Products We Like: Husqvarna’s Automower Solar Hybrid

It’s too bad Father’s Day is eight months away. And that I don’t have a lawn anymore, because I would definitely want one of these: the Automower Solar Hybrid.

Basically a Roomba for your lawn, the Automower Solar Hybrid is a robot that can mow lawns of up to half an acre. It has a large solar panel built in and uses a combination of solar and battery power (reportedly less energy than a conventional mower). In daylight, the solar cells enable the mower to extend its cutting periods before requiring a recharge at its base station.

In case you’re worried about someone running off with your Automower, it requires a pin password to operate. It’s also quieter than traditional lawnmowers: The noise level is only around 63dB (the average lawn mower operates at between 90 and 100db). It’s supposedly pet-friendly too, although I can imagine dogs chasing it for the first few days.

I wonder how many consumers who could afford this actually cut their own lawns anymore? When I lived in the ‘burbs, even though most of my neighbors had postage-stamp-sized lawns, they had a lawn service. (We were too cheap or too poor to get one.) But perhaps there is a niche market for these.

I would call mine The Gaffer.

This was written by Dan Saffer. Posted on Saturday, October 25, 2008, at 6:01 pm. Filed under Products We Like. Bookmark the permalink. Follow comments here with the RSS feed. Post a comment or leave a trackback.