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I'm finally tired of raking leaves! So next season I plan to buy a vacuum. But I don't know that much about them. Should I consider a pull behind type or go with whats available for my mower from the
manufacture. They have a bag setup to mount directly to the mower, and a clamshell dump both blower
driven by the deck. What are some of the pros and cons.........

.......Also do they suck up acorn nuts and what happens if driveway stones or gravel goes through.
I have a lot of oak trees and a couple of stone driveways. It was a banner year for acorns.

I would greatly appreciate your views on this, thanks...cubby

You can get something like this...
The Cyclone Rake Lawn Vacuum, Leaf Vacuum and Property Care Machine

Or the deck belt driven... you will have to check into your mower availability...
I have one of the engine powered ones that vacuum from the discharge of my Cub Cadet... it works great sucks up walnuts so I guess it would do acorns...
I rarely use it anymore I just mow the leaves into the grass.... :smile:KennyV

I've had a Cyclone Rake for about 12 years now. Best investment I ever made.
Makes life easier when clearing leaves AND when mowing.

Different sizes and power ratings available - mine's the little one at 5HP.
Rich

cubby said:

.......Also do they suck up acorn nuts and what happens if driveway stones or gravel goes through.
I have a lot of oak trees and a couple of stone driveways. It was a banner year for acorns.

Click to expand...

The acorns will most likely get smashed and shattered while passing through the impeller (walnuts do)...
Small sand will generally get pulled into it, but larger stones will not ... when an occasional mid sized rock goes in you will hear it get flung int the bin...
I use to use mine a lot to gather grass clippings and leaves for composting... the pass through chopped things up good, ready to start composting... KennyV

I checked out the cyclone rake on their site and it looks pretty good and the price seems fair.

Haven't had time to check any other vacuums yet, but a few popped up when I was on cyclones site.

Tomorrow I hope to stop at a scag dealer near a job I'm working if I get done early and see what they

have to offer. I'll bet the price is a lot more, thanks to all.......cubby

Chipper Shredder Mulcher Vacs by Troy-Bilt

I have the CSV206 yard vac, the thing is great it shreds leaves grinds up tree branches and deposits everything in a bag. My only complaint is that the bag fill up so fast, but then I have some very large trees around the house that lay down a wall to wall carpet of leaves 6 inches thick. The machine doesn't like wet leaves but when they are dry it tears them up.there is a adjustment on the front for smaller debris, during the summer I use it to vacuum the driveway , I have a pine tree that drops tiny pine cones plus the millions of seed pods from the three giant maple trees. You would have to check with the dealer if it can be used on a gravel drive. I think that it would all depend on the size of the stones that were used. The machine won't pick up a larger stones but any thing smaller then a marble is fair game. I forgot to mention that it is self propelled with a very easy to use control lever.it is like the brake lever on a motorcycle as the more you squeeze it the faster it goes.

I have th DR comercial job and it works very well.
:smile:

I'm still checking out different vacs so keep the info coming, thanks to oldfatguy and jeepnjim for the
help.

I still kinda like the cyclone rake but not ready to make a move yet. I also checked a few pull behinds
from stores like tractor supply, etc. and their prices are cheaper but quality is too.

I just don't know if I want the pull behind or the bag/clam set-up for my particular mower.
Do I want a piece of equipment thats bulky and have to store pretty much all year versus the bag
set-up that mounts on the mower?

The scag dealer told me the bag set-up doesn't take up much room and comes off easily, and oh yeah
cost alot more. Hopefully I'll talk to some scag owners and find out what they have to say.

again thanks.........cubby

I would think by now all the leaves would have dropped. If you haven't picked them up yet and they aren't frozen or covered with snow, here's what I do:

Sweep them up with a Swisher lawn sweeper



The only thing wrong with these is the sweeper height adjustment is critical. If it's too high, you won't pick up as much leaves; if it's too low, the brushes hit the ground and won't turn, so the wheels dig trenched in your lawn. They'll do that anyway if it gets too full and on uneven ground.

I also use my mower at its highest setting to blow the out of areas where the sweeper won't work. I have a Honda H3013H rider that used to have a bagger, so it blows leaves like crazy.

The one thing you didn't mention was the size of your yard. I'll tell you this , however. The bag type systems fill up very fast. I have about 3 acres and 200 trees and my old self propelled Troy Built chipper Vac (one of the originals actually built by Troy Bilt) and it fills up in nothing flat. If you've only got a 1/4 to 1/2 acre yard and a few trees, it'd do o.k., but anything larger and you're just going to wish you hadn't wasted the money on it. I also have an Agri Fab vacuum chipper trailer. It's the better model with a hammermill chipper in it, so it really chops things (including rocks) up pretty finely. They make a lesser model without the chipper, and the mulch you end up with depends on how well the mower towing it chews it up. Depending on how deep and wet the leaves are, I can do about 3/4 to 1 acre per fill up. I also have a Scag STHM (61" deck) fitted with super high lift blades that i use to simply mulch the leaves into the grass and two commercial blowers, a Little Wonder and a self propelled Giant Vac that I use to blow the leaves into the neighbors pasture and then grind up there with my Scag.

