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Collection, Preservation and Display of Old Lawn Mowers

Dynamow

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Hello

Having acquired a lawn for the first time in 20 years I now have somewhere to play with my many vintage mowers, whilst a bit bumpy for the early 1920's cylinder type, I decided to try out the Dynamow (introduced in1989) which I acquired just over a year ago, never had it going but after checking oil, hydraulic fluid, filling tank with fuel, the 5.5hp Honda engine burst into life.

Yes 'Hydraulic' drive via the 8in front wheel & the 22in deck are driven by oil pressure, NO chains, belts, etc to worry about!

Drive is really smooth from 0 to 5mph, simple forward & reverse plus you can cut whilst going backwards without stopping the blade. 

It drives like a Dogem Car turning well within its own length, 200 degree steering!

To share my fun check out the video link below

http://youtu.be/6qcgonrTPMc

gtc Sat, 26/08/2017

That sure gets around!

Yes, hydraulic drive is nice and simple, as long as it doesn't leak.

 

 

wristpin Sat, 26/08/2017

Hope that you continue to enjoy your Dynamo. I don't want to p*** on your bonfire but back in the day when they were introduced we sold (attempted to sell them) but they were not a success.  Our first sale went well in a very dry March when an elderly  man traded in his Atco 24 with an autosteer seat which had got a bit heavy for him.. The dem went well and he was very pleased and we were fired up to sell them.

Then came a very wet June and our man was on the phone expressing extreme displeasure as the  driven front roller was digging trenches in his lawn scrabbling for grip. We ended up taking it back and refunding the purchase price and selling him a conventional cylinder mower.

The grip problem at the front was exacerbated by the small diameter dual rollers at the back . In soft ground with a full load (operator and collector content) they tended to "squeegee" the ground in front of them rather than roll over it over -  overcoming the grip  of the driven roller. A similar issue was later experienced by Westwood and Countax , with the rollers on their Power Grass Collectors behind their tractor mowers, where the excessive load of the "squeegeeing" rollers resulted in a number of transmission issues.

A great shame really as the idea was good. I believe that the Dynamo was the brain child of Denis Selby of Mountfield and Shay Rotoscythe fame and that they were manufactured in Italy by the company who produced Harry walk-behind rotaries.

History repeated itself with the Moore Mower , the pet project of a former director of Howard Rotavators, well thought out and constructed but not able to establish itself against the conventional products from the big manufacturers.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6q2rlom8i7x1cm7/Moore%20Mower0001.pdf?dl=0

Clive1997 Sun, 27/08/2017

Thanks for that, yes aware that they didn't sell too well, that's why its hard to find a good one with all the body work still in place. I agree in the wet the narrow drive could be a problem but I have plenty of others to stand in or use in the wet areas, might give the Sabo a run out next!