clutch broke within 1 hr, it has plastic in it that melted... customer service was great and they has a new one to me within a few day,keeped getting small branched 1 inch dried dead, jammed in in the chopping area .. every 5 min had to stop to remove,every time i hit some vines it would wrap up and die, unlike my zero turn which does fine.the tire popped right off the rim about 2 hours in workif swisher offered me back a partial refund i would send it back right away,if u have grass this is great. if u have vines and dried dead sticks it sucks.

Brush mower is 448 pounds and tires on the unit unable to carry the weight effectively. First time mowing and had a flat. Following day, noticed the other tire was half deflated. Also, drinks gasoline fast. Furthermore, raising and lowering and leveling machine complicated. One last thing, due to only two flimsy, small wheels to support mower; I found that scalping ground with mower blades happens on rough ground. My previous brush mower with four wheels mowed the same area and never ever scalped the ground. Purchase of this Swisher Mower from Northern Tool is a regret. I plan to sell and take a loss to be rid of it.

This thing is amazing! It starts immediately with a simple turn of the key. It chops up anything I can drive over with my 4-wheeler. (1999 Polaris Sportsman 500) However, keep in mind that it can't be backed over anything larger than about a 1/4" twig. The back of the mower is angled away from the top of the mower making it cut into anything it is backing toward and preventing it from riding up over anything from the rear. I do not find this to be a problem and is presumably done to help things being chopped up inside to get out from in there in the normal process of mowing going forward.It is rear discharge with most of the 'clippings' being sent to the right rear as it is moving forward and cutting with the blade rotating clockwise as viewed from above.. This effectively makes a small windrow on the right rear as it is going through tall grass/brush. (In other words, the cuttings are not evenly distributed across the rear cleared area as it moves forward; if that matters to you.). I am attaching a 6 minute video of me dragging it around a small brushy area inside my goat pen. The area I am chopping in the video is small enough to keep me in the video most of the time so I tend to get it stuck trying to turn it around sharply. But it gives a good view of how it works. The range of brush and small trees I chop with it is from thick bushy growth to a couple small trees about 2" in diameter. It works great and I highly recommend it! I removed the little angle tongue attachment that is designed to ride on the straight tongue because I probably won't use it and it jingles very loudly on the two pins it hangs there on. Also, I attached the 'remote' control console to the tongue with two of the huge zip wire ties that were holding the mower to the pallet it was delivered on. I ran one of them through the hole in the tongue formerly holding the pin to support the angle adapter which I store in the garage. That zip tie keeps the control from sliding around on the tongue and they are heavy enough to keep it secured in that location. The swinging chopper blades underneath are very heavy duty and are about 1/4" thick steel. I need to sharpen them though since I have hit several rocks with them and they are getting banged up pretty good. Maybe I'll attach a photo of them when I tip it up to sharpen them. I think I can sharpen them with a hand grinder if I tip the mower up rather than removing them to use the bench grinder.I bought it to maintain about 10 acres of grass meadow we have that has been shrinking as brush is encroaching from perimeter woods along the sides. I have made two trips around it so far chopping anything that is there from lots of thick brush to small trees that range up to a bit over 2 inches in diameter and 15+ feet tall. This things doesn't even cough chopping those things up! I will go more aggressively around it more in the future once I cut off some of the long tree limbs that are reaching out making it impossible to drive under them to cut the ground cover back below them.In the video, I start it up behind my 4-wheeler back pretty far since I didn't want to try to start it on top of the brush. But later in the video, I get it positioned in front of the camera better. The narrow fenced area is pretty cramped, but it gives you a good view of how it works. The mower height is set to about 1/2 way between its high and low elevation settings.The battery (bought separately) fits in a little U-shaped box that holds any battery that is 5 inches in its longest dimension. I got an EverStart ES14AA2 for $45 from Walmart and it fit perfectly and easily starts the mower. The little rubber bungee cord supplied with the mower fits right around it to hold it securely. (Photo attached) That battery says on the box that it is 5 1/4 inches, but it is not. It fits easily in the 5 inch container on the mower.The mower arrived well packed in a heavy wooden pallet/crate. Other reviews state that to return the mower, you need to repack it in the original crate. Good luck with that! I pretty much needed to use a sledge hammer to bust the crate apart to get it out! I don't intend to return the mower, but if I did, there is no way that crate is going back together! The only parts of the original crate that were still recognizable were the top panel and bottom pallet. The sides were busted apart into splintered debris.

I really thought it was great, till the blade shaft bearing and housing broke. Not like you can get those anywhere, so down for days for sure. Waiting on customer support to get back to me. Will update after.Update 1: Customer support was nice and quick. Waiting on parts for repair.Update 2: got the parts quick, 40 minutes of work later and up and running again. This thing is designed well to be repaired. The quick pins are terrible though. Lost those cause they just popped out.Update 3: after a year of ownership, this thing is not for those timid of wrenching. 1hr of run time = 30 minutes of wrenching time to repair. The breakaway blades lock into position easily when they get debris in them, which causes terrible vibrations. The original tow bar and attachment bolts (i think this has been redesigned since I purchased), are terrible. Sheer bolts all the time and the original bar bent. The framing on the front of the machine is not really great either, as it gets snagged easily on trees and stuff, should be more of a A frame from front to back, to slide around trees. I likely have some welding time in my future to modify the body of the machine as well. The front bottom digs in any time you go over a small crest of a hill, and the rear of the machine has similar issues when trying to reverse it.