Picked up my tiller this morning at their local company store, and figured I
could play with it since I had off today, of course it rained. But I
couldn't resist and had to try it out!
It is pretty versatile, right off the bat I tried to till a pile of wet
leaves and grass into the garden soil, the Mantis didn't like that. The
Mantis became all clogged up to the point of not running, I put that down
more to the moisture in the grass, leaves and top soil rather than a fault
of the Mantis. I did try the Mantis on relatively dry, clean soil, and it
eats it right up and produces a very nice evenly ground soil in return.
Harder compacted soil (like dead grass patches) it does okay, but is fairly
slow at getting beneath the dead sod and roots. Still quicker than digging
it all up. Rocks don't seem to be a bother, the Mantis spit out two rocks
the size of my fist right out of the back of the unit... I didn't even hear
the tines hit the rocks! However, a smaller rock about the size of a roll
of quarters wedged itself between the recess in the center of the tines and
the worm gear housing and that caused the second blockage. I think it is
important to mention that if you rush the Mantis, it feels like you're
wrestling a bull (especially when the tines get clogged), so just let its
powerplant do the work for you at the machine's pace.
The sun is out now, so if things dry out some more in an hour, I'm going to
finish up outside. I am relatively satisfied with the initial results,
afterall it is quicker than turning soil by hand. I almost opted to buy the
electric model this morning, but figured the two stroke may be the more
durable unit as it is the original design and an extension cord may
compromise the Mantis' maneuverability.
Thanks for the recommendations on the Mantis! I had a look at the Sears and
Ryobi home tillers in the same price range and wasn't too impressed, they
just seemed like Mantis rip-offs with larger less aggressive tines.
Kai
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