OT: Battery Operated Yard Tools - Recommendations? (2024 Update)

[Markem618]

Might go to EGO website and check

that is discussion place might find answer and avoid a trip to the store.

[DerbyDad03]

Thanks, but nothing found.

No Articles or Discussions related to my model number and no Articles or Discussions related to my symptoms occurring on other models.

The closest was a couple of models turning off when Turbo button was pressed, but that's not my issue.

[Markem618]

Cannot really feel I can give you anything, mine is an earlier model. Sorry but I do not know is the best I can do.

[DerbyDad03]

Thanks for trying. I appreciate the link.

And thanks for suggesting the Ego. Expensive, but it has as much power as my corded Ridgid as well as many features that my Ridgid does not. I like it a lot, other than this annoying issue.

I'll give Ego customer service a call and see what they say before I take it back for an exchange.

[Leon]

It sounds like a bad trigger/switch.

[Leon]

Calling Ego is probably going to be a waste of time as they will tell you it is normal or defective. And if they say normal that would piss me off enough to return it for another brand. Or they will tell you to return it to the store for a refund or exchange. Either way you are going to have to return the unit.

I would simply return it and get another.

[DerbyDad03]

I'm leaning that way, but this blower does have "electronics" built into it.

For example, one of the features of the Ego LB6504 is a "Speed/Lock-On Dial" which is separate from the trigger. You can turn it on and set a constant speed, no trigger needed. However, you can increase the speed with by using the trigger or the Turbo button.

OK, so knowing that, here is what it says in the manual:

"NOTICE: If the speed/lock-on dial is not turned back to the off position before the battery is removed, the blower will not start when a fully charged battery is installed. This is a protection feature to help prevent accidental startup. Depress the air-speed trigger to deactivate the protection and start the blower."

That tells me that there is circuitry involved which allows the trigger to talk to the Lock-On Dial. If it was simply a mechanical latch that sets the Lock-On Dial, I would think that the blower would start as soon as the battery was installed.

In addition, on the website that Markem618 mentioned, there are the following

2 items. Note - These do not apply to my specific issue, they are just examples that lead me to believe that there is circuitry involved.

Symptom: Blower turns off when pressing turbo button: Electrical failure Suggestion: Attempt to run the blower at a lower speed for one minute and engage boost again.

Symptom: Blower doesn't work: Electronic failure Suggestion: Make sure the your bare hand is in contact with the steel strip in the handle when operating the blower, especially when using it in snowy or dusty conditions.

[DerbyDad03]

The issue is that "other brands" don't have the same features as the Ego.

If this particular behavior is normal, I will probably live with it. I'm not going to forgo the other features that I find useful just because "they pissed me off" with their answer.

I'm sure that you have tools that are fine in the vast majority of situations but that you wish "had this or that" or didn't do this or that. You keep them because of all the good things that they do, assuming there isn't a viable replacement.

Is every one of your green tools perfect in every way? ;-)

[Leon]

My Echo gas blower has that feature, commonly called cruise control with the ability to speed up and return to the preset speed.

Ok, but this does not sound like what your having an issue with.

Yes, with variable speed and safety features there is certainly some type of circuitry. But electricity moves fast and there should be no hesitation regardless. I would think the switch is faulty and or the over all design was not tested before roll out.

Again, it sounds like a faulty part or piss poor design in the circuitry.

If normal I would return it and look at another brand. Or Test other brands at a lawn and garden dealer where you can test.

While for most, if this is a normal issue, it may not be a concern, you have clearly got reservations about that.

[Leon]

Absolutely no tool or brand is perfect.

BUT I am not complaining or sharing concern about a feature or issue that I find irritating.

I thought you were looking for a solution or advice about this particular tool.

Irrelevant, I'm not the one complaining about something I just bought.

