Hey gang. New member here, with a new Honda.
I work semi-commercially, doing about 12 yards or so a week, and I also maintain my own property. For a number of years I lived in apartments with no yard, after being an avid lawn-chore addict in my teens when growing up. I spent many hours hammering away on my dad's lawn with an electric Weed Eater and a 20+ year old Lawn Boy, and loved it. Once I got my own home, I decided to take up working on the neighbourhood properties, because I love being outside working on it, and with the right tools, I can do a professional job.
I had a Husqvarna Royal 48, which came with the house, but wasn't especially reliable. The deck was plastic and a little bit warped, and the engine, while a Kawasaki FC150V, had a lot of issues. Hard warm starting and myriad gas and oil leaks among them. I gave that up when I decided to start working in the neighbourhood, as I didn't want to put a bunch of money into a machine whose history was elusive. This is where my mistake comes in. I went to Home Depot, and having read good things about their cut quality, bought a Cub Cadet push mower with a Honda GCV160. While this was one of the most solid machines in the shop (there were some, like Lawn Boys, whose entire deck would flex when you pushed down on the handlebars, scary), turned out to be pretty bad. It couldn't cope with moderately tall grass, or wet grass, getting plugged up and stalling the engine. I stained the plastic wheels in five minutes. The handlebar folding procedure was asinine. The list goes on. After two weeks, and upon discovering the paint coming off the bottom of the deck when I was cleaning it out, I returned it, and fled.
That's where the HRR2169PKC comes in. I knew Honda made mowers, but I'd read mixed things about them online. I wanted something that could bag, mulch, and discharge, with a sturdy deck, decent power, and NO drive assists. The Husqvarna had a drive mechanism that weighed nigh on 30lbs, and was utterly broken internally, which made pushing that machine anywhere a chore. I heard it's not uncommon to have to "service" (i.e. fix) the drive mechanism on most mowers once every season or two, and more often likely in commercial use unless you buy a commercial machine. So despite it's 85lb curb weight (30 more than the Cub Cadet), I opted for the push-it model.
This machine is fantastic! I've run it about five hours now, and in some pretty thick stuff, and it's a different animal. The cut quality is great, the bag is awesome, all of the control bits (wheel adjusters, control handle, handlebar release, etc) have way more beef in them than the Cub. More interestingly, despite it having the same engine as the Cub, with identical spec sheets, it seems to be ever so slightly different. The engine is louder and runs slightly higher RPMs in regular use, as compared to the Cub unit. It also ran 2.75 hrs on one tank of gas, so either the gas tank is bigger (which goes against spec sheets), or it's more efficient than the Cub, which doesn't make sense given the similarities. The only differences you can *see* on the unit is that the Honda has a completely automatic choke instead of the one-step auto-choke-return lever on the Cub, it has a valve cover that looks sturdy and says "HONDA" rather than "OHC", and the top cover is red, instead of black. The cover seems to be slightly bigger and differently shaped than the black cover, too. Is the Honda supplied GCV160 different, beefier, or better than the Cub supplied "identical" unit?
The Cub Cadet was $379CDN, off sale. The Honda was $479, with $25 for P.D.I. For that hundred bucks, there's a huge difference between the two machines, although in fairness, if not for the "Man's New Best Friend" sale, the Honda would have been close to $200 more. I figure I got a great deal.
The guys at WesternOne were awesome. They gassed it up, put the oil in it, ran through the operations with me before I left, and registered my warranty. The guy in the shop who sold it to me did show me a couple of the HRX Versamow machines, but said the HRR was almost as good, just lacking in a few of the higher-end features. He also said a lot of their landscape customers run HRX Residential units, not the HRC commercial units, and put similar hours on their units with no adverse effects. We'll see how that turns out.
One more thing: I swear Honda used to offer a $700-ish HRC machine. It didn't have the hydrostatic drive, was just a push mower. Pretty similar to the HRR I just bought, but with the additional ball bearings in the wheels, deck bumpers, etc. Now I can only find evidence of the HRC Hydrostatic model, for $1300ish. I would have considered the $700 HRC if I could have found one. Why would they have done away with the cheaper HRC?
