a head to head comparison between my bosch rotary mower and my Allett cylinder mower
i'm going to be comparing all the key features between these two different types of lawnmower
so you can get a better understanding about what to look out for when you're making a purchase
and an in-depth breakdown of all the features around both types of mower
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all the products i use can be found in the description below with so much choice in the
different types of lawn mowers i thought i'd make this video to simplify some of the key
features between the different types of lawnmower first up i want to talk to you about transport
this allett classic 17 sits on the rear roller and a front roller and that gives it great
stripes but it also causes a bit of an issue for transportation along paths like mine in my
case these little gravel stones can get onto the path and sometimes get caught under the machine
the machine itself rolls really nicely across grass and it's just something to be aware of
you want to have a nice clear route when you're moving it from a to b
you can see here for example for the bosch it's really really lightweight this is an
electric machine so it is a lot lighter than its counterpart petrol machine but as it's sitting on
these four wheels i can just move it through the path and the stones really don't come into effect
when you're thinking about lightweight and manoeuvrability this electric bosch can be a great
choice but it is stripped back and it doesn't have some of the more advanced features like
the self-propelled mechanism the Allett does which makes the Allett really enjoyable to cut the lawn
with as well as the additional weight in the allet can help with stripes getting a more profound and
defined stripe that lasts for longer i'm going to be covering that later in the video side by
side you can see some visual differences in these mowers as well on the left you've got the Allett
which is much more sturdy and robust made out of metal a more traditional appeal to it and on the
right the bosch is more lightweight and modern and it's made mainly out of plastic materials
the next feature i'd like to point out is the height of cut adjustment between the
two different mowers on the bosch the height of cut is controlled by this little lever on
the side where you can raise or lower the height of the mower it's very simple to use
and the settings range from 30 millimetres to 70 millimetres you can see here by lifting the lever
the chassis deck raises up and all wheels adjust simultaneously
when we look at the allett the adjustment is done on the side through this little dial and it's got
a number of different settings there are different types of Allett that can go
onto a more infinite adjustment or variable adjustment but this particular one i've got
has got five heights of cut and it's much better for cutting a lower length of lawn
with the highest setting being 32 millimetres 25 right the way down into the single digits
the next thing i'm going to look at is in terms of operating power
the bosch is operated by a lithium-ion battery these actually charge really well
they're quite lightweight and you can just slot them in or out
one of the downsides to the battery type of models is the batteries themselves do
tend to be a little bit more expensive but the overall running cost should be
lower because you don't really need any fuel just to charge every couple of goes
you can also get the Allett in a battery version which is called the liberty
but for me particularly on my classic it's powered by petrol you fill it up at the cap at the top
there's a small ignition switch and a pull cord and then you're ready to go
this is a really powerful machine and it should have no problem cutting through
most different types of grass one thing i will say linked off the height of cut
discussion we've just had you generally need to be keeping your lawn at a lower height for this
type of mower to cut through and give you a good quality cut if you're one of those people who
cuts very intermittently and leaves your grass to grow longer you might struggle to get as good a
result with the Allett because with the Allett you want to be cutting on a more regular basis
just to maintain that excellent high quality lawn finish and cutting at a shorter setting
the next type of thing that i'd like to look at is the cutting mechanism you can
see here on the rotary it's exactly that a rotary blade like a helicopter it's got two
sharpened faces on it that sort of hit the grass and chop the tops off the grass
as it spins it does actually lay the grass blades down which even though it's got a back roller it
can cause some issues with your stripes and what you tend to see is like a light side
stripe and a dark side of the stripe and that's purely due to that rotating mechanism of cut
if you're keeping your grass on the longer side the bosch stripes just fine but as you're dropping
it to the lower height you get a less pronounced stripe than you would do compared to this allett
moving on to the classic this type of cut is done on a reel and the reel hits a bed knife
at the bottom of the mower and it almost creates like a scissor type of action this is going
to give you a much finer type of cut and it's going to give you an even cut as well coming up
i'm going to be talking about whether you need a flat lawn to get one of these mowers and there's a
few other tips and tricks to come so stay tuned until the end of the video to find out more
the fifth thing i want to talk about is the weight of the two machines you can see on the bosch the
machine weighs around 13 kilograms which means you can easily pick it up and move it around
very lightweight there's pros and cons of that in terms of pros moving it round is very easy
but also you won't get that really nice rolled stripe that you'll get for example this Allett is
41 kilograms and it's sitting right across this self-propelled rear roller at the back
which is going to give you some great stripes even at a lower height of cut
as opposed to the Allett which sits both on its front and rear roller with no wheels
