I am thinking of getting one of these - I understand that I'll have to turn over hard soil first but then these will make a finer soil.
They come with up to 2 yr g'tee at about £120-130.
Digging is hard for me to do now and cost of hiring seems high.
Maybe could remove some tynes to make whats left more powered.
https://www.tesco.com/direct/the-han...gclsrc=aw.d s

Thanks in advance davej

On 23/05/2017 10:57, wrote:
I am thinking of getting one of these - I understand that I'll have to turn over hard soil first but then these will make a finer soil.
They come with up to 2 yr g'tee at about £120-130.
Digging is hard for me to do now and cost of hiring seems high.
Maybe could remove some tynes to make whats left more powered.
https://www.tesco.com/direct/the-han...gclsrc=aw.d s

Thanks in advance davej

Hanging on to one of those can be harder work than digging!

Mike

On Wed, 24 May 2017 08:57:43 +0100, Chris Hogg wrote:

On Tue, 23 May 2017 02:57:27 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

I am thinking of getting one of these - I understand that I'll have to
turn over hard soil first but then these will make a finer soil.
They come with up to 2 yr g'tee at about £120-130.
Digging is hard for me to do now and cost of hiring seems high.
Maybe could remove some tynes to make whats left more powered.
https://www.tesco.com/direct/the-han.../751-5060.prd?
skuId=751-5060&pageLevel=sku&sc_cmp=ppc*DNF+Seasonal*PX+-+Shopping+GSC+-
+Gardening+Capture+All*PRODUCT
+GROUP751-5060*&gclid=CIm9xIrahdQCFReRGwodYssIeg&gclsrc=aw.d s

Thanks in advance davej

Are electric tillers really up to the job of doing anything other than
turning loose soil? If you're going to have to dig it over anyway to
start with, that's the hard bit done; if you can do that then knocking
down the lumps would be fairly easy by comparison.

Agreed

Is it really going to be more expensive to hire one for perhaps a day's
work? If you buy one it'll sit in the shed/garage unused for 99%
of the year, taking up space. This, from Jewson's, for example
http://tinyurl.com/qzj88oa Approximately £90 for the weekend, and you
get to take it back :-)

But if he buys one for £130 and uses it for two seasons he'll be £50
better off than hiring. And it has, he says, a 2 year g'tee

I've only ever used a tiller once, for rotavating a new garden that had
been compacted by building work. It was a mighty beast, Atco IIRC,
but it was forty years ago and the memory fades. Did a good job, and
fast, whatever the make. But as Muddymike implied, they do tend to drag
you around. My next-door neighbour was watching me and was frightened
every time I approached the intervening fence, at speed, that I'd go
straight on through!

You also need to put a fair bit of weight into them otherwise they just
skid across the surface. A few seasons of this will leave a very hard
pan below with a 'polished' surface between the hard pan and the finer
tilth above.

Alternative approach is to get a 'gardener' in for the heavy work of
digging over - I use the word 'gardener' loosely as they need to have no
particular skill other than wielding a spade/fork and breaking the lumps
after.

On Wednesday, May 24, 2017 at 11:14:54 AM UTC+1, Ermin Trude wrote:
On Wed, 24 May 2017 08:57:43 +0100, Chris Hogg wrote:

On Tue, tilth above.

Alternative approach is to get a 'gardener' in for the heavy work of
digging over - I use the word 'gardener' loosely as they need to have no
particular skill other than wielding a spade/fork and breaking the lumps
after.
Good points. I have plenty storage space and I find breaking the lumps so time consuming.
The ground is clay under whatever soil has built up from past gardening.
I would like to mulch it to death but no access for a bulk load of anything.
Thanks for input.

On 23/05/2017 16:09, Muddymike wrote:
On 23/05/2017 10:57, wrote:
I am thinking of getting one of these - I understand that I'll have to
turn over hard soil first but then these will make a finer soil.
They come with up to 2 yr g'tee at about £120-130.
Digging is hard for me to do now and cost of hiring seems high.
Maybe could remove some tynes to make whats left more powered.
https://www.tesco.com/direct/the-han...gclsrc=aw.d s


Thanks in advance davej

Hanging on to one of those can be harder work than digging!

Mike
My dad was a keen gardener. He used to have a petrol tiller similar to
that tesco one - hold on tight, and hope it doesn't escape. It was damn
hard work, and he was only about 35 at the time. He bought a Howard
similar to Chris's rental suggestion, and used it for years. In my
limited experience those little things are only good if the soil is
really easy to dig in the first place. In which case you probably don't
need one.

It might be worth wandering down to your local allotments and asking.
Someone might let you dig their plot for them

Andy

Well I finally got to read chris's post by using gardenbanter. , my isp used to have very basic usenet but no longer.
google groups did not show it.
I got the tiller £99 vonhaus 1400w through ebay 12mths g'tee and am very happy with it.
I did not dig over first. The tiller tends to run fast and I prefer to pull it back towards me slowly.
Breaking up the lumps was very very time consuming by hand - this thing makes a fine tilth!
Yes, it tends to skim and you have to hold it to attain more depth .
The biggest point in it's favour is that it has got me back in the garden.
Digging the garden over myself simply wasn't going to happen.
I can only recommend it.

wrote:

Well I finally got to read chris's post by using gardenbanter. , my
isp used to have very basic usenet but no longer.
news.individual.net is inexpensive
news.eternal-september.org is free

google groups did not show it.

Google used to treat X-No-Archive as a hint to display a message for a
week then remove it, now they drop all such messages immediately, if
only the various "banter" sites would obey X-No-Archive we'd have a way
to kill them off ...

On Wed, 31 May 2017 04:58:42 -0700 (PDT), wrote:

Well I finally got to read chris's post by using gardenbanter. , my isp used to have very basic usenet but no longer.

http://www.eternal-september.org/

is used by a lot of people to avoid being at the mercy/whim of an ISP.
--
Peter.
The gods will stay away
whilst religions hold sway

On 23/05/2017 10:57, wrote:
I am thinking of getting one of these - I understand that I'll have to turn over hard soil first but then these will make a finer soil.
They come with up to 2 yr g'tee at about £120-130.
Digging is hard for me to do now and cost of hiring seems high.
Maybe could remove some tynes to make whats left more powered.
https://www.tesco.com/direct/the-han...gclsrc=aw.d s

Thanks in advance davej

Even if you can't dig with it, you can use it as a hoe to get rid of
young weeds as long as you have the width to use it.

Thanks for the newsgroup advice.
Yes the weeds are going to get the chop!