As is known in the prior art, greens mowers are particularly useful in mowing golf course greens, which are known to require exacting mowing results to assure that the grass is cut consistently throughout the green. Traditionally, these greens mowers are either walk-behind type mowers or riding mowers.
Greens mowers generally employ a reel type mowing unit as opposed to a rotary type mowing unit. The clip rate of these reel type mowing units are of utmost concern due to the fact that the clip rate often determines the consistency and quality of the cut, which leads to improved turf health. Because of the time required to grow a mature green and the cost associated with therewith, it is extremely important that greens mowers operate properly and not damage the turf.
The term clip rate is generally understood to mean the ratio between the rotational speed of the reel and the corresponding speed of the traction or drive unit. The clip rate can often be measured by the distance between the locations of individual sequential grass cuts produced by the rotating reel blades successively moving over the grass. The grass between the locations of the cuts will necessarily be left taller than the cut grass at the cut locations. Consequently, the cut rate is vital to producing an optimum condition of the grass on the golf course green.
In light of this need for optimum cutting performance, it is desirable that greens mowers include electrical circuitry which precludes mower overloads and consequent mower damage, gives the operator current information on the quantity of the battery charge, automatically and manually shuts off under both desirable and undesirable conditions, automatically shuts off the electric power by a predetermined time after the mower has been used for mowing.
Additionally, it should be recognized that many golf courses are serviced by a fleet of mowers. Ideally, these mowers will provide identical cutting results in their respective mowing roles. However, as can be appreciated for instance in greens mowers, one operator may operate his mowers at a different groundspeed or clip rate than others, thereby resulting in differing cutting results.