"Eggs Zachtly" wrote in message
...
eBob.com said:

[...]

Nitty Grity: Within the first two years of light use the mower failed me
twice. The first time it just quit while I was mowing and would not
start
again. The second time I was mowing and heard a difference in the noise
it
makes and discovered that the blade was no longer rotating. The first
service was covered by the warranty. The second was not. Although it
was
still under warranty the problem was a broken belt and that is considered
wear and tear. I hadn't used the mower more than about a dozen times, so
that tells you something about the quality of the parts they use.

You only cut your grass twelve times, in two years?

Yes. It was mowed much more often than that but not by me and not using my
mower.


I've only owned one other riding mower. And it was a Snapper. I owned
it
for at least 15 years and never had such serious problems. I wish now I
had
kept the old one. Or bought a different brand. There are NO
improvements
in the new mower. They have added some safety features but they are so
poorly designed that I would not call them improvements. One of the
safety
features shuts the engine off if you lift your weight from the seat. It
starts to stall if you even shift your weight on the seat.

All new riders have that feature.

It seems to me
that they could have at least let the engine continue to run if the blade
was disengaged and you had put the mower in park. Oh, but wait! That
would
have meant having a park gear which it does not. So if you stop on
ground
that is not perfectly level you have to leave it in gear - which means
waiting for the engine to completely stop before getting off it - because
you have to keep your foot on the clutch/brake. The other new safety
feature prevents you from shifting into reverse if the blade is engaged.
I
can see that (although I don't like it). But the blade does not
disengage
automatically. So you disengage the blade, shift into reverse, back up,
shift back into 1st and then re-engage the blade. Probably wouldn't be a
big deal if it had a tighter turning radius. But given the turning
radius
you have to do a lot of backing up in my standard suburban lot.

Perhaps you should have bought a zero-turn mower. Or, better yet, maybe
you
should have inquired about the turning radius of this mower, before you
purchased it.

[...]


I can't understand how they failed to make simple, low cost improvements
which anyone who used the mower would know were desirable. One example,
the
seat is black vinyl - just like my old Snapper. And just like the old
Snapper, if that black seat has been in the summer sun for a few minutes
you
don't want to sit on it if you are wearing shorts. Do they not know that
black things get hot in the sun? Or do they not know that people mow
grass
when the sun is shinning? Sheesh!

Did you not think about the black seat, when you purchased the mower?
Well ... In my mind knowing about a defect when I make a purchase does not
mean that I am never allowed to criticize the defect.

[...]


Well ... I am not sure that exhausts all of the reasons I wish I had not
purchased this mower but you get the idea.

It sounds to me as though you didn't research your options, before
purchasing the mower. You didn't research or inquire about the turning
radius. You saw it had a black seat. Did you not think it would get hot?

Part of my yard has a fairly steep slope and I thought that I needed a
rear-engine mower because I think that they have a lower center of gravity
than the lawn tractor style mowers. I also wanted the bagger attachment.
If there is another rear-engine bagger available I am not aware of it. Also
the old mower was in pretty bad shape and I needed a mower. The grass did
not stop growing while I was looking for a new mower! I did do Internet
searches but found nothing which indicated quality problems and a company
unresponsive to customer complaints.

This is not a newsgroup which I follow. I am contributing this report in
the hope that it will prevent someone from making the same mistake I
made.
I may follow this group for a few days to respond to questions/comments
but
no promises.

Oh. We'll feel quite fortunate, then, if you grace us with your replies. I
expect a drive-by, though. You wanted someplace to whine because you
didn't
think a major purchase through, thoroughly.

The real bottom line: You made a bad purchase, due to your lack of
research. Get over it.

You call it whining I call it bitching. My main complaint is that it needed
to go back to the dealer twice during two years of light use. I am not sure
what kind of research would have allowed me to predict that. I think that
my report is a contribution. You obviously think otherwise. Fine.

--

Eggs

-Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.