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The cutting edge
Mower blade technology remains the old standby of the golf course maintenance industry, but subtle technological advances continue.
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The dynamics of golf course turf equipment are such that even the most basic components are in an ongoing state of change in the quest to provide optimum playing conditions.
The exception would seem to be mower blades, which to the layman’s eye — and those of many superintendents themselves — are what they are and do what they’ve been doing for the better part of the last century or so.
Even the tireless research-and-development people in the industry’s manufacturing sector are hard-pressed to prove otherwise to the naked eye. While golf course management’s grass-cutting implements — rotary blades, reels, bedknives, etc. — are changing at a fair rate to accommodate today’s new turf varieties and ultra-low mowing heights, the fact is the evolution of mower blades is markedly less than that of most other turf maintenance products.
But, however imperceptible, the focus nonetheless is on giving turf professionals the edge, literally, they desire in aesthetics, conditioning and green speed. The major manufacturers are routinely seeking improved processes to create the perfect blade. As you shall see, the competitive lines — pitch and product — are so fine they tend to blur into one.
Competitive tightrope
“We have our own metallurgy group in Moline (Ill.) that we lean
on pretty heavily,” says Brad Aldridge, product manager for John
Deere, which pioneered heat-treated metallurgy for its array of farm equipment
many decades ago. “We give them an application for what the metal
is going to be used for and they come back with a recommendation of an
alloy or steel that should be used.”
Helmut Ullrich, senior marketing manager, greensmowers for The Toro Co., notes that manufacturers in recent years have pushed the envelope on harder blades, added inserts to toughen wear-prone bedknives and made back-lapping a standard feature on most mowers to basically provide sharpening, increase the life of a blade and extend the time between grindings. And most of the time it’s difficult to tell one company’s product from another.
“Not a lot of things have evolved over time,” says the 27-year veteran of mowing technology. “Everyone can pitch their product, but in the end the hardnesses are very similar among the manufacturers. It’s all about the quality of cut; the right material for consistency between reel and bedknife for the edge retention and long life that manufacturers want and superintendents want.”
Playing to the customer
Viewing such limited subjectivity with a practical eye is a cohort of
Aldridge, Ron Reichen, Deere’s worldwide engineering supervisor
of golf and turf reel products. He says there is only so much carbon and
other alloys that can be added to steel to harden it for durability and
corrosion resistance. He adds that, as a result, some new concepts bandied
about include cryogenics (immersing steel in liquid nitrogen) and ceramic
coating.
“In a practical world, like with disposable bedknives that get a
lot of use, it’s how much the customer wants to pay versus how much
they want to trust the knife staying sharp,” Reichen says.
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By that token, the customers’ expectations are high, if often beyond their means, according to the inestimable Peter Whurr, who got started in the business four decades ago with the British firm Ransomes, fashioning a varied career from sales and marketing to research and product management and continuing to be an industry icon since the company’s acquisition by Textron eight years ago.
“Their goal is to have the best-quality surface they can get, whether it’s a golf course superintendent or the supervisor of a sports field,” says Whurr, who is currently vice president of product support for another Textron company, Jacobsen, and an advocate of testing and research programs that replicate the scrutiny of turf professionals in the field. “Be it quality of cut, frequency of clip, quality of finish ... we have to make sure that anything we put in the marketplace has to not only meet, but exceed the customers’ expectations.”
From one hand to the other
To attain that in the realm of reel mower blades is to accomplish a delicate
manufacturing balancing act. In what Aldridge describes as a “strength
compromise” — a blade too hard is too brittle; a blade too
soft wears too fast — the idea is to achieve a blade with a useful
life that can last as long as it can and still be restored to its original
factory condition through grinding, sharpening or backlapping.
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“It’s a unique process because new technology is slim in turfgrass applications,” he says. “There are only so many ways to cut grass at an eighth of an inch. There are a lot of tweaks and twists, but a blade is still what it is. It’s kind of like, how do you find a better way to do the same thing?”
Whurr says it’s a very fine balancing act in a lot of ways.
“One, you’ve got to bring it in so it’s cost-effective,” he says. “It’s also got to be material that wears and retains its cutting edge for that quality of finish. And the design has to be in balance within itself to avoid uneven wear.”
Adds the wry Ullrich: “Everybody has their own little art on how to get there. There are many factors that go into achieving that, and not just the blade.”
