Going To Buy A New Flail - What To Get?

[wirlybird]

FedEx called and Monday is delivery day. That was quick shipping!

 

[Milo]

Given what you're cutting I'm surprised you chose hammers? For my similar application I was strongly advised by Woodmaxx to go with Y blades which are made with heat quenched spring steel, are reversible, and give a cleaner cut on grass and weeds.

 

[Molalla1]

You are correct Milo . . .

 

[wirlybird]

I have "Y" blades on my smaller flail and it didn't take much to bend 2 blades. Hit a 2" stick that was about a foot long and it got jammed and bent blades.
Also it cuts ok but anything more than modest grasses, 5-6 inch, and it will load up and start slipping belts. It doesn't mulch well at all. I understand it is a light duty flail and does ok for what it is designed for.

I opted for hammers because I don't know what I might run into in some fields. Could be small saplings or other tough stuff hiding in the grass.
We'll see how well it does on the regular grasses but several advised it should do just as good.
My big John Deere flail has the duck foot blades that are similar style to the hammers and it cuts fantastic. Way better than my small one with side slivers!

Anyway we'll see!

 

[kenmbz]

I use my HD48 in stilt grass (2-4'), does great and doesn't bind up, so you should be fine.
I don't notice much difference from lawn tractor cut to flail cut on lawn, but I am not very picky.

Hammers don't like rocks, but I just try to do a high pass first since any big rocks get taken out during a walk through.

 

[Milo]

Interesting, maybe it's more the mower itself rather than the type of blades? I mow some pretty high, thick, grass/weeds which only get cut once a year and haven't experienced any belt slipping yet, but I do run fairly slow down to allow it to clear all the material. It runs three belts which are self adjusting.






Wirlybird looking forward to pics and your impressions of the new mower, and how it compares to your other two.

 

[wirlybird]

Interesting, maybe it's more the mower itself rather than the type of blades? I mow some pretty high, thick, grass/weeds which only get cut once a year and haven't experienced any belt slipping yet, but I do run fairly slow down to allow it to clear all the material. It runs three belts which are self adjusting.






Wirlybird looking forward to pics and your impressions of the new mower, and how it compares to your other two.

The stuff I was in was very thick, emerald green grass. Imagine super thick lawn with tight clumps heavily fertilized by the animals! These spots were just so heavy and lush I had to mostly come to a stop and go at a crawl.
My small flail, 50", is just one belt and manual tension. I probably run the belt slightly loose rather than too tight. It may also be that this one doesn't spin as fast as newer ones.
It was like pushing your mower into the heavier green grass while mulching. It gets overwhelmed!

Going to have to find an area to test the new one on. Most everything is mowed at this point! Might have to call a customer and "borrow" their field for a test run.