The build is based around a John Deere LX188 lawn tractor, which runs a 17 horsepower Kawasaki engine and features a hydrostatic transmission. It’s a perfectly fine way to mow a lawn. In this case, though, it’s given new abilities with the addition of a real working loader. It’s fabricated from raw steel from the arms right down to the bucket. It’s all run from a hydraulic pump, which is mounted to the engine via an electromagnetic clutch. The clutch can be engaged when it’s desired to use the hydraulics to actuate the loader.
As you might expect, the humble lawn tractor isn’t built for this kind of work. Thus, to support the extra equipment, the mower was also given some frame reinforcements and a wider track for stability.
Although there’s been considerable excitement over the past half century of a Jetsons-like robotic future, outside of a few niche uses of our day-to-day lives there hasn’t been much in the way of robotic assistants coming to ease our physical household workloads. Sure, robots exist in manufacturing and other industrial settings, but the vast majority of us won’t see a robotic revolution unless we make it for ourselves. To that end, [Jim] has begun construction of a robot that can at least mow his lawn and eventually plow his driveway, among other potential tasks.
The robot, called the Lawny Five, is a tracked vehicle currently under remote control but with a planned autonomous capability. The frame includes a set of caster wheels at the front to take advantage of the differential steering of the tracks, and between everything is where the mower, plow, or other tool can sit. The attachment system is based on a 2″ receiver hitch, allowing the robot to eventually change tools at will while still preserving the usefulness of the tools in their original state. The robotic platform has been tested with the mower on a wet lawn with a 20° slope and showed no signs of struggle (and didn’t damage the grass) so it’s ready to take on more challenging tasks now as well.
With the core of the build out of the way, [Jim] is well on his way to a robotic lawnmower and potentially even an autonomous one, not to mention one with interchangeable tools that he hopes will be put to work in other ways like parking his boat in a small space by his house. For those maintaining a piece of land a little more involved than suburban turfgrass, there are other robotic platforms capable of helping out farmers with things like planting, watering, and weeding.
Before the Ford marketing department started slapping Maverick badges on pickup trucks, the name had been attached to compact cars from the 70s instead. These were cheap even by Ford standards, and were built as a desperate attempt to keep up with Japanese imports that were typically higher quality and more efficient than most American cars at the time. Some people called them the poor man’s Mustang. While Ford and the other American car companies struggled to stay relevant during the gas crisis, it turns out that they could have simply slapped a lawn mower carburetor on their old Mavericks to dramatically improve fuel efficiency.
The old Maverick used a 5 L carbureted V8 engine, which is not exactly the pinnacle of efficiency even by 1970s standards. But [ThunderHead289] figured out that with some clever modifications to the carburetor, he could squeeze out some more efficiency. By using a much smaller carburetor, specifically one from a lawn mower, and 3D printing an adapter for it, he was able to increase the fuel efficiency to over 40 mpg (which is higher than even the modern Mavericks) while still achieving a top speed of 75 mph.
While it’s not the fastest car on the block with this modification, it’s still drives well enough to get around. One thing to watch out for if you try this on your own classic car is that some engines use fuel as a sort of coolant for certain engine parts, which can result in certain problems like burned valves. And, if you don’t have a lawnmower around from which to borrow a carb, take a look at this build which 3D prints one from scratch instead.
It should be said that, at least technically, the Husqvarna TS 348XD in question was still working. It’s just that [xxbiohazrdxx] noticed the locking differential, which is key to maintaining traction on hilly terrain, didn’t seem to be doing anything when the switch was pressed. Since manually moving the engagement lever on the transmission locked up the differential as expected, the culprit was likely in the electronics.
Testing the dead actuator.
As [xxbiohazrdxx] explains, the switch on the dash is connected to a linear actuator that moves the lever on the transmission. The wiring and switch tested fine with a multimeter, but when the actuator was hooked up to a bench power supply, it didn’t move. Even more telling, it wasn’t drawing any power. Definitely not a good sign. Installing a new actuator would have solved the problem, but it was an expensive part that would take time to arrive.
