MOWER OF THE MONTH
Number Eighty-Two
GREENS LIGHT MOTOR MOWER
This Greens Light Motor Mower dates from the late 1920s to
early 1930s although some of the features can be found on earlier models
from the same manufacturer. The design was perhaps slightly behind its
time during a period of rapid development across the industry.
Greens seems to have been much more conservative with its motor mower
designs than many other manufacturers during the 1920s and 30s. This
machine incorporates a number of features that could be found on machines ten
years earlier and which had been largely superseded on more modern mowers.
For example, this mower still has the square bracket for supporting a
suspended grass box at the front. Indeed, the box itself (not shown in
these images) was the same wooden sides with corrugated metal skin type
that was used on the Silens Messor mowers for the preceding 50 years.
Virtually all other
manufacturers had switched to a "cantilever" mounting where the
box was supported by brackets or hooks on the main chassis by the
beginning of the 1930s.
Despite similarities with earlier designs the Light Motor
Mower also had some modern features. For example, its frame was made with
sheet steel sides supported by tubular cross pieces. Frames like this were
used by almost every major manufacturer from the early 1930s onwards. And
like earlier Greens motor mowers, the Light Motor Mower had a kick
start mechanism, mounted on the end of the main drive shaft with a pedal
that folded away when not in use. Only Atco of the other main
manufacturers had kick start
as a standard feature on its mid range domestic machines - but not until
the mid 1930s.
Greens motor mowers from the period before 1945 are
generally much less common than similar sized machines from the other
principal manufacturers of the period, namely Atco, Ransomes and Shanks.
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