the bosch does sit on the four wheels it's got a built-in roller at the back which is
this plastic roller which does well at the higher heights of cut but as you start dropping it down
to get that more neat nice finish you're going to lose some definition of stripe
the next cool feature i want to talk to you about on the allett which is about
i'd say versatility this allett system comes with a cartridge based system and you can see
here i've got two cutting blade cartridges which can be removed from the machine there's a whole
host of different cartridges across the allett range including a scarifier and verti cutter
lawn brush and many others so in terms of overall functionality you can have many different types
of machines all built into your allett which is a great nice feature as opposed to having many
different actual physical assets like a different scarifier and lawnmower etc you've kind of
almost got all in one system something that might surprise you is the actual size of the allett you
can see that i've just flipped up the front lid on the grass box and the grass box just sits on
top it actually holds a smaller profile than the bosch does and it's really nice and easy to store
the bosch has got the grass box sitting at the back of the machine
it can be removed it doesn't really have a natural storage place on the machine you could probably
light on top of it but overall in terms of storage i found the Allett really nice and compact
considering how heavy the machine is it's really easy to store
one of the questions i get asked most is do i need a flat lawn well you can see here i can
fit my fingers underneath this straight board of the lawn and i don't have a perfectly flat
lawn which many people think you do need to have in order to use a cylinder mower here's
another example where i've got probably half inch or so gaps sitting in the lawn
yes in terms of your ground conditions i would say the electric mower is going to be more forgiving
but you can get away with some slight undulations in your lawn and still have a great result
using the cylinder mower take a look at this bit here this is a bit that actually water logs a bit
or stays moist one of the downsides of having such a heavy mower is it can smear or compress
parts of your lawn which can cause compaction especially if it's getting wet you do want to
pay special attention to the ground conditions when you're using that type of cylinder mower
whereas this lightweight battery mower is a bit more forgiving in terms of your ground conditions
the next thing i want to talk to you about is stripes i'm not going to do a full comparison
of the stripes in this video i will link to that in the card above where i'll do a full
in-depth review of the different stripes between the two machines but here you can see bosch
cutting the lawn and to be fair throwing out some all right stripes you can see
some browning at this lower height of cut from the bosch
it just doesn't cut as well as the Allett does at the lower heights and you'll see for my next
video which was shot a couple of weeks ago this is where the Allett really comes into its own
and you can see when you talk about stripes and quality of course the Allett really
comes into its own i would just not get this quality of cut and high definition stripe with
any other type of mower it lays the grass down really well throws out
great pronounced stripes and you can also get like a nice edging pass going around the lawn
you can really tell this is a great quality machine and it makes your lawn stand out
especially if you're coupling it with a good care regime and fertiliser and you've got healthy grass
this thing is going to paint the stripes on like crazy
one of the things i have noticed about the Allett is the position of the grass box
i haven't necessarily found it a problem other than i've just had to slightly change the way
that i mow and make sure the obstacles around the lawn are clear you can see here the front grass
box actually hits my sleeper bed and i get this kind of little edge along where it just misses
i'm just gonna have to take the edge in a couple of centimetres
and it's something to think about that be aware of the obstacles in your lawn
here's another example of the front of the machine it just kind of hits this planter
it's not a major issue i can move the planter back or just do an edging pass to clean things up
the last thing that i want to talk about is which machine cuts better on the edges this bosch
even has a special feature where the front wheels are a little bit narrower to the cutting deck
but even still it can be a bit of an art to get right along the edge and make sure that
you get a clean cut along the edge also a small mistake and the machine can drop down
and it's quite unstable it can rock and it's quite easy to scalp your lawn in this way
if we take a look at the Allett it sits right the way across the front and the rear roller
that increases its stability across that front face and also the extra weight helps it feel a
little bit more stable on the edges you can actually get away with rolling this
right across the edge of the lawn and it still stays relatively stable and easy to control
this is going to allow you to get a nice clean edging pass right the way across with no issues
at all i have to say since i've bought the Allett i've been really impressed with the quality of cut
and the high level of stripes that i've seen i don't believe that i would have got the same
results using the bosch and for that reason as i'm a keen lawn enthusiast i have to say the Allett
machine is a great bit of kit it's well engineered and it gives absolutely fantastic results
to balance that for the last three years i've created a lawn care channel solely using the bosch
lawn mower with the right care you can achieve a good result using those type of mowers as well
but you're not going to get the really low cut with high defined stripes you're
probably going to need to maintain your lawn at a taller setting if you like this video please
drop me a comment in the comment section below on which one your favourite mower is
and why not check out some of my other videos until then i'll see you in the lawn