Friendly Robotics RoboMower RL1000

I found this mower to be very impressive. I have a lot about 100" x 25', generally flat with a mild slope down the length of the yard, and filled with small divits between clumps of grass. I generally… don't have many bushes or trees in my property, so the deviations in my wire-line were few. I also have two dogs that commonly use the yard. The set up was fairly simple; a single perimeter wire layed the groundwork along the fence. It rounds a few bushes and trees along the fence line. I found the system set-up easy enough to only require a light read of the manual. When I started the mower I hadn't cut the grass in about 2-3 weeks (which is probably not recommended), but the mower cut through the 1' grass length without many problems. While tackling this length of grass it did stall in a few spots because of a lack of traction, so it needed a few nudges to continue. As it cut the lawn, however, the wheels were able to grab better and better traction and soon resolved the grass to the proper length. I don't believe I'll need to fill any of the divits to allow the system to run from here on in without my watching it. I set it up to cut the grass to max power for every day of the week, however I will probably reduce this because the cut-time is certainly long enough to handle the backyard every few days (beyond 2 hours so far). I would recommend setting up the docking station on a flat stone surface (I'll probably lay cinderblock slabs beneith it later) as the mower will not be able to cut along the edges of the docking station very well. My dogs at first were curious about it, but the quiet mowing sound wasn't at all intimidating, so they simply sniffed at it a few times and left it alone. Also, with the mowing sound lower than the general street traffic, mowing at any time of day would likely be fine. Outside of that, my only regret is that I didn't buy this mower earlier in the year. That would have saved me a lot of time. I look forward to reducing my workload in the backyard going forward. All in all, I'm satisfied.

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I got this guy off-season and got him set up, running through multiple "shake-down cruises." Very few problems so far; a bit of a learning curve in setting up the perimeter, etc. But, jeez-o-pete, is he… ever so cool! I may design and build a home for him, to simplify the winter storage process, but I can't wait until spring so I can truly turn him loose and see how well he performs in real life. The docs are accurate, though a bit sparse, so far. There is a growing community of dedicated users more than happy to share their thoughts and experiences, which is a huge asset. I wish I knew how to build a body-mod for him so he would look like the chomping turtle on the Flintstones! A very positive experience so far.

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You have to have a flat lot, and not many trees in there for Friendly Robo... to work. It will get stuck right by the trees, and if it rained, then you cannot use it because it gets stuck. It can not cut… tall grass, and leaves some grass here and there. The worst part is the service. Mine had problem the second week, and when I called the tech. the only way he would look at it is for me to ship it to them. That is 80 to 100 dollars in shipment, and he didn't know how long it will take. You are dealing with Middle Eastern company, so don't expect good customer service.

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I bought my Robomower about a year ago, and decided I've probably had it long enough to make a comment. My wife and I moved from our house in the city to a place in the suburbs with a half-acre lot. I… spent our first summer using our walk-behind mower, but quickly decided that was for the birds. It took hours. All my neighbors had riding mowers, but I didn't want one of those. It seemed a little too stereotypically suburban. So in researching mowers I discovered the Robomower. Now, I am not an early adopter by any means. I don't go for the latest gadget. But I learned that the Robomowers have been around for about ten years now, and have been much improved since the early models. And the Robomower cost about the same as a riding mower. So after doing a lot of research I decided to take a chance on it. Someone else left a comment here saying that the Robomower comes with poor documentation. I really disagree. The manuals were well-written, and I was surprised how easy and straightforward the set-up was. The most monotonous part was laying the perimeter wire. That probably took me three or four hours -- but then, I have a rather large yard. Once the wire is set and the docking station set up, you just let the mower charge up and then -- off you go. It runs pretty quietly, and sounds very much like an electric weed trimmer (the three blades underneath the mower deck look quite a bit like trimmer blades, actually). One of my neighbors came over to see what I had trolling around the lawn. "My wife and I saw it but didn't know what it was," he said. "One day I said to her, I think it's cutting their grass -- I don't see him out there with the lawn mower anymore". In terms of the quality of the cut, I think it does pretty well. Your lawn won't look like a golf course, but I'm not that picky. Looks pretty much like it used to when I cut with the gas mower. Robomower has soft bumpers on the front and back so that if it runs into a tree it will simply toddle off in the opposite direction. It doesn't seem to hit very hard, and I haven't noticed any damage to the bark. When the mower battery runs low, it automatically goes back to the docking station. Once in a while it had trouble finding the station, or had trouble docking on its own, but it would usually make it by itself. Worst case scenario, you can simply use the manual controller to drive it back to the station. You can run perimeter wire around a tree to keep the Robomower from hitting it. I will need to do that for one of the trees, as Robomower keeps running up on one of the tree roots and getting stranded -- its wheels keep turning but it doesn't get anywhere. Then I have to walk out and drag it off. But generally, if it gets a wheel stuck in a chuckhole or something, it will just beep loudly and start off in the other direction. There is a manual setting that allows you to use it as a conventional electric mower, ostensibly for doing small areas that don't fall in one of your zones. You simply pull out the control panel (it's connected to the mower by a 4-foot line) and work the manual controls as you walk behind the mower. However, this is not very easy to use. You have to hold two buttons down simultaneously (one to move the wheels, one to run the blades) as well as manipulate the direction controller. My hands tended to cramp up within a couple of minutes. If you start with grass of a reasonable length, Robomower will do a good job maintaining it. But it has a hard time cutting overly long grass. Because the mower is heavy (it's about 80 pounds with battery) it tends to flatten down long grass before the blades get a chance to shear it off. So you probably don't want to give away your gas mower - you may need it once in a while. The literature says Robomower can work in the rain, but I wouldn't recommend it. The tires can get kind of gummed up with wet grass clippings and tend to slip. It will mow at night (you can see the blinking light on the top even if you can't see the mower), but I really haven't bothered. Usually, I start it up on a weekend, when I'm doing other stuff around the house. Overall, it cut the grass trouble-free throughout all of last summer, and it was a snap getting it set up again this spring. Robomower handles different zones, but be aware that model that comes with docking station can only be used for one zone. There's a battery-powered perimeter switch that can be moved from zone to zone, but that's not included with this. Overall, though, this was a good purchase for us. If you're thinking about buying one and are on the fence, I'd recommend you go for it.

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