around 4-6 mph. Makes mowing a good Sunday afternoon "chill" chore. Or after work at sunset, because it has lights all over it- a nice feature I didn't even know I wanted.

All in all, it takes me about 25 minutes to mow my 1/2 acre suburban lot with trees, bed, and fencing, and my yard uses about 40% battery. I don't think you'd get the advertised 2 acres with this in anything less than ideal conditions, but it should handle a 1-1.5 acre lot with beds and trees on a single charge. Could mow more if you add additional batteries. Charge time is about 2 hours, although I've only needed to charge it once so far.

There are a couple of warts- the Bluetooth interface isn't mentioned at all in the manual and can be a little fiddly. It doesn't "pair" like other BT devices, you have to hold down the "settings" button on the mower, open the Ego app, and then tell it to connect. Then and only then will BT connect. But I did follow customer service's instructions for updating my mower's firmware (again, not in the manual- why?), which is said to solve some "known problems"... I had no problems updating the firmware once I got BT connected.

This mower also has a LOT of plastic on it- generally more than I'd like. The Ego logos are just stickers on the outside- they didn't emboss or color the plastic. Kind of cheap feeling for a $5000 mower. I might eventually remove them and have a "debadged" mower. If it gets wet, they'll peel.

The stamped metal deck seems OK, although it rattles a bit during high speed driving. I adjusted and leveled it immediately, which minimizes the rattle. It's easier to adjust and remove than most gas riders I've seen (Dixon, Grasshopper).

Haven't tried the deck-wash system yet, but I clean it off using my leaf blower (also Ego) and it stays fairly clean.

Hope this helps.
 
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FarmerCharlie

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I went ahead and bought the EGO Z6 last fall, but I didn't use it enough to evaluate it. I have been using my trusty Gizmow 61" commercial grade ZTR for 11 years with almost no problems. I use Oregon mulching blades and a mulching plate on the Gizmow, and that work's great. I can mow seven acres in a single sitting. The Gizmow suddenly quit on me a couple of weeks ago, and it will be three weeks before the shop even looks at it. So I got out the EGO and did my first real test. By that time my grass was pretty long. Some of it on the West side of the pond has a good bit of ryegrass and weeds and had not yet been cut for the first time this season. The EGO did a surprisingly good job on my centipede--even the section that was a little long. I bought a mulching plate for the EGO, but have not yet installed it. I mowed clockwise, and the mower did a good job of throwing the grass to be recut the next pass. In the areas of centipede, by the time I was done, there was almost no visible cut grass left. This is an image of the mixed centipede on the west side of the pond after mowing.20220517_182833_crop_1000W.jpg In the background is the centipede in the front yard on the East side of the pond. The EGO did almost as good a job as my Gizmow, although I had to go a lot slower than I am used to. On the really weedy sections on the West of the pond I had to go even slower and overlap even more, but it did a surprisingly good job there too.20220514_132206_1000T.jpg . It left some weedy stems, but they were easily removed with another pass. The total was about six acres. It took about five charges to get it all done, but it was doable. As a final test, I tried mowing the path of mostly Bahia on the edge of my native grass field. That grass was really long and had lots of stringy ryegrass and other weeds. The EGO again surprised me. I had to go really slow, but it did manage to plow through it pretty well.20220518_180622_crop_1000T.jpg I'll be glad to get my Gizmow back from the shop, but now I know that I can use the EGO for the front yard and even the more weedy sections across the pond in a pinch. The only place I am not willing to try the EGO is on the backside of my dam, where it would not be safe to use a regular ZTR. The EGO had a harder time handling the pine cones and small limbs that my Gizmow chews up without a complaint, and the deck rattled a lot more than I am used to. It won't do my seven acres in a single sitting, and I don't think it will handle eleven years of abuse like my Gizmo has, But it is more than a toy. It's a real mower.
 
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