A Cure for Maintaining Intended Green Sizes?

[Steve Burrows]

This one is obviously a shot in the dark, but, at least in theory, it has the capabilities preserving green edges better than a human-controlled mower.  We will see if time will allow it to work properly, and/or if the market will simply sort it out for any number of reasons (which may be more likely):

http://www.indystar.com/article/20081123/BUSINESS06/811230329/1281/BUSINESS06

[ChipRoyce]

Neat idea - just hope that it can also tell when there's an oil leak and stop mowing in time before the burns on a green or fairway cause significant damage.

[Greg Chambers]

...and the unemployment line gets a little longer...

[John Moore II]

I am not sure this will catch on very much. The initial cost will likely be too high. At $30k per unit, and with only a one reel cut, that would be enough to purchase 10 walk behind mowers (if not more). So, you'd need 4-5 of these, or more, to function. I just can't see it taking off and many courses using them.

[Bradley Anderson]

There are a lot things that the greensmower guy does every morning.

Before mowing the green he fixes ballmarks.

He takes the flag out of the green before mowing it. Does the robot mow the flag over?

He picks up sticks before mowing. The robot mower woul dgo right over the stick and drag it, gouging the green.

He brushes away sand or small stones that may have been thrown up on to the green from bunkers. The robot mower would go over a stone and throw the mower out of adjustment.

He steps gently on the old hole-cup plugs so they don't scalp in case they have heaved slightly. This is especially important the day after a rainfall when the plugs tend to swell a little. The robot mower would scalp old plugs.

He throws and spreads clippings somewhere out of play in the rough.

On heavy dew mornings he brushes grass clippings that may have gathered on the rollers and fell off on the green.

I don't see how all of these vital jobs will ever be managed by robots.

[John Moore II]

There are a lot things that the greensmower guy does every morning.

Before mowing the green he fixes ballmarks.

He takes the flag out of the green before mowing it. Does the robot mow the flag over?

He picks up sticks before mowing. The robot mower woul dgo right over the stick and drag it, gouging the green.

He brushes away sand or small stones that may have been thrown up on to the green from bunkers. The robot mower would go over a stone and throw the mower out of adjustment.

He steps gently on the old hole-cup plugs so they don't scalp in case they have heaved slightly. This is especially important the day after a rainfall when the plugs tend to swell a little. The robot mower would scalp old plugs.

He throws and spreads clippings somewhere out of play in the rough.

On heavy dew mornings he brushes grass clippings that may have gathered on the rollers and fell off on the green.

I don't see how all of these vital jobs will ever be managed by robots.

Well, the funny thing is, you still have to have a man out supervising the robot. It doesn't work totally on its own. So that is what makes it funny. You pay $30k for a machine that is supposed to take the place of a person and yet you still need a person to run it. Makes no sense, financially or otherwise.

[corey miller]

Maybe the robot would do a better job of maintaining the shapes and sizes of the greens?  We have many years of history of the greensmower guy allowing greens to shrink on classic courses.  Perhaps he was more concerned with ball marks?

[Bradley Anderson]

Maybe the robot would do a better job of maintaining the shapes and sizes of the greens?  We have many years of history of the greensmower guy allowing greens to shrink on classic courses.  Perhaps he was more concerned with ball marks?

You make a good point Corey.

But I can't say that I ever had that problem. I kept one course for 18 years and I know the greens did not shrink in that time - I guess because I just kept a close eye on it. Fairways definitely did shrink on me. I put some stone yardage markers in the fairways exactly three feet in from the edge, and then I noticed after a few years that where the markers were on the inside edge of a dogleg curve in the fairway the mowing line had moved in two feet from the stone. But then we began painting the edges every spring for those first few cuts and that solved that problem.

You're definitely right Corey, the lines can move if you don't pay close attention to them.

[Adam Clayman]

The lead into the thread is a red herring. Maintaining the size of the green is a red herring.

If greens were uniform, this idea... is probably still a bad idea. The sensor set-up will probably take as long as mowing half the green.

Burying a wire at the greens edge and occasionally using a metal detector is a lot cheaper method for maintaining green size and shapes.