Thursday, December 10, 2020

Free Fitness Program! I'm now the official "Lawn Worker" at my Senior Compound: Cordless Lithium powered electric mower

 Yes, this GreenWorks mower will mow grass. Here are the benefits of an electric mower:

Easy to start.
Light in weight, making them easier to push than a gas unit.
Quieter than a gas unit.
No exhaust fumes.
No maintenance on the engine.

So at the "compound" we're having to get trees removed to prevent disease spreading or some such. The Emerald Ash borer beetle? $3000K for one tree! But we're having other trees removed also. I would ask about using it for shrooms but since it's a disease issue then I don't want to complicate matters at all. Also we had black top work done. 


 

Turns out we over spent on our organic lawn care. So I said - hey there's the city compost pile just up the hill. I know how to make "compost tea" - I can just get a $30 back pack sprayer. The organic lawn care business just had one person spray the whole lawn. We have just under an acre. So I'll just do it myself. I'll bring back a 15 gallon stock tank that I didn't use last summer - to soak shrooms. Instead I'll soak compost and harvest the "tea" in a back pack sprayer.

The 6.0Ah battery takes approximately 3 hrs to charge.

People complained the lawn grew too long - that's cuz the only "organic" company was driving 45 minutes to an hour to get here (which reverses all the pollution saved from them using the lithium powered mowers). haha. So I will be able to make sure the grass does not grow too long and I will now get a lithium powered mower - plus an extra battery or two. 

The runtime with the 6.0Ah battery is approximately 60 minutes.

So I will recharge - and even can use my solar panels to recharge via my lithium generator inverter! It will take me "forever" to mow the lawn but at least I will get in good fitness. haha.

Chomsky's latest "office hours" - vid

 So we're having a mind-boggling warming trend this "winter" - no one could call this winter weather since it's still above freezing. Abrupt Global Warming is now quite obvious but as Noam Chomsky points out  - "the Master" says global warming is not real so 50% of the US does not "believe" in global warming. haha.

So today I will get the backpack sprayer and also the refractory blanket - at Harbor Freight. (or Harbor Fright as people jokingly call it online - due to the magic purple electrical smoke their products produce). haha. Frying cheap circuits all the time.

40V L-300 3.0 Ah Smart Battery with USB port

Charges in 90 minutes with C-220 charger ;  Charges in 45 minutes with C-400 charger.

Anyway I said I was going to do "Corn Gluten Meal" as a preemergent "organic" herbicide against the crabgrass. But then in the Senior Compound ruling elite meeting - someone raised the issue of the smell being bad. I had not read this but I looked it up - sure enough the stuff does smell bad. I now remember this when we got the treatment at our previous mini-forest farm place. haha. Personally I could care less about the smell - smells like money! It's just organic fermentation. But also we are way over budget.

The first lawn company charged $10,000 for just mowing and chem-lawn - NOT even "grass reseeding"!! We just got a grass reseeding done by the organic lawn company. Also that charge includes "fall cleanup" - not sure how the first chemlawn company did it. The organic business brought out this huge tractor type leaf vacuum.

So I am gonna get the Toro leaf vacuum mulcher - it's limited by a cord though. Not sure how long I can use the extension cord to maintain power - two long extension cords? I need to look it up. Then I will also use a cordless battery leaf vacuum that is also a blower. And wow - maybe I'll just RAKE like I have always done for leaves - and then just haul them up to the city compost.

So I can then clean off the road of grass with the blower - and use a weed wacker that is also lithium powered.

So I need to buy several tools obviously. To have a good lawn you want aeration which is normally provided by Ungulates or ruminants. haha. The best lawn mowers are sheep or cattle, etc. Bison.

Still if we can save almost $10K a year by me mowing the lawn and doing fall clean up - then that will be a huge saving. Although it will be basically a full time job since I will weed out the crabgrass by hand with a hoe and then do spot reseeding with grass seed.

I will get chelated iron spray to use as "organic" herbicide for "broadleaf weeds." Personally I do not consider these weeds at all but valuable medicinals! Dandelion cures cancer - people here should be harvesting it and juicing it. Same with thistle - throw it in blender. I'll probably be doing this as my FREEBIE harvest of the lawn. haha. 

People are complaining about the lawn having creeping charlie. So the liquid iron spray (from the backpack sprayer) will burn out that creeping charlie.  

Chelated iron burns creeping charlie foliage and its stolons. A maximum of four applications may be applied annually.

Finally Plantain cures poison ivy - it's by far the BEST treatment for poison ivy. So if you buy "commercial" poison ivy treatment it has the active ingredient in plantain. 

Oh well - people want to try to have a monoculture which is the definition of insanity. haha. Trying to do the same thing over and over.

OK so I don't get paid but I do get free fitness and I've been getting free living here. So this is my way of paying back to the Senior Compound. Everyone's been nice to me except when I first moved in then my new camp tarp got banned. I was driving around with it on the roof of the car to evaporate off the mineral spirits or naphtha. haha. People freaked out - didn't like the canvas. Apparently that's a big deal with a HOA - an acronym that's new to me. Home Owners Association. So you can't "park" anything in front of your house that will bring down the "property values." haha.