Talk to y'all later.
I work semi-commercially, doing about 12 yards or so a week, and I also maintain my own property. For a number of years I lived in apartments with no yard, after being an avid lawn-chore addict in my teens when growing up. I spent many hours hammering away on my dad's lawn with an electric Weed Eater and a 20+ year old Lawn Boy, and loved it. Once I got my own home, I decided to take up working on the neighbourhood properties, because I love being outside working on it, and with the right tools, I can do a professional job.
I had a Husqvarna Royal 48, which came with the house, but wasn't especially reliable. The deck was plastic and a little bit warped, and the engine, while a Kawasaki FC150V, had a lot of issues. Hard warm starting and myriad gas and oil leaks among them. I gave that up when I decided to start working in the neighbourhood, as I didn't want to put a bunch of money into a machine whose history was elusive. This is where my mistake comes in. I went to Home Depot, and having read good things about their cut quality, bought a Cub Cadet push mower with a Honda GCV160. While this was one of the most solid machines in the shop (there were some, like Lawn Boys, whose entire deck would flex when you pushed down on the handlebars, scary), turned out to be pretty bad. It couldn't cope with moderately tall grass, or wet grass, getting plugged up and stalling the engine. I stained the plastic wheels in five minutes. The handlebar folding procedure was asinine. The list goes on. After two weeks, and upon discovering the paint coming off the bottom of the deck when I was cleaning it out, I returned it, and fled.
That's where the HRR2169PKC comes in. I knew Honda made mowers, but I'd read mixed things about them online. I wanted something that could bag, mulch, and discharge, with a sturdy deck, decent power, and NO drive assists. The Husqvarna had a drive mechanism that weighed nigh on 30lbs, and was utterly broken internally, which made pushing that machine anywhere a chore. I heard it's not uncommon to have to "service" (i.e. fix) the drive mechanism on most mowers once every season or two, and more often likely in commercial use unless you buy a commercial machine. So despite it's 85lb curb weight (30 more than the Cub Cadet), I opted for the push-it model.
This machine is fantastic! I've run it about five hours now, and in some pretty thick stuff, and it's a different animal. The cut quality is great, the bag is awesome, all of the control bits (wheel adjusters, control handle, handlebar release, etc) have way more beef in them than the Cub. More interestingly, despite it having the same engine as the Cub, with identical spec sheets, it seems to be ever so slightly different. The engine is louder and runs slightly higher RPMs in regular use, as compared to the Cub unit. It also ran 2.75 hrs on one tank of gas, so either the gas tank is bigger (which goes against spec sheets), or it's more efficient than the Cub, which doesn't make sense given the similarities. The only differences you can *see* on the unit is that the Honda has a completely automatic choke instead of the one-step auto-choke-return lever on the Cub, it has a valve cover that looks sturdy and says "HONDA" rather than "OHC", and the top cover is red, instead of black. The cover seems to be slightly bigger and differently shaped than the black cover, too. Is the Honda supplied GCV160 different, beefier, or better than the Cub supplied "identical" unit?
The Cub Cadet was $379CDN, off sale. The Honda was $479, with $25 for P.D.I. For that hundred bucks, there's a huge difference between the two machines, although in fairness, if not for the "Man's New Best Friend" sale, the Honda would have been close to $200 more. I figure I got a great deal.
The guys at WesternOne were awesome. They gassed it up, put the oil in it, ran through the operations with me before I left, and registered my warranty. The guy in the shop who sold it to me did show me a couple of the HRX Versamow machines, but said the HRR was almost as good, just lacking in a few of the higher-end features. He also said a lot of their landscape customers run HRX Residential units, not the HRC commercial units, and put similar hours on their units with no adverse effects. We'll see how that turns out.
One more thing: I swear Honda used to offer a $700-ish HRC machine. It didn't have the hydrostatic drive, was just a push mower. Pretty similar to the HRR I just bought, but with the additional ball bearings in the wheels, deck bumpers, etc. Now I can only find evidence of the HRC Hydrostatic model, for $1300ish. I would have considered the $700 HRC if I could have found one. Why would they have done away with the cheaper HRC?
Talk to y'all later.
