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OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

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Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#101

Post by Finnucane »

WillAdams wrote: post #5
WalterBright wrote: post #3

My dad's solution was simple: "Mow the lawn!" directed at me.

My solution has been even simpler --- I just use a reel mower (on an admittedly small lawn, ~1/3rd of an acre) --- it's a decent workout, esp. when I strive to finish quickly. (the one time I asked my son to cut the grass he broke the reel mower)

Another reel mower user here. But our, uh, lawn, I guess you'd call it, has maybe 300 sq. ft of grass. Well, mostly grass. There's other stuff in there that I'm pretty sure is not grass? Come to think of it, 'mostly' grass at this point is a bit of an exaggeration. Also, in the spring violets. Which I leave for the bees until June. Rabbits come and help out too.

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#103

Post by wickedsight »

jeremysalwen wrote: post #56

I run an Open mower on my 1400 square meter lawn in the USA. AMA. (ps. If you are interested make sure to go to the discord instead of just reading the docs or GitHub pages -- that is where all the activity is!)

The page says there's no obstacle avoidance. How does it handle obstacles? Does it at least have a sensor to detect it running into an obstacle to then find some way around it? This would be the main concern for me.

Also, how long have you had it and about how much downtime have you had?

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#104

Post by conductr »

WillAdams wrote: post #83
conductr wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I made another comment about it but consider adding a drivetrain. My v1 was RC but then I added lidar when I got tired of driving it by controller.

If it becomes easier to do, then I get less exercise --- getting the Fiskars w/ the chain drive gearing was as much reduction as I can justify.

Gotcha. I’m optimizing for least calories expended ;D

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#106

Post by deckar01 »

unwind wrote: post #53
deckar01 wrote: post #24

I have been dreaming of small solar robots that quietly trim the grass all day. Static blades pulled across the grass in short bursts. RC orchestration guided by security cameras.

Wouldn't the small solar robot have to move pretty fast in order for the blade to be able to cut through grass? I can't imagine cutting grass very effectively by just (manually) dragging a knife through it, it will just bend out of the way instead of cut won't it?

I am imagining razor blades arranged like Vs. They don’t necessarily have to cut horizontally either. Cutting upwards would exploit the tension of the roots rather than overcoming the inertia mass of a blade of grass.

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#107

Post by unshavedyak »

infecto wrote: post #95
lukan wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything having lots of rpm ain't silent. Especially not at night. So they surely ain't as loud as a combustion lawn mower and are pretty silent in comparison, so maybe you won't notice them in the city with its background noise. But in rural areas I perceive them as noisy even on daylight with normal noise level. And I never saw anyone using them at night - for a reason. And as for gp .. he is already shadowbanned a…

Electric motors can run at quite high rpms with lower decibels. Sure not silent but the origin is low enough that at a distance say 25 feet it’s almost silent.

Yea, my neighbors battery powered mower is super quiet. I don't even know when they run it.

Mine is also electric and my wife says (i'm always too close to it) it's easily 4x as loud. Not sure what the difference is.

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#108

Post by Mumps »

vdupras wrote: post #94
IgorPartola wrote: post #25

I was hoping this was more of a hardware project as in building the physical mower from scratch. I am not quite sold on the robotic mowers but the quality and market for riding mowers is insane right now. I own two riding mowers and both are completely dead. One needs a rather expensive wiring harness so they it would stop catching fire when it runs. The other has the most common single cylinder engine that comes in…

> And the prices of these new and used are out of this world even compared to baseline inflation. How many such cases do we need to have to be able to put out the hypothesis that the baseline inflation figures we're being fed are wrong?

If the poster is in the USA couldn't it be explained by Trump Tariffs (in addition to inflation)

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#109

Post by jeremysalwen »

zeroping wrote: post #98
jeremysalwen wrote: post #56

I run an Open mower on my 1400 square meter lawn in the USA. AMA. (ps. If you are interested make sure to go to the discord instead of just reading the docs or GitHub pages -- that is where all the activity is!)

How difficult was it to get the needed hardware in the US? It seems hard or expensive to do so.

The yardforce500 is hard to find in the USA, but it's extremely cheap in Europe. I found a great deal and paid $208 for the mower and $135 for a package forwarder to ship it from Germany. I have a complete spreadsheet of my expenses here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1BV8VCtqTer8iodXvyRd1...

Re: OpenMower – An open source lawn mower

#110

Post by conductr »

skewbone wrote: post #93
conductr wrote: post #18

This is a fun project to take on. Couple years ago I built an autonomous controlled chassis onto a push reel mower (removed handles of course). It’s not as safe as the typical robot mower given they use tiny blades to trim (and reel mower will take a finger) but it’s relatively low maintenance since the blades need replacing every month or so. I opted for lidar as the reviews on RTK GPS seem pretty hit or miss and di…

Would you mind sharing any pictures or video about the mower? I converted my push reel to electric without a kit, and have been considering putting separate high torque, low speed motors for drive wheel control to start moving towards autonomous cutting. Would be great to see your experience!

I made it for my country home and won’t be there for a bit but maybe one day I’ll document it. But the parts store I used closed down, Open Builds Part Store. It’s nothing proprietary to them, I just got all the v slot aluminum frame and connectors there to build the chassis. Then I got hub motor wheels on Amazon or Aliexpress and batteries too. Most small components I get on Amazon, motor controller. I went with off-road air filled tires. And I wrote all then logic into an arduino mega. Oh and I used an upside down rubber made container as the case for electronics. Everything is mounted to the bottom of the lid and the box part is functionally the lid that I remove to gain access. It as built in snap locks and I used weather stripping to make the seal tight.

You just have to figure out how to mount to the lawn mower part of your choice, after than it’s the same as building any vehicle.

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