Repairing the dead actuator seemed worth a shot at least, so [xxbiohazrdxx] cracked it open. The PCB looked good, and there were no obviously toasted components. But when one of the internal microswitches used to limit the travel of the actuator was found to be jammed in, everything started to make sense. With the switch locked in the closed position, the actuator believed it was already fully extended and wouldn’t move. After opening the switch itself and bending the contacts back into their appropriate position, everything worked as expected.
A tiny piece of bent metal kept this $4,000 machine from operating correctly.
As interesting as this step-by-step repair process was, what struck us the most is [xxbiohazrdxx]’s determination to fix rather than replace. At several points it would have been much easier to just swap out a broken part for a new one, but instead, the suspect part was carefully examined and coaxed back to life with the tools and materials on-hand.
When mowing the lawn, you generally have a choice of pushing power, electric or gasoline. Thanks to the nutty inventor [Colin Furze], you can now add wood gas to the list, as long as you don’t mind some inconvenience. He built a wood gas generator on top of a formerly gasoline powered lawn mower, so he can now run his lawn mower on wood chips.
Wood gas generators have been used with internal combustion engines for a very long time, reaching their peak in the later parts of WW2 when fuel shortages plagued Europe. When wood is burned at high temperature but with limited oxygen, it produces a combustible gas mix that can be fed into an internal combustion engine. [Colin]’s generator went through a number of iterations, and the problem-solving that goes into a project like this is always interesting to watch. We would not recommend running tests like these indoors, but we suppose no [Colin Furze] video would be complete without a bit of danger.
On his first version he had an extraction fan that was too close to the outlet of the burn chamber, so it melted very quickly. The combustion temperature was also not high enough, which required some changes to the chamber geometry. The main problem that plagued the project was filtering out the moisture and tar. [Colin] did eventually get the lawn mower to run on wood gas, but tar was still getting into the engine, which prevented it from starting the second time. The filtering system will need some refinement, which [Colin] will address in his next video, which he also hints will involve some sort of diabolical swing set. Continue reading “A Wood Gas Powered Lawn Mower”→
When we think of lawn mowers, our first thought is of heavy, rusty old machines that take the best part of an afternoon to get started. Of course, there’s always another way, as [Mark] ably demonstrates with his own build.
Beginning from an unconventional starting point, [Mark] chose a remote control car, of the type that can flip and drive in both orientations. Having lost the controller, he started by ripping out the original electronics. In its place, an ESP32 receives signals from a FlySky RC receiver, and runs the drive motors with a Sparkfun Monster Motor Shield. Another channel on the receiver is hooked up directly to a drone speed controller driving a brushless motor, outfitted with a sawblade to cut the grass.
It’s a small platform, and one that ordinarily you might doubt could do the job. However, for [Mark]’s purposes, the rig works just fine, and has been doing good work for the last two years! We’ve seen mowers hacked before too, like this autonomous rig out in the wild. Video after break.
For some people, mowing the lawn is a dreaded chore that leads to thoughts of pouring a concrete slab over the yard and painting it green. Others see it as the perfect occasion to spend a sunny afternoon outside. And then there are those without the luxury of having a preference on the subject in the first place. [elliotmade] for example has a friend who’s sitting in a wheelchair, and would normally have to rely on others to maintain his lawn and form an opinion on the enjoyability of the task. So to retain his friend’s independence, he decided to build him a remote-controlled lawn mower.
After putting together an initial proof of concept that’s been successfully in use for a few years now, [elliotmade] saw some room for improvement and thought it was time for an upgrade. Liberating the drive section of an electric wheelchair, he welded a frame around it to house the battery and the mower itself, and added an alternator to charge the battery directly from the mower’s engine. An RC receiver that connects to the motor driver is controlled by an Arduino, as well as a pair of relays to switch both the ignition and an electric starter that eliminates the need for cord pulling. Topping it off with a camera, the garden chores are now comfortably tackled from a distance, without any issues of depth perception.
Remote-controlling a sharp-bladed machine most certainly requires a few additional safety considerations, and it seems that [elliotmade] thought this out pretty well, so failure on any of the involved parts won’t have fatal consequences. However, judging from the demo video embedded after break, the garden in question might not be the best environment to turn this into a GPS-assisted, autonomous mower in the future. But then again, RC vehicles are fun as they are, regardless of their shape or size.
