Rotary Cutter Flail or rotary weed cutter in 72"

[muscat]

Flail or rotary weed cutter in 72\"

I need to mow 3 or 4 times a year including down vine rows about 10-15 acres and some times the weeds will be heavy and tall (2 feet) before I can get to them.

What are the plus and minus of Flail over rotary type mowers?

I am leaning toward a flail partly because the darn rotary at 6' is huge.

On flails I can not figure out what is better, hammers, or Y blades.

Any recommendations on price and brand?

 

[DirtHauler]

Re: Flail or rotary weed cutter in 72\"

I'm no "expert" on this but I can tell ya about what little experiance I have using these two types of mowers. I do high weed mowing on the weekends. I have a 52" rotary and a 47" flail that I use depending on customers wishes for finished looks.
The rotary I use for quick knock downs, it cuts the grass at a given height leaving "wind rows" of long grass/weeds, dosen't like rocks and branches too much and with out a guard on the front, will throw objects pretty far.
The flail mower I bought came with "Y" blades. I kind of like these because they have a double edge, so if one edge wears or chips, I can just turn them over and get a fresh cutting edge. The "hammer" blades, I believe, are more for "shredders" where you would have heavy vine prunings etc.
I've used my flail on land from 1/2 to 3 acres of 5' tall wet, green, thick grass/weeds. A flail leaves a finish simular to what a "mulching" mower does, it "chops" up the grass into fine pieces. I've run over fallen oak branches, it just chews them up! Mowed right over rocks etc.
Around here, almost all vineyards use a flail, easier to control and manuver thru and around vine rows.
I think for the money, a flail would be your best bet. I bought a Caroni from Agri Supply. I couldn't beat the price locally even with cost of shipping.
Hope this has helped ya some /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif