Reader's Responses:

1. Product Reviewer says:

   May 13, 2010 at 4:26 am

   Review by Product Reviewer for Black & Decker CM1936 19-Inch 36 Volt Cordless Electric Lawn Mower with Key Start and Removable Battery
   Rating:
   This is the first major redesign of the Black & Decker 19″ Cordless Mower since its introduction. I bought one of the first CMM1000’s shortly after it was introduced in 1996. It worked great for 14 years, with only two battery replacements in that time. I gave it to a friend who is using it and it continues to give great performance.

   The CM1936 has a customer removable battery allowing easy battery interchange for large yards with long grass. My yard is about 12000 square feet and can normally be mowed with one charge. The blade has been redesigned for longer run time. The charger recharges the battery a useable amount in 4 hours.

   The height of all four wheels can be readjusted in less than 1 second. The run interlock is now a bail bar (like the original CMM1000) which is nicer than the lever on the CMM1200. I wish the new mower had the battery indicator that was provided on the original CMM1000. Perhaps it can be added as a special accessory key assembly. It is not really necessary, but is a nice feature.

   Once you experience not having gasoline smell on your hands and quiet operation with no starting hassles, you won’t mind having to push this mower. If you keep it connected to the charger continuously when not in use, it will give the best battery life. The battery can be charged when removed from the mower if you keep the mower in a shed without power. The CM1936 is highly recommended.
2. K. Salinger says:

   May 13, 2010 at 5:00 am

   Review by K. Salinger for Black & Decker CM1936 19-Inch 36 Volt Cordless Electric Lawn Mower with Key Start and Removable Battery
   Rating:
   I’ll admit it – we’ve gotten lazy over the last few years and had been using a gardening service for our lawn care. But after getting this mower we’ve cancelled the service and my husband is back to mowing the lawn (and enjoying doing it).

   In the past, he’s hated the odor when using a gas mower, but obviously this is not a problem with the Black & Decker battery-powered CM1936. Combine the easy startup, quiet operation, and “green” performance of this mower, and it’s a winner.

   We have an average size yard and one battery charge handles both the front and back with ease. The battery removes easily for charging, and I like the fact that our daughter can’t accidently start the mower while it’s stored in the garage between uses.

   This mower has worked exactly as advertised and I’d highly recommend it to anyone who wants to lawnmower that doesn’t rely on gas for operation.
   
3. Robert Jacobsen says:

   May 13, 2010 at 5:20 am

   Review by Robert Jacobsen for Black & Decker CM1936 19-Inch 36 Volt Cordless Electric Lawn Mower with Key Start and Removable Battery
   Rating:
   I bought the cordless electric on the feature that it had an easy removable battery that I could charge in the garage while storing the mower in the outdoor shed. And this mower has that option or you can also charge it directly without removing the battery.

   Another advantage is the mower handle easily collapses and folds up allowing the mower to be vertically flipped and stored simply on the garage floor in a minimum of space.

   The rear grass catcher is removed by simply lifting the spring door and lifting up and then replacing is also that simple.

   The mowing height adjustment was the simplest encountered, squeeze the release lever on the rear wheel while observing the height gauge on the front wheel for the desired height. Could not be easier or more simple.

   Here’s the clincher. The easy out of the carton instructions had you raising and locking the handles, cutting the front part of the carton open and wheeling the mower straight out. The grass catcher assembly was straight forward and simple – absolutely no tools required. Someone in Black and Decker wants to make friends with the customer and they emphasized this again with great features and simple out of the box usage.

   And guess what – they said to fully charge the battery before using, so I hooked up the charger and the fully charged green light happened in less than two minutes – the battery was fully charged before leaving the factory and the mower was ready to take over where your old failed mower left off.
4. J. Groh says:

   May 13, 2010 at 6:00 am

   Review by J. Groh for Black & Decker CM1936 19-Inch 36 Volt Cordless Electric Lawn Mower with Key Start and Removable Battery
   Rating:
   Here is a video overview of the mower.
   
   [...]

   The reason I chose this model over the cheaper 18 inch cordless or the cheaper 24v cordless is because of the removable battery. This will make it much easier to get the job done if you need to keep mowing longer than the one battery will last. It will also make it easier to convert it to a LiFePO4 battery which would make this mower lighter and have a longer run time. I also chose the B&D over the other brands because B&D cordless mowers received the most positive reviews.

   Assembly of the mower is very simple. Move the handle in the proper position and tighten it down, pop in the battery, pop in the key and your ready to mow. The mower comes with a grass catcher and you can also attach it if you plan on using it. You first have to remove the mulching plug when attaching the grass catcher.

   The mower is mostly plastic and looks cheap. It almost looks like a large version of a child’s toy mower. I would have liked to see a metal body for the mower deck but then the mower would weigh more. My experience with B&D products seem to be that they do take abuse very well but I don’t know how the plastic will hold up in a mower environment.

   The handle of the mower is covered with a very nice soft no slip grooved rubber. It feels very nice to grip.

