Remote Control Lawn Mowers For Slope Mowing Applications
Today’s popular zero-turn riding mowers are generally rated to safely handle up to a 30 degree incline without risking injury to the operator. A lawn care professional has to equip 5 or 6 of his crew members with profit eating string trimmers when it comes time to mow a client’s slope that is too steep to drive his equipment on. This has always been a problem for the professional lawn care provider as well as state maintenance crews working on the highway DOT (Department of Transportation) crews. With government officials raising the bar on safety regulations regarding slope mowing accidents, hills and banks over 30 degrees are being left unattended along portions of our nation’s highways and other government owned properties. Parks and recreation facilities are among some of the other properties affected by the new safety regulations.
The Summit Lawn Mower Company, based out of New Albany, Mississippi, has a rather new and interesting solution to slope mowing problems with their remote controlled mowers. By placing the operator out of harm’s way, safety concerns are not much of an issue. By not having a person on top of the machine, combined with an industrial grade rubber track drive system, commercial models such as the TRX-34PRO are able to achieve a very low center of gravity giving it slope mowing capabilities that are topping out at around 40-50 degrees while remaining practical. I do not expect to see these 34-60 inch robotic machines replacing the massive tractor mowers that the DOT guys need to maintain hundreds of acres along our highways. While their current line of commercial mowers are being used by lawn care professionals in mountain regions world wide, the company plans to release a hydraulic powered industrial line of mowers to cater to large area slope mowing that the state DOT departments just might be interested in.
Commercial Grade Remote Control Lawn Mowers Affordable For Homeowners
In addition to the track driven remote control lawn mowers only practical for commercial applications, Summit also offers zero-turn wheeled models that are practical for use around the house. Unlike the hydrostatic designs that use the engine for propulsion, these electric powered machines use high torque electric motors for propulsion utilizing an alternator that acts as an on-board generator to keep the battery charged while in use. As with the commercial models, the transmitter has two joysticks. One controls the machine in all directions while the other starts and stops the gas engine. This simple-to-operate design makes the ZTR series mowers popular with the elderly and disabled people who want to rekindle joy and satisfaction sometimes associated with maintaining your own lawn. While the track driven remote control lawn mowers have really impressive slope mowing capabilities, the ZTR series models are limited to being practical on 30 degree slopes due to their front end castor wheel design.
The company also offers a full line of replacement parts and upgrades such as video control, remote\ deck height adjustment, and headlights.
