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Review – Gtech Cordless Grass Trimmer

If you have been following my blog you will know that I moved into my current house in June 2015 inheriting two very over-grown gardens; you can following my progress here.

My previous house had three large lawns so I employed a couple to mow and trim it once a fortnight, however, my new front garden only has a small lawn so I am going to mow and trim it myself. Because it is quite small I purchased a small, hand-push mower which works well and I’m sure if I keep it sharpened it will work well for me, however, one can’t have a “nice” lawn without trimming the edges. I bought a pair of manual lawn edgers which do the job just fine but I have decided that I need an electric strimmer to make life a little easier.

Here is what I require from a lawn trimmer or strimmer:

  • It must be cordless to avoid trailing cables around the garden
  • It must be lightweight as I struggle to use heavy equipment for any length of time
  • I would like it to charge up quickly in case I forget to charge it and need to use it
  • It must not be too large so it can be easily stored
  • It must be easy to get replacement blades / wire

The trimmer I settled on to fulfil my wishlist was the Gtech Cordless Grass Trimmer, model ST20 at £89 direct from Gtech.

Here is a quick overview of the product from their own website:

  • The new Gtech Grass Trimmer gives you the power to cut and edge the lawn – without a cord to hold you back
  • Designed for comfort and ease of use, the Gtech Cordless Grass Trimmer features an adjustable handle for perfect balance. Equipped with a one-handed power trigger and safety switch to prevent accidental starting, it is simple to operate
  • With a twist of the cutting head, the Gtech Grass Trimmer easily converts to a precision lawn edger, allowing you to give your lawn a neat finish
  • The grass trimmer mechanism is powered by a Lithium-ion battery, giving you up to 30 minutes run-time with a charge time of just 4 hours
  • If you need more time, then spare batteries are available from Gtech, and better still, they are interchangeable with the new Gtech HT20 hedge trimmer
  • Don’t worry about the cost of replacement blades. Your Gtech Cordless Grass Trimmer comes with 20 easy change blades, but Gtech also offer free spare blades for the life of the product.

Despatch and Delivery
The trimmer was despatched and delivered quickly and it was packaged in a neat box which made the most of the space, avoiding excess packaging.

Set Up
It didn’t take long to set up the trimmer as you only need to attach the head and the shroud. The shroud was a little difficult to snap into place but once it’s on it stays on. I then placed the battery into the battery charger and plugged it in.

Charging
I left the battery charging overnight so I don’t know how long it takes to charge from empty, I will run down the battery and test this out in the coming days. I like the way that the front of the battery indicates the amount of charge left in the battery by lighting up each quadrant in turn until all four are lit. The lights pulsate until the battery is fully charged.

Once charged the battery slides easily into the handle of the unit.

Testing
With the battery in place the trimmer still felt quite light and manageable so it passed that test quite easily.

The head of the trimmer can be turned around to allow trimming of edges or strimming of grass, this was just a matter of pressing in the green button on the side of the head and turning it around. I found this quite easy and changed the head position a few times during testing. The handle also changes position so you can find the most comfortable position for the job you are doing.

When you are ready to start trimming you push and hold one of the small safety buttons near the trigger and press the trigger, the positioning of the buttons makes it easy to operate the trigger with one hand.

I wanted to test the unit in three situations. First is on grass which grows out over the patio, second is the lawn edge itself and third is on some tall weeds which I want to remove. You can see from the photographs below that the grass growing over the patio was cleanly strimmed but it did damage the plastic blade so it is great that the trimmer comes with 20 blades as well as free blades for life! The lawn edge was trimmed neatly but I managed to cut into the lawn a bit too much so I will need to practice to avoid this going forward. The large weeds I’m going to leave for another day so I’ll update the post after I’ve done that.

Summary
I am giving a thumbs up for this trimmer. I like that it was easy to assemble and charge and that the battery isn’t too big making it easy to manage. Finding the correct angle and depth to hold the trimmer whilst cutting was a bit tricky for me but I assume this is because I’ve not used a strimmer before, if you are experienced at using a strimmer I think you will like this one. The fact that is strims as well as trims is a big bonus too.

The Bad Stuff
Despite the unit being lightweight and quite easy to use I found the vibration through the handle and trigger meant my hands began to ache quite soon after using it. I’m hoping I will get used to it over time and in the meantime I will do my trimming in sections.

 

*Price correct at time of publishing