Before reviewing the Bosch AHM 38 G I’d like to explain that I decided to go with a traditional push-type lawn mower, because I liked the idea of getting a workout from mowing your lawn. And due to the fact that push-mowers definitely require less storage space and cost less. And hopefully they also require less maintenance and are a bit more hassle-free vs. the electric and petrol kind of mowers.
There were a few options around the same price on Amazon like this Einhell GC-HM 40, but I went with Bosch as it’s one of the few brands I’ve not had a problem with in the past and own other Bosch tools. So I’m hoping this will be a good purchase that will last me years to come.
However, I had my reservations about this mower as the existing reviews on Amazon are very…. Polarised to say the least. There were lots of people complaining about the mower that it doesn’t cut well, the grass box doesn’t work and that it’s hard to assemble. I shall go through all of the negative points I saw in other people’s reviews accordingly. In that sense this review is a bit different from other reviews on this site as I feel like I have to address the points made by others, as this is the first item I’ve actually bought that hasn’t had almost 5 star reviews on Amazon!
Right, enough talk – Let’s get mowing! (Eh… Sorry)
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Bosch AHM 38 G Manual Garden Lawn Mower
Assembly
The lawn mower gets delivered in its own box and there are not that many parts to put together – so you should be able to do this in less than 5 minutes with or without the instructions. And the first couple of pages of the leaflet that comes with it has very self-explanatory pictures on how the different parts are put together – in case you decide to be on the safe side.
So…. To the people complaining it’s hard to put together… I don’t mean to sound nasty but maybe you shouldn’t be using a manual tool with sharp moving parts if you find assembling this difficult or “impossible” as one reviewer stated.
See for yourself and decide if this looks like it’s hard to assemble:
PS. They provide you with a slightly dubious and ill-fitting spanner for assembling the mower, so I’d just make sure that you have your 10mm socket or proper spanner at hand when you begin to assemble the mower. I guess it’s nice if you don’t have any tools that you can put the lawn mower together…. But let’s face it most of us ordering something like this will have the means to tighten a 10mm nut in some shape or form.
Build Quality & Design
The lawn mower appears to be of decent quality as expected from Bosch and well built. But in saying that: You can tell that it clearly has been designed with the production costs in mind with simple solutions and design. But then again it’s not a very expensive lawn mower so based on the cost of it I’d say you definitely get your money’s worth – as long as it works and doesn’t fall apart that is.
The lawn mower after the quick assembly:
One thing to note: Before using the lawn mower release the blade with the little thumb screws above the blade that are meant for finer adjustment of the blade. This is necessary as the blade is locked in with these for transport. Actually – do study the manual in case you have not used these before, as the the adjustments are well explained in the manual provided and will make your life a lot easier & lawn mowing more effective and accurate.
The blades seem very sharp and all the mechanical parts seem to be of good quality:
Functionality
My initial ‘test drive’ was done on a lawn that hasn’t been touched for… More than half a year or so. So in other words this is about as bad as it should get in terms of lawn mowing and if the Bosch AHM 38 G can handle this, then surely a bit of more frequent lawn mowing wouldn’t be a problem. And just to clarify the ground underneath this lawn has a few lumps and bumps here and there but it’s not terribly uneven – so I decided to leave the roller setting of the mower in the middle as recommended by the manual.
Here’s a image of the lawn before mowing:
About 10 seconds into my very first go it was clear to me that the grass box would just be in the way as I’d have to go back and forth multiple times to be able to cut through the ridiculously long lawn as it had outgrown so badly. So I decided to take it off out of the way for the first try and will have to come back to how it will work at a later point in time. Therefore I can agree at least to some extent with the people complaining about the grass box that it can be completely useless at times.
Cutting a lawn like this is a bit extreme so I’m not faulting the grass box for being a bit useless on this occasion. And it actually wasn’t that useless as I found it to be a handy container for the grass to be swept into with a rake and then using the grass box to transfer the cut lawn into bags. The blades got stuck on the grass a few times as well – but again this was a bit of an extreme stress test for the mower, so I wouldn’t expect it to go through this lawn like a hot knife through butter.
Will the grass box work perfectly in the future when the lawn isn’t as out of control? Will have to wait and see. I’ll update this post accordingly in due time!
And here’s how the 20 square meter (ish) lawn looked like after 20 minutes of mowing and raking:
After one (slightly extreme) use of the mower I’m quite pleased with how well the blades cut, and that how light it is to push around – although the first experience wasn’t all positive. As mentioned this lawn was so out of control that I had to go over several areas multiple times and rake the lawn in the middle of the mowing as it had just gotten too long. So to the people complaining that it doesn’t cut well or evenly: Don’t expect it to do miracles. It cuts just fine! (Albeit not perfectly!)
I’d also like to point out that if you remove the grass box – you can essentially step into the spinning blade from the back, so just use caution and common sense when using something like this.
One annoying thing I’d like to complain about however is: If mowing a lawn as long as mine is – the darn long bits of grass & weeds would get tangled around the sides of the blades to the extent that the mower would almost become stuck if you didn’t get the tangled ones out every now and then. I guess this could be avoided by having a slightly better design that just doesn’t allow this to happen… But I’d expect (and bloody well hope!) that this won’t happen when you are mowing a lawn that isn’t as out of control as mine was.
How the grass tangles into the mower as below: (Note that there isn’t that much space to get your fingers or any tools in there to release the tangled grass – so this was definitely a bit annoying to do 3 times on each side!)
And the other annoying thing was that the mower won’t cut all the way to the sides so you will need to touch up sides and corners with a pair of sheers. But that is nothing to complain about as that’s just the way the designs of these push-mowers work. (Or don’t work)
Do I think you should get one?
After first use I am 90% pleased with this, but still have some reservations about how well the grass box will work and how long the blades will stay sharp and everything in working order. (I’m giving the blades some WD-40 after each use just to be on the safe side though!)
So I would say yes, I can recommend this mower. But only as long as you don’t expect it to do miracles and you have a good amount of common sense, and operate it with caution. I think this is a great way to save space in your shed as long as your lawn isn’t a lot bigger than 30-40 square meters.
Check out the latest prices and full product description on Amazon:
Bosch AHM 38 G Manual Garden Lawn Mower
Bosch AHM 38 G Review - Manual Garden Lawn Mower
The Good!
- Easy to assemble
- Easy to use
- Lightweight
- The blade spins very easily and is sharp
- Silent operation
The Bad!
- Grass can get stuck when mowing out-of-control lawns
- Not entirely sure how well the grass box works yet, but on the first time it was pretty pointless to have it (to be seen)
- The spanner provided for assembly is a piece of scrap metal
A decent buy with some considerations - Only as good as its user!
With this Bosch AHM 38 G you definitely get what you pay for, which isn't that much! As long as you don't have ridiculous expectations set for a push-mower, this is definitely a good buy worth considering. However, if you want to have minimal effort and money isn't a problem you probably should just hire a gardener.