Well I know some other secrets about the history of the buildings here, etc. I've enjoyed living here because of qigong even though I have barely meditated here at all - living here for two years! We have highway noise and it's a small place and there is also a television blasting. So I try meditate at night but it's best to have the intestines all cleared out - and we eat big dinners also. Not a good qigong lifestyle. haha. That's why I escape up north and fast so I can get in some decent meditation.

So then the Senior Compound Council thanked me for volunteering to mow. As it is everyone is gonna be charged extra a lot of month since we're over budget. So that's why I'm gonna refuse to do the Corn Gluten Meal (that saves us $500 probably or at least $375 and most importantly no "bad smell" that people would freak out about). Also I'm refusing the Reseeding since we just had that done at a cost of $1700 (which is the typical cost of  five cents per square foot or something for seed/fertilizer mix.

Anyway so that will bring down the cost of my "lawn work" to just the price of the tools - a lithium powered mower. I had NO idea that lawn mowers by gas were the equivalent of 100 miles of driving a car - for what? Two hours of mowing?

https://www.greenworkstools.com/shop-by-tool/mowers

OK I just ORDERED the lawn mower and weed wacker plus an extra 3 amp hour battery. Those lithium batteries are super pricey. Harbor Fright sold me a 4 amp lithium battery for I think about $40 but these people want like $150 for a 4 amp battery  Crazy. 

Oh cuz the voltage is way higher and the battery is huge - vid

So I got everything on CLEARANCE so it is cheaper. I figure someone MADE these tools and they need to be SOLD. So that's good enough for me. haha.

The Lawn Mower is NOT Self-propelled so I'm getting a SERIOUS work out. I used to do our previous lawn with a push reel mower - so at least this has a power cutter mower. The reel mower requires going over and over the longer grass - trying to mess with it for a "complete" cut. haha. Also hitting any rocks or sticks will dull the blade and also bend the metal or nick it. As much as I love a reel mower - I could not risk all that messing around.

 So their website does not say what type of charger comes with the mower. So I kept digging online. Bingo:

C-220 CHARGER

Or I mean "boom."

 So I might need a third battery looks like.

OK a Lithium battery does NOT need to be fully charged to reuse (unlike a lead-acid battery). So that means I can use the 3 amp hour battery for a half hour while the 6 amphour battery is charging and then keep switching every half hour for the last half acre. haha. Kind of a drag.

But they claim you can mow a 1/2 acre in an hour? We'll see....

OH it is a BrushLESS motor. 

Actually it does not say.

hmm - so this model says you can switch the batteries - without losing power?

Or just "store" a battery...

 https://www.amazon.com/Greenworks-21-Inch-Brushless-Included-M-210/dp/B07MVQL5RT/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=greenworks%2B6ah%2B40v%2Bmower&qid=1607612228&s=lawn-garden&sr=1-4&th=1

just be careful on the old model there are copper contacts inside and the wear lose very easily hopefully this new model has improved on this. 

 https://sciencing.com/difference-between-brushed-brushless-motor-7805274.html

Because brushed motors depend on the physical contact of the metal brushes with the coils of the commutator they are subject to a loss of efficiency due to friction with the contacts and also, like all mechanical parts, wear and tear on the brushes and the connections after long periods of use. As brushless motors get less hot (due to the lack of friction) they can work at greater speeds (because great heat interferes with magnetic fields).

 Oops - looks like I got the older Brushed commutator?

Happy with my push mower. I was worried that self propelled would eat up the battery faster. I would rather have more battery life. But depends on your terrain and size of mowing area.
stargazer54
· March 14, 2019
Do you find this helpful?
This mower is not heavy to push around and I would not spend the extra money and battery life for the self-propelled model.
Vt Bob
· March 14, 2019
Do you find this helpful?
We have a small yard so pushing the mower is good exercise for a senior citizen. Mower moves easily through thick grass. I got the whole set. Mower. weed eater and hedge trimmer.
Florida_Lawdog
· March 14, 2019
Do you find this helpful?
The mower is so light, forget the extra cost and complexity of self propelled.
fjhintz
· March 14, 2019
Do you find this helpful?
No its really lightweight! I dont think you need to spend the extra money

 based on this review I just ordered a 2nd battery - 6 amp hour

 vid link

So I've used lithium batteries and I totally agree with him that the higher amphours last more than twice as long as the lower amphour batteries.

So I'll have TWO batteries that are 6 amphour and then 1 battery that is 3 amphour.

Since I'm mowing a huge lawn - then I can just charge up one of the six while I use up the other two batteries - it takes three hours to charge up one battery. 

So I'll have to take a break but I'll need to take a break anyway.

 Ok I just rewatched the vid because in the comments section he says to get the "greenworks equivalent" battery for half the price.

lasica 5 ah 40V battery ML: 29472

So I bought this also.

Because these big batteries take a long time to charge. And I'm gonna need three batteries to get the job done - at least. 

So now I have two 6 ah batteries and 1 five amphour battery.


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