Mike Prager wrote:

I'm in the market for new loppers. I've had the old ones for
18 yrs, and my fingers bang together when they close.

Recommendations?

The local hardware store has a nice-looking pair of bypass
loppers for about $30.00. By mail order, Felco are $65! I
really like my Felco pruners, but can loppers be worth that?

I have always used bypass pruners (said to damage the wood
less), but I see some of the heavier loppers are anvil types.

What do folks like?

I have a very old pair of bypass loppers (brand unknown). They
have wood handles, which absorb some of the shock when using them
(e.g., when you finally cut through a branch and the stops on the
blades meet).

Also, I recommend against anything that uses some kind of lever
action to increase the force on the blades. If you need that much
force to cut a branch, you should be using a pruning saw.

--

David E. Ross
http://www.rossde.com/

I use Mozilla as my Web browser because I want a browser that
complies with Web standards. See http://www.mozilla.org/.