I'm in some what of an intolerant mood. I have had it with inferior workmanship and service. I am personally dealing with Brinks security. They bought the company that was monitoring my home alarm and decided that I needed to upgrade my equipment. No cost to me! Well they would have lost my business as my equipment will not longer be able to communicate to them through 3G cellular.

They had no choice if they wanted to keep me as a customer.

New alarm system wend in 30 days ago. I have had 7 false alarms since that day and they have been out 2 times since to remedy the wireless sensor issue. And they have no showed 2 more appointments to remedy the problem and did not call to let me know that they were not coming. Calls to them to set up appoints take from 60~90 minutes.

And now my Roomba robot vac. The cool IT kids decided it would be neat to change the firmware in my robot so that the vacuum and brushes turn off between rooms. This is problematic as now it drags debris from yet to be cleaned areas to previously cleaned rooms.

This feature is called Quiet Drive. So some one thinks it will makes a big improvement to noise to turn the vac and sweepers off 1% of the time it is running.

Sheeh!

[krw]

Return it as defective and get another. If the new one works as expected, everything is good. If it doesn't fix the problem and you still want the thing, it's just an annoying design flaw.

I wish my track saw had imperial scales but it's an oldie. The newer ones fixed the "problem". You get your choice (though I've never seen a new metric one. OK, this qualifies as not being perfect but the depth adjustment isn't something I usually rely on. I wouldn't be nearly as forgiving if the trigger wasn't consistent.

[DerbyDad03]

That?s basically my plan, but it?s worth the call to Ego. If it is a ?feature? then I don?t have to do the exchange.

If this was a track saw with a flakey trigger ?by design?, it would be a tougher decision. This is a blower. I?ll live with it if I have to.

[Ralph E Lindberg]

All of our "yard" tools are Greenworks 24V and they work great. Leaf blower, weed-eather, chain-nibbler and chain-nilbbler on a sitck

The power tools (including the stick vac) are Ryobi 18V and we are happy with them also/

The neighbor and best friends use the Ryobi 40V and they also work great. I was just using their large "back pack" leaf blower to clean up after a day making them a wheel-chair ramp for the front door and was very impressed

[DerbyDad03]

My brother runs an independent alarm company in the NYC/LI area. He outsourced the monitoring a long time ago and now he's working on selling off the hardware end of it so he can retire. It ain't easy.

Not only is there so many different types of equipment out there, there are at least three different "standard" ways to sell your customers to another company. They are all based on future revenue, upgrades required, what equipment will talk to the buyer's monitoring systems, etc. He's been in negotiations for close to 2 years. One of the problems is that the environment (technology and customer base) keeps changing so he constantly has to update the information that he's provided, so the contract terms keep changing.

In the meantime, the Tel Co is now requiring a "1" to be dialed when calling the area code of the monitoring service from outside of the area. Some hardware can have the number changed remotely with a couple of keystrokes, other equipment uses hardcoded chips to store the number. Guess what? No one makes/programs the chips anymore, so that equipment will have to be replaced before the "1" becomes a requirement.

He's hoping to be able to close the deal and not have to deal with the upgrades himself. He's looking for less work, not more.

Color me confused. (I don' have robot vac)

If the vac is in a dirty room, why wouldn't it clean the room before leaving? Seems like it should always be travelling from a clean room to dirty room, not the other way around.

Are you sure it's about noise? My uprights all have a floor setting which turns off the brushes for 2 reasons: 1 - some floor finishes can be damaged by the bristles; 2 - the bristles often send stuff flying even if the vacuum is on. In your case, if they are going to turn the vac off, they would certainly want to turn the bristles off too.

[DerbyDad03]

I tried the Ryobi 40V 110 MPH hand held blower. I was not impressed at all.

I don't know what you are comparing your usage to, if anything. In my head-to-head battles, the 56V Ego works better than my corded Ridgid (feature-wise that is. Blower performance at top speed is comparable) Both the Ego and the Ridgid outperform the Ryobi 40V 110 MPH model by a huge margin.

