Manufacturers of hand-held power equipment are facing a difficult road over the next five to 10 years. Revolutionized by the Clean Air Act of 1990, which called for unprecedented reductions in emissions, manufacturers are struggling to come up with products that will meet regulations, exceed the expectations of contractors and beat the competition.
Improvements in product design continue to be released, but the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board won’t be finished with their second rounds of emissions regulations until next year. In the meantime, manufacturers are testing a variety of engine types and adaptations to determine what will suit the equipment of tomorrow.
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Companies admit they are reluctant to invest too much in research and development now when they don’t know what regulatory standards the equipment will have to comply with five years from now.
“The regulation issue is very real, and it does affect our willingness to invest dollars in new product development until we know where the regulations are going to be,” noted Linda Mayer, vice president of marketing, John Deere Consumer Products, Charlotte, N.C.
“I don’t want to say product development has taken a backseat, but we’re concerned with the future,” voiced Jim Elmer, marketing manager, Tanaka, Kent, Wash. “Right now, the future is regulation compliance.”
“We don’t have a wait and see attitude,” added Mark Michaels, senior forestry product manager with Husqvarna Forest & Garden Co., Charlotte, N.C. “But we aren’t sure what level of emissions reduction we will need to hit.”
But John Deere, Tanaka, Husqvarna and their competitors are still improving the effectiveness of the blowers, trimmers, edgers and other hand-held equipment.
“We’re looking for new pieces of equipment and entirely new categories of equipment,” said Mayer.
The stick edger is one particular tool enjoying growing popularity among contractors. “We’ve found as landscape design principles have improved, there’s fewer tight areas that require string trimmers,” commented Wayne Richards, president, Cagwin & Dorward Landscape Contractors, Novato, Calif.
“Many contractors use string trimmers for edging property, but that’s technically incorrect in a lot of ways,” observed Phil Christian, president, pdc Associates, Atlanta, Ga.
“Our edger business has taken off,” added Gary Hardee, manager of power tools, Stihl Inc., Virginia Beach, Va. “These tools really offer more power for laying out beds or dealing with horizontal growing grasses such as zoysiagrass.”
“We filled out our line this year by adding string trimmers, brush-cutters, hedgetrimmers, a pruner and an edger,” remarked Brian Masterson, marketing manager, Toro Landscape Contractor Group, Bloomington, Minn.
“We’ve made improvements to each of our four engine families of trimmers,” added Dave Dahlstrom, marketing manager, Shindaiwa Inc., Tualatin, Ore. “We added a two-bearing clutch assembly to our T-230 for durability and added a metal engine cover. Contractors demand that these products hold up over time.”
“On our blower, we’ve protected the power source completely so when these tools are thrown in the back of the truck, they don’t get torn up,” said Hardee. “Plus, all of the cables are protected in one canal for the throttle and on/off control.”
4-CYCLE. All of these developments are worthless, however, if the equipment doesn’t conform with impending regulations from the California Air Resources Board and the Environmental Protection Agency. (See stories on page 24 and page 30.)
The drastic cutbacks mandated by the proposed restrictions, especially with CARB Tier II, have forced manufacturers to abandon much of their traditional development paradigm and sail into uncharted waters. Much of their efforts right now are focused on making the cleanest operating two-cycle engines possible using technology such as catalytic conversion and fuel injection, as well as developing an efficient, affordable, durable four-cycle engine that is workable for hand-held equipment.
“We, as an industry, can only do so much with the two-cycle engine to make it cleaner. It does leave a lot of unburned hydrocarbons,” admitted Dahlstrom. “Trying to make it run leaner means running it hotter, and that will affect the service life of the engine and require cleaning up the exhaust with catalytic conversion systems.
“The next step in the technology is the four-cycle engines,” Dahlstrom continued. “The problem is that thus far, a four-cycle has not been developed which works as well as a two-cycle engine.”
“Four-cycle engines will have an easier time meeting the regulations, but traditionally they include more moving parts, they are heavier, the power band is different and they don’t operate as well when turned over,” agreed Elmer.
At least two trimmer products will be sporting new “micro four-cycle” engines in the next model year. American Honda Power Equipment, Duluth, Ga., and RedMax, Atlanta, said they will be releasing products with the four-cycle engine design.
RedMax is working in conjunction with Ryobi North America, Easley, S.C., to bring Ryobi’s four-cycle engine to the commercial market. The engine has been available in consumer trimmers for a couple of years at a price point ranging from $179 to $229, and has been a success so far, according to Frank Coots, director of public relations for Ryobi.
“It is inherently cleaner than the two-stroke engines and easily meets both levels of CARB and EPA standards,” noted Coots.
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American Honda’s micro-four engines will power a new line of commercial trimmers, according to Scott Conner, manager of consumer products. Conner said the goal was to give the units a two-cycle feel with the advantages of four-cycle technology.
He claimed that many of the problems associated with four-cycle engines in hand-held equipment, such as the inability to turn the unit 360 degrees while it is running, the weight and low rpm levels have been addressed with these new units.
Conner said he expects the engine life to equal Honda’s other overhead valve engines, which is about three times longer than a two-cycle engine. There are two engines available - a 22-cc and a 31-cc. The 22-cc weighs about ¾-pound more than comparably powered two-cycle units, and the 31-cc is only a few ounces heavier.
Conner also claimed the four-cycle provides more usable power, which makes a difference in certain applications, such as running a blade on a trimmer. Still, the engine’s rpm range of 8,000 to 9,000 falls short of the requirements of high-speed equipment such as chain saws and blowers.
FLEXIBILITY. In addition to the focus on making equipment work better, manufacturers are working to make equipment easier to maintain.
One of the newest innovations has been to tie a group or “family” of equipment to-gether using a single engine. Husqvarna developed the e-tech engine to meet proposed EPA Phase 2 emission standards and chose to make the engine fit a variety of product applications to maximize their research and development investment. It also creates a positive maintenance situation for servicing dealers and contractors.
Stihl has also gone to the family concept. “We have 11 different tools running on one engine type,” Hardee noted. “All of the parts, filters, starter mechanisms and fuel systems are interchangeable for all 11 tools. This allows a company’s mechanic to become very familiar with this engine and use that familiarity to work on all 11 tools with the same competency level.”
The authors are Managing Editor & Associate Editor of Lawn & Landscape magazine, respectively.