I just use the old Lawn Boy mower to mulch up the leaves. It works perfectly if you don't have too big a yard. Mine doesn't have a discharge place on the deck so it works great for leaves. This is the only one I've ever seen without a discharge, guess it was made for mulching.

Yes, if there's no discharge chute, it's supposed to mulch. Normally, with a regular deck, an optional mulching plate is provided to close off the discharge, which is supposed to keep the leaves and grass in there a bit longer to get mulched. However, what usually happens is clumps fall out, just leaving a mess behind. Unless the deck is deep enough and you have special mulching blades, a mulching plate is a poor compromise. The old Honda H1000 and H3000 rear engine riders had elaborate mulching kits available that virtually reshaped the interior of the deck.

We have a Walker Mower which vac up everything, it sure makes picking up leaf easy. We have been cutting grass for people quick a few years and picking up leaves was the biggest (pita) until we got the Walker a few years ago. It's almost fun.:wink:

I have a Trac Vac Model 1080 that has a 44 bushel capacity. It is somewhat costly but does an extremely good job and saves a lot of time dumping leaves due to the large capacity. I collected 1,800 bushels last year and have done 1,300 this year. Well worth the cost for me.

bob19 said:

I have a Trac Vac Model 1080 that has a 44 bushel capacity. It is somewhat costly but does an extremely good job and saves a lot of time dumping leaves due to the large capacity. I collected 1,800 bushels last year and have done 1,300 this year. Well worth the cost for me.

Click to expand...

Who sells this vac, or where do I get info on it.

Sounds like a heavy duty unit, thanks cubby.

I am 80 and live in Lebanon Missouri and have about 2 acres of oak trees and lots of leaves which I have been fighting for over 35 years. Over the last 10 years I have built several "tow behind" lawn vacuums with goal of not how to get the leaves into the container but how to get those packed leaves out. I used winches- cables - and all sorts of devices none of which worked very well and wound up in the junk pile. About 5 years ago I hit upon an idea that I thought would not only get those packed leaves out of the container but would do it without getting off the lawn mower, removing the input hose, lifting or removing the tailgate, manually lifting the container to dump the leaves, putting everything back together, starting the lawn vac engine, and getting back on the mower. After about two years of trial and error I had my first EZ Dump in operation and after 3 more prototypes I think I have got it right. You can go to youtube and type in EZ Dump to see a video. The first factory prototype has been built and my patented EZ Dump will be available before the end of the year. The EZ Dump is made of .080 and .125 aluminum with a frame made of 11 gage tube steel powder coated for durability and has a capacity of 60 cubic feet or 48 bushels. The lift is rated at 1100 pounds and only has to lift 60 percent of the load because of the design. The engine is a 9hp electric start with a 3 amp charger built in.

I've had a tow behind DR that works great. I have owned it for about 6-7 years and I would highly recommend. It's rated to reduce leaves, etc 10 to 1, but it still fills up pretty quickly. With my one acre lot I have to dump it 3-4 times.
Bruce

I have about 3 acres with tall trees on 3 sides and an inground swimming pool , so dealing with leaves is not an option . I have tried everything from burning them , blowing them , had a pull behing vac , to raking them . I bought a mulch kit for my sears 23 hp 48 inch cut mower and it worked great , then I bought a MZ2861 husquarvarna zero turn and put the mulch kit on it (200.00 option ) and I run gator blades . Its the best option of all the rest . looks like I vaccumed the lawn and I dont have to stop and dump leaves or deal with them after I have dumped them . I just gave away a 3 bin bagger that I had for the sears 48 inch mower . I will never go back to bagging . I mulch year round , no grass clippings in the summer and no worry about discharge of anything from under the deck to cause damage .

I've been looking at various manufactures to purchase a lawn vac. I think the EZ Dump may be the best one out there. Well done sir.
Unfortunately, your quoted price of $3,800 is going to kill your sales. I don't think that included shipping or tax.
If something changed let us know. I wish you the best of luck though.

So tired of pulling compacted leafs out of my 8 year old Agri-Fab vacuum.
It has never dumped correctly, poor design. I welded the dump mechanism closed the first year, weak point.
Just finished the 2013 cleanup on a four acre yard with over one hundred 100 year old trees, mostly maple, 72 loads to rake out.
I mix the leafs with urea fertilizer, turn the pile every couple weeks with a front end loader. Come spring I have about 30 yards of excellent compost.

The Agri-Fab has had to be heavily modified as it wore, bulged out and bent, welds and new angle iron everywhere.
Almost every part of the Agri-Fab has been modified, no more things that wear out every year.
It's still the most heavy duty model on the market though. I would hate to see what a Cyclone soft top type would do in my situation.
This is the one I want Lawn Vacuum/EZ Dump Lawn Vacuum - YouTube