I had a Greenworks power washer. First power washer I ever owned. I thought it was "great" until it died and I bought a Karcher. Holy crap, what a difference. The ability to compare makes a big difference when assigning the word "great" to something. Compared to my garden hose, the Greenworks PW was great. Compared to the Greenworks, the Karcher PW was greater. ;-)

[John Grossbohlin]

In my case a push mower was part of the ensemble and due to the mowing conditions, quality, and availability, Stihl was the brand of choice. A Model RMA 510 push mower was chosen for the mower in large part because the heavy load performance and I've got a great Stihl dealer a mile from my house. Their technology draws more power when you get into thick, wet grass, than it does in "normal" grass, so it doesn't bog down and it continues to mulch well. That does not occur with all brushless cordless mowers... The string trimmer works well as does the blower.

These were purchased in 2020 and the mower choice was influenced by

For use on the residential lot where they live they work very well. For my work on bigger properties and rail trails I have pro-grade Stihl gasoline tools (chainsaws, pole saw, hedge clippers, back pack blower, and a big trimmer that accepts brush and sapling cutting blades. Does the power of the cordless tools compare to the pro-grade gasoline tools... short answer is no. Does it matter on a relatively flat residential property with a moderate string trimming need? No. The edge actually goes to the cordless tools for such use as my pro-grade gasoline tools are heavy and grossly over powered in those cases. That power has it's place elsewhere though.

[krw]

Are alarm companies still a thing? I thought they were going the way of the dodo with all of the DIY stuff on the market. It's certainly not a business model I'd want buy into now. <...>

[krw]

It's not really a fair comparison but you brought green tools into the discussion. I'd not put up with either, though the saw is a safety issue. The truck I have on order has start/stop (didn't know they still did that nonsense*). That's sure an annoying "feature" but it's part of the package. I understand, from someone who owns one, that the feature can be disabled with the push of a button, at least until the next time it's started. He also said there is a setting deep in the infotainment settings to disable it permanently.

• I haven't been bugged about it at work for a couple of years. It was a major PITA.

[Leon]

IRobot has a feature that maps your home and lets you name the rooms. It will clean each room independently and then move on.

The beauty is that you can choose the order that each room is cleaned. The robot cleans the room and goes to the next on the list in the order indicated.

Our kitchen is in the middle of the house. To go from the office entry area, where the robot docks and recharges, to the guest bedrooms, guest bath, and laundry room it has to go through the kitchen. Or to go to the living room and master bedroom, master bath and master closet it has to go through the kitchen. Our kitchen has 3 entrances.

So our robot starts at 8:00am and so that it is not under foot during breakfast I have the robot do the kitchen last.

AND that worked perfectly until the last "cutesey" firmware update called "Quiet Drive"

In quiet drive the robot vac and main sweepers shut off. It is intended to only go into quiet drive when beginning a cleaning routine of the whole house and when returning to the base to recharge.

Yes it is somewhat quieter for about 2 minutes out of the 2 hour daily cleaning routine.

Unfortunately when you select rooms to be cleaned in a different than shortest distance order it goes into quiet mode until it gets to the next room.

So it cleans a room and then stops vacuuming and sweeping when going to the next room. It often goes through a yet to be cleaned room and a cleaned room to get to the next room. So since the sweepers and vac are turned off in quiet mode it drags debris from the yet to be cleaned room into the cleaned room as it proceeds to the next room.

In this mode we see more clumps of debris that before quiet mode was added.

It is all about noise. They explained that it is a inconvenience update. It is quieter when simply traveling about the house.

[Leon]

Unfortunately DIY stuff is 99% wireless. And we all know how dependable and how much fun it is to set up 23 wireless devices....

Wireless is all that is giving my system fits.

And yes even with DIY you still need an alarm monitoring service to call the authorities if there is a break in when you are gone.

And FWIW alarm companys are a dime a dozen.