The rest of the story
The manufacturing reps all allude to a bigger picture regarding mower
blades. As Aldridge says, the industry has more changes to its credit
in the technology that propels the blade or reel — the mowers —
for it is the machine that determines just how good the cut is.
“I think it’s about different dynamics,
the relationship between reel and bedknife, clip frequencies, consistent
performance and maintenance,” he says. “To me, that’s
where the technology is being driven. Things like that really improve
the cutting units themselves.”
Without getting too product-driven here, the proof’s in the pudding
as each of the major manufacturers have recently developed mowers and
mower features that enhance the performances of their best blades and
reels.
The precise cut
For instance, Toro, which produced a thinner cutting edge on its greensmowers
back in 1989 to improve backlapping and added the feature to its new fairway
mower, the Reelmaster 5010 series, this year, introduced in 2001 Dual
Precision Adjustment cutting units on its greensmowers as its key improvement
in the reel-to-bedknife relationship.
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Ullrich says the DPA, which was also added to the 5010, emphasizes precision manufacturing that gives the cutting unit more rigidity and more uniformity across the bedknife and requires less adjustment and maintenance.
“These kinds of things are the real advancements at this time,” Ullrich says, echoing his peers among the competition.
Snap, click, done
Nearly three years ago, a Canadian and former Jacobsen salesman, Jeff
Buchko (see “Desperate measure” on Page 49), developed something
called the MagKnife, a bedknife that’s attached with magnets instead
of screws to provide ease and speed in changing knives. He brought the
idea to Jacobsen — where he is now product manager — and soon
the technology was incorporated in all of the company’s reel mowers.
“The MagKnife has been a major development for Jacobsen,” says Whurr. “Bedknives wear the fastest, and there was a need for improved efficiency and less down time. The knives can be changed in mere minutes as opposed to hours. We’re also seeing more longevity in these knives than the screwed-on version. It’s outperformed anything we’ve put it up against.”
Half ’n’ Half
Meanwhile, John Deere’s answer to making blades do their job better
is a hybrid triplex mower, the 2500E, which features a gas or diesel-propelled
machine with cutting units driven by electric reel motors and controllers
that maintain consistent speed.
“Regardless of how fast the machine is moving,
the reel power is consistent,” Aldridge says. “You can reduce
or increase the engine rpm without affecting the speed of the cutting
unit.”
He adds that the key to the hybrid is that its electrical power is generated
by a 48-volt, 90-amp alternator that’s belt-driven by the mower
engine, assuring consistent power to the reels at all times.
The next level
Deere’s concept is not lost on Whurr. Jacobsen pioneered electric
mowers several years ago, both riding and walk-behind, and has been working
to improve the breakthrough product ever since. The all-electric model’s
main drawback has been the lack of a dependable and affordable battery
power source.
“To some degree, we have to wait for that technology to reach a competitive, cost-effective place,” he says.
Nevertheless, Whurr, whose tenure spans so much of what was and what is in this branch of the industry, believes what will be is electric-powered turf equipment.
“I see it as the future,” he says. “If you look at that type of product, you have no petroleum-based fuel of any description, no opportunity for hydraulic leaks, no opportunity for engine oil leaks, fuel leaks or spills. It does away with many of the major concerns a golf course operation has.”
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Aldridge sees the trend of tweaks and twists to blade and reel development continuing. “I think mostly it’ll be improvements in the metallurgy to optimize a hard/soft range or balance that really works,” he says.
Ullrich, who favors getting out in the field to witness product application in real time, says there are some distinct trends: “Golf course technicians are having more input in equipment development and purchasing — anything to make their job easier. Also, more superintendents are grinding now. It used to be everyone just back-lapped, but now spin grinders are available more and more. We (Toro) recommend our specs for hardness, sharpness and angles, but I’ve noticed that a lot of superintendents do what works for them. As long as it works for them, we don’t get too involved.”
The final word
Reichen notes that superintendents appear to have reached a level of comfort
with the current metallurgy. “It’s cost-effective and they
know how to grind it,” he says.
As for the future, the Deere engineer is high on what he sees happening at university research facilities.
“They’re studying better ways to maintain turf — better mowing patterns, better ways to verticut and groom to attain green speeds other than through ultra-low cutting heights that don’t always accommodate reel mowers.”
Best advice from the succinct Reichen? “Keep ’em sharp.”
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