I live in San Antonio, Texas and my yard is fairly shaded in the front so I have St. Augustine grass there.However, the back gets full sun so we have planted Bermuda since it likes the sun and is drought resistant.Fine grasses like Zoysia and Bermuda should be cut low and with a reel mower instead of a rotary mower.My first reel mower was the Scotts 20-Inch Classic mower. I loved how quiet is was and it gave my grass a nice, clean cut.When I received my Fiskars mower I never thought that I would love it more than my Scott’s, but I was wrong.

The Fiskars has more plastic than the Scott’s but it is in nonessential components, like the front housing, which is more for appearance.It was pretty easy to put together, however you will need both an 11mm and an 18 mm wrench or socket.It feels a little “looser” than my Scots but that doesn’t seem to be a problem.Between the time that I assembled it and the time that I completed my video review I used the mower over 10 times (I even cut several of my neighbors yards) so that I could give it a fair evaluation.I found that it was easier to push than my Scotts and was even quieter.I hope that this video review is helpful to you!

6/25/2013 UPDATE:I have had my Fiskars for over a year now and it is still going strong.I haven’t had to sharpen the blade and it still cuts grass like a champ!

Next I tried 16″ Brill mowers from Germany. These used a non-contact cutting system that greatly reduced the resistance, one because there was no friction with the blades since they don’t contact each other but two because the blades are made of harder material and stayed sharp longer. The Brills had two problems. One there were too narrow. They did cut well in one pass, but there were just a lot of passes. And two they didn’t cut tall enough. If you have very rich deep soil with frequent rain or where you can water often, then the grass can do very well when cut to the 1″-1.5″ height that the Brill can cut. My yard has neither of these things.

Then Fiskar came out with the Momentum mowers (now StaySharp Max) and we got two (my wife and I mow together, which is how we manage such a large yard with push mowers, though I have done it myself on occasion, so it is possible for one person to do it all). These mowers are unique in that they throw the grass clipping forward where they were cut and recut until they were cut into very fine pieces and fall below the level of the cut grass. The Momentum has a non-contact cutting system like the Brill, but it had a much heavier reel which resulted in higher momentum in the reel (hence the original name). This allowed more energy to be stored in the reel which keeps the mower from bogging down in a spot of heavy grass or stalling on a tiny twig. Also this mower adjusted for cutting heights up to 4″! Finally I could cut my grass at the 2″ – 2 1/2″ it does best at. But, and sadly there is a but, I came to not like the fact that the clippings were being thrown forward. First it tended to mat down the uncut grass resulting is some unevenness in the resulting cut, and two in thick grass it could be very hard to push since you were cutting new grass and recutting previously cut grass several more times. I think that all the recutting of clippings as well as the very large size of my yard resulted in the blades of these mowers becoming dull after just two years. When they first came out Fiskar didn’t make a grass catcher for this mower, though there is one now. I am sure that with a smaller yard and the use of the catcher when the grass is very tall or especially thick that the mowers would have gone more than two seasons before becoming dull.

So finally at the start of last year we bought two of these 17″ StaySharp mowers. They use the same high momentum reel of the original Momentum, but these discharge the clippings to the rear. The maximum cutting height is 3 1/2″ rather than 4″, but truth be told I never cut at 4″ with the Momentum because the clippings pushed the uncut grass down below the 4″ cutting height resulting in many places not getting cut! The 3 1/2″ maximum cutting height on the StaySharp should be just fine. I find the mowing effort to be much lower than the Momentum because the clippings are only being cut once and then discharged. Plus the clippings are falling on already cut grass so there is no matting down of uncut grass. The result ismore visible clippings on the surface of the grass as one would expect. My solution if the clippings are too thick for my tastes is to take an electric leaf blower and just sweep the airstream over the surface of the lawn. This causes the little clumps of clippings to be broken up and *all* of the clippings magically disappear below the surface of the lawn. I can sweep in 10′ – 12′ wide swaths, so this doesn’t take very long. But I only do this because I am fussy. The clippings for the most part dry up and then disappear below the surface in no more than a day on their own. And lastly if the trick with the leaf blower doesn’t work I have a 36″ manual yard sweeper that has rotating bristles that sweep the recalcitrant clippings off the lawn and into a catcher. This also fluffs up the wheel marks so I can catch them when I cross-cut if I want a perfectly manicured lawn.

Based on all of this experience, I very highly recommend the StaySharp reel mower.

One last word on reel mowers, I think that anybody without a clear physical disability or more than a 1/2 acre of grass (and really do you need to keep so much in grass? let some of it become meadow) should be cutting their lawn with a reel mower. We all need more exercise. My wife and I try to mow a 1/3 of the yard at a time (about 5000 ft2). For our sized yard and with two of us doing it only takes 20-30 minutes for each 1/3. So at a minimum we get 3 really good aerobic workouts a week. Since there is no fueling or starting, we can just come home from work, jump into our lawn clothes and grab a mower and go. So it isn’t hard at all to get in a little mowing each day. In the spring when the grass “explodes” out of the ground, we often need to cut each section twice a week, so our workouts increase to 6 a week. But this is just in time to blow off the rust that has accumulated all winter and lets us get our “beach bodies” back. The best thing is that at the end of our workout we also have our yard cut. If instead we went to the gym and made a treadmill go round and round 3-4 times a week, we would still need to spend 3+ hours on the weekend guiding a hugely noisy gas mower over the yard. So with reel mowers you get the exercise we all really need more of and you don’t “harsh the calm” of your neighbors. Viewed as a piece of exercise equipment, the $150 StaySharp is a very cheap investment in your health.

Overall, the Fiskars Is high quality and feels durable.Assembly and blade adjustment is easy. I completed this task in less than 30 minutes. Cutting height adjustment is very fast. That’s all you need to do. Mowing is quite enjoyable. Some twigs and pine cones will stop this mower but it’s very easy to clear the obstruction and move on. Maneuverability is far better than I expected. Just push down on the handle to raise the front wheels and turn.

One thing you should know: the mower doesn’t do a great job cutting tall grass. If you tend let your grass grow too tall (5-6”), you probably won’t be happy with this. In addition, because I have a level yard, I cannot say how the mower would do on sloped yards.

Overall, I’m quite pleased with the mower. It’s high quality, easy to use, costs less than a good power mower, requires no fuel, makes very little noise, and needs no maintenance!