Cr*p strimmer cord

[F]

The cord on my Flymo strimmer breaks and I have to dismantle the head and re-thread it just as soon as it gets anywhere near anything slightly solid.

Can anyone recommend a decent brand of cord?

[charles]

You need to have the right thickness. This is usually indicated by the colour. I suspect the one you are using is too thin.

[F]

Red, 1.5mm?

[John Rumm]

IME they all break - having a decent auto feed head is part of the solution.

I use Makita 2.1mm square section cord in mine - its effective, but still brakes regularly.

You may be able to a head that takes the pre-cut coated glass fibre cords - I have one strimmer head that takes these. They need to be manually swapped when the break, but they do last much longer than normal cord.

[Tim Lamb]

In message , charles writes

I use a cheap electric single line strimmer for lawn edging. It does not have auto line advance and fails as above.

The cure has been to anticipate how long one can cut before a break is due and pull out a few mm of fresh line.

I was interested in the comment up thread about Winter storage. I believe Nylon absorbs water which may explain the impact of low temperature.

>

[Brian Gaff]

Do you leave the c ord on the strimmer when in frosty conditions? This is normally what causes the cord to go brittle. I sussed this after a couple of years, and then took it off and kep it in the drawer indoors and had no further issues. Brian

[Brian Gaff]

Also if the cutting blade on the shroud is missing or busted, then it tends to break at the hub instead. I suspect frost damage though. Brian

[F]

Strimmer and spare cord are kept inside a garage all year. There's no frost in there as it's attached to the house and has the central heating boiler inside.

The head doesn't have automatic advance, you're supposed to press a button underneath it. But it breaks before there's any chance of doing that.

Is there another type of strimmer that doesn't use cord? I've had enough of this one and the Bosch before it that was even worse.

[F]

My Flymo doesn't have auto-feed. You are supposed to press a button on the head but it breaks before you get a chance to do that.

I'll have a look for some of that or similar.

Not sure that that would be possible on the Flymo. Care to recommend a decent brand that would?

[The Natural Philosopher]

You can get chain type or metal blade type heads, but they are not considered to be safe for use by Consumers, who must at any cost be protected from their own lunacy.

[The Natural Philosopher]

My (Not sure if its stihl or Ryobi) is similar but it never usually breaks at the hub. Use green cord of I'd guess 2mm diameter.

In practice the nylon simply wears down towards the hub and a smart tap on the ground lets another few inches out.

[Chris Hogg]

I assume it's electric. I had several electric strimmers over the years. Never got on well with any of them. Cord kept breaking, although with tap-on-the-ground feed it wasn't really a problem except that I ended up with a rapid turnover of chord and 4-inch lengths of bright blue stuff all over the garden.

Then I got a petrol one, and never had a problem since. It's an Echo, but I doubt that's important.

Get a decent strimmer!

[The Natural Philosopher]

Yes.

13A/240V = 3kW = 4.5bhp.

is 4bhp or so really enough for a strimmer? Barely, and most electrics are 1Kw or less.

[Part Timer]

Or use a piece of cable such as D10 military spec telephone cable, complete with galvanised steel reinforcing wires!

[Michael Chare]

Yes, I have not had a problem with the orange cord for my Stihl. I never found my Black & Decker electric strimmer much use.

[F]

I'd pretty much worked that one out!

Suggestions welcome...

[John Rumm]

All my strimmer related kit is Ryobi (not sure I would recommend it specifically though!) To be fair though, the auto feed does work very well - just tap it on the ground when its running, and it spools out more line. (its a double line head). A blade on the guard trims any excess to length if you spool too much.

The other day I was abusing it quite drastically by removing all the stuff growing through the patio that ought not be - you can strim right into every crack and it nicely scarifies away not only the growing stuff but also the accumulated mud, soil, moss etc. However it does means you are playing the line against concrete the whole time. Got through two spool loads of line (probably about 10m) in total doing 70m^2 of slabs. Tt takes about 3 mins to rewind the spool from a bulk reel of line (or

10 mins if you sit down for a beer at the same time!)

[John Rumm]

My ryobi came with a metal "tri arc" blade:

which is supposed to be used for heavy brush cutting. Not really had much cause to use it though. Must give it a try next time I am massacring some brambles!

Obviously not ideal for use against path edges etc!