Mower wanted - 24" lawn stripes for large area

[Kristen2]

I use a 24" Atco Royale - cylinder, ride-behind.

I have a large area to cut and would like to consider a "faster" mower. Currently it takes me 3 hours to cut the lawn; I don't know the total area, but the Atco goes at a brisk walking pace.

Google tells me that 24 inches x 5 miles per hour x 3 hours is about 3.5 acres, I doubt it is that much, so allowing for emptying the box and turning etc. lets say 2 - 2.5 acres.

Is there a gang-type mower that has 24" reels "offset" so that it will cut stripes 1, 3, 5 on the first pass, and then stripes 2,4,6 on the return?

I don't want a standard "wide" mower as that will give me wide stripes which will not suit my lawn.

Ideally it will need to be able to collect the grass clippings

Thanks for your help.

 

[KennyV]

WELCOME to LMF...
I can picture what you have in mind...
I do think you could fabricate such a system, it would be unhandy to operate as it would be 10 foot wide, not very maneuverable... and it seems it would be hard not to spoil your stripes....
you may find it easier to fab a twin system, it would only be 6 foot wide, but may be easier to keep the striping uniform... Good luck, if you come up with something Post pictures or better yet a video...
We don't do much striping with reel type mowers in the states, but they do the BEST, looks great when done right... :smile:KennyV

 

[Kristen2]

maybe I should just rotary-mow the whole lawn with the widest mower I can afford, and then make some 24" gang rollers with 24" spacers for the stripes!

Its a good point about the width though, I hadn't really been thinking about that and you are right that 10' would be a lot to manoeuvre. The Municipal Parks etc. over here tend to use a 5 gang Ransomes - never seen a shiny new one, so they must last for ages, but the new one on Ransomes-Jacobsen's site looks like this:

and I had been thinking I could lift Gangs 2 & 4 (assuming they lift independently), but I think the rear wheels are running in their tracks ... and I'm 100% sure I can't afford one of them! but now you've raised the width issue a 3-gang might be just fine, and affordable, such as this Ransomes:

which has the rear wheels in line with the front. 7.4 mph cutting speed (although their blurb states area-per-hour at 11 mph - which I doubt is realistic!). I calculate that a 48" cut at 7.4 miles per hour would reduce my mowing time from 3 hours to 1 hour - perfect!

I used to use an Allen National, 2 acres per hour, 68" cut, looked like a flying-bedstead!

but the rear reel was much wider than the side ones, otherwise that would have been perfect.

But ... the rollers on those reels are a lot less weight than my existing one (specially with me sitting on it!) I wonder if they are heavy enough to make really good stripes?

I had also thought about a Toro, which I think most of the golf courses use, but they are 3-wheelers, so lifting the middle gang would leave the rear wheel running on uncut grass (and running the "wrong way" up the middle stripe)

Here's my front and back lawns (there is more to the side too ...)

 

[KennyV]

You have the grass type that looks Perfect when properly striped... our grasses, for the most, are needed to be too long for it.
Yours looks Great!
A 3 gang set,with the center reel removed, would give you the spacing, But you would have to be using a 4 wheel rig to give any chance of not spoiling your striping....
Since you added some great pictures... I will include a youtube video clip... ATCO WhichMower Royale InAction - YouTube
I think this is the manufacturer promo video... (wish they would have left the engine and cutter blade sound instead of the music overlay). I like the sound of a reel cutter... :smile:KennyV