This post was going to be a rave review of the cordless Black and Decker Front Tine tiller, and it is a good machine...but you know us and mechanical tools (see My Generator Rant)
I sold all of my bee equipment and decided to use the money to buy a tiller. We have always dug our garden by hand but I felt like that was getting to be too much for such senior citizens. I knew we could never cope with a gas powered machine and the finicky maintenance so, after tons of research, I decided on the Black and Decker.
I placed the order with Amazon and within a few days the tiller arrived. It required a lot of assembly but it went together fairly quickly. Then I tried to charge the battery. This should take 20 hours the first time but the charger was saying "done!" in 10 minutes and the unit didn't start. I called Black and Decker and they said "bad charger" and sent a new one. Same thing--no charge. So we packaged it back up and ordered a replacement.
At this point, our long suffering UPS driver knew the drill. He claims we are trying to give him a hernia but Tom helps him load the heavy packages so we're forgiven.
It didn't take long for the replacement to arrive. This time the battery charged as advertised. Then we took it for a test run in the garden.
It started right up and immediately bogged down. There was no way I could get it to move and Tom was exhausted after shallowly tilling two rows. We both agreed that it would be less tiring to use a shovel.
I know lots and lots of people happily puttputt down the garden tilling merrily away. I have to believe they have stronger arms than we do or are prithy to some esoteric tiller secrets that we'll never know.
Make no mistake. This is a good tiller, reasonably priced, free from dependence on cords or gasoline. But it doesn't work for us. I have come to the overdue conclusion that most machines are not for us and will not be ordering any more heavy, engine-driven products; maybe I'll spring for an extra shovel.
Our UPS driver will thank us.
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