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Comment by conductr | Hacker News Reader

This is a fun project to take on. Couple years ago I built an autonomous controlled chassis onto a push reel mower (removed handles of course). It’s not as safe as the typical robot mower given they use tiny blades to trim (and reel mower will take a finger) but it’s relatively low maintenance since the blades need replacing every month or so. I opted for lidar as the reviews on RTK GPS seem pretty hit or miss and didn’t want the base antenna thingy. It works well for me and the cut quality is amazing even just running once a week.

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Would you mind sharing any pictures or video about the mower? I converted my push reel to electric without a kit, and have been considering putting separate high torque, low speed motors for drive wheel control to start moving towards autonomous cutting. Would be great to see your experience!

I made it for my country home and won’t be there for a bit but maybe one day I’ll document it. But the parts store I used closed down, Open Builds Part Store. It’s nothing proprietary to them, I just got all the v slot aluminum frame and connectors there to build the chassis. Then I got hub motor wheels on Amazon or Aliexpress and batteries too. Most small components I get on Amazon, motor controller. I went with off-road air filled tires. And I wrote all then logic into an arduino mega. Oh and I used an upside down rubber made container as the case for electronics. Everything is mounted to the bottom of the lid and the box part is functionally the lid that I remove to gain access. It as built in snap locks and I used weather stripping to make the seal tight.

You just have to figure out how to mount to the lawn mower part of your choice, after than it’s the same as building any vehicle.

> after than it’s the same as building any vehicle

LOL. Love this line ;-)

Yeah sorry to make it sound easy. I learned all this on YouTube and tailored those lessons to my needs, so just a nod to the fact that tons of much better resources already exist. I have no official training, if a finance bro like me can figure it out I have a lot of hope for anyone else on HN :)

Granted I have built a few robots prior to this one as a hobby hacker, so this one felt pretty easy for me. If it’s your first, it will probably take you 6 months LOL. In almost all cases, you’re better off buying unless you just like the maker aspect of the project, which was true for me.

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