   The key for the mower plugs into the mower’s charging port on the right hand side of the mower. The key snaps in place just fine but I can see this wearing out over time. The key could fall out since the key is kind of pointed downward a little and facing out. Only time will tell how well this holds up. Since you don’t have to charge the battery with the battery in the mower you could always glue the key to the mower and charge the battery at another location.

   In order to start the mower the key must be installed first. After you have the key installed you have to push in the safety switch on the right side of the handle bar area near where the key is located. Then you pull back the lever and the mower starts. The lever to start the mower has a very light spring so your fingers should not get tired holding it back while mowing. Once you let go of the lever the blade will completely stop in about 3 seconds or less. There is almost no vibration during use so your hands should not get very tired.

   The one touch height adjustment works just as advertised. You can quickly adjust the height if needed.

   The noise level is about 82dB according to my cheap dB meter. It’s about as loud as a vacuum cleaner. Since most of the sound is directed to the ground it sounds much quieter. It’s so quiet you just have to wonder if it has any power to cut grass. I was expecting more of a high speed high pitched whine but what you hear sounds more low pitched. You can almost have a conversation with someone while mowing.

   There is not much maintenance that needs to be done. Charge battery, clean the underside of the mower, sharpen/replace blade and that’s about it. No oil, oil filter, gas filters, air filters, gaskets, grease, spark plugs, belts, no pull start and NO GAS!

   There are three 12v 10Ah SLA batteries connected in series inside the battery box. There is a little bit of room around the edges in this box so an upgrade to LiFePO4 should be pretty easy. The place the battery sits on the mower is pretty large and could hold a much larger LiFePO4 battery and still be able to strap it down. The mower uses a standard Anderson connector for the battery connection so that will make it easy to add a LifePO4 battery in the future.

   I performed a run time test inside my house and the battery lasted for about 60 minutes at full power. The battery kept on going for another 25 minutes but with much less power. At about 70 minutes you could tell it was losing power. At 75 minutes it was to the point where you should just give up and recharge. This mower does not have a low voltage cut off so in order to keep from killing the battery your best to stop cutting grass as soon as you start to lose cutting power and recharge. Since this test was done indoors under no load the actual run time should be a bit lower. I’m going to take a guess and say that under normal cutting conditions the battery should last for about 45 minutes at full power. I will get a real world number as soon as the grass starts growing. I would like to see someone perform a no load run time test for a gas mower inside their house. :p

   A full recharge does take about 12 hours and uses about 410Wh of energy.

   First mow.

   Since the Ariens AMP mower did not complete my .9 acre lot I decided to see how much mowing I could get done by pushing this mower around. Since I have not pushed a mower in a few years I was only able to do about 25 minutes worth of mowing. In that time I traveled about .8 miles. The mower still had plenty of energy left to do more cutting but I ran completely out of energy and could not walk anymore. I would guess I got about another .3 acre cut in that time. I’m not going to recharge the mower just yet. I want to finish the job on day 2 and see how far I can drain the battery before it just wont cut anymore.

   Second mow.

   I did some more trimming with this mower. I was cutting for about 25 minutes and still had enough charge to keep cutting. I was able to finish all the places the riding mower could not get so the battery charge for this mower is perfect for the amount of use it will get on my lawn.

   I charged the battery after the second mow and was able to put in 270Wh. My guess is that you can do every bit of 1/3 of an acre and maybe a bit more if you don’t mind draining the battery a little deeper. Possibly the best thing about using an electric mower is that you just keep the blade on when your actually cutting grass. If you have to move to a new location just stop the blade, move the mower, and start the blade again. If you have to move to multiple new locations that are far apart this will save a lot of energy.

   Just like a gas powered mower this mower can get bogged down in thick grass. In thick grass I would say that this mower is just not as powerful as a gas mower but you can still get through it if you take your time.

   Overall I’m really impressed with this mower. If I had 1/3 an acre or less this would be the mower I would use to cut it all. I see no reason for anyone that currently uses a gas powered push mower to keep on using a gas mower. If your currently using a gas mower and are looking for a replacement get the Black & Decker 36v mower. I don’t think you will be disappointed.
5. Lloyd Kingswell says:

   May 13, 2010 at 6:02 am

   Review by Lloyd Kingswell for Black & Decker CM1936 19-Inch 36 Volt Cordless Electric Lawn Mower with Key Start and Removable Battery
   Rating:
   I havebeen using my new Black and Decker CM1936 battery powered lawn mower only a few weeks, but the results I have gotten are way beyone what I expected. I can do my entire level lawn, front and back in one charge of the battery. That would be a bout 20,000sq feet. I was amazed how well it operates. I can clean in safely, fold it up, and put it away in a tiny space. I have been paying for a lawn service up until now and by the time summer is over it will have paid for itself, besides I get some good exercise while doing my lawn. I always wait until the lawn is dry to cut and everthing goes smoothly. I could not be more please with this product. I leave it on the charger so it is always ready to used. Besides being efficient,cost effective, it is so quiet. My neighbors already have commented about that and they are so please. No more gas, oil, etc. how wonderful.
   
   S.