The Temple of VTEC - Honda and Acura Enthusiasts Online - Articles - Hey how bout a supercharger?: On the lawn

Mowing Performance

Lest you forget, the purpose of this $700+ device is to keep your lawn neat and trim. So let me tell you how it cuts grass. First of all, the blade uses an interesting "bi-plane" design, with two sets of blades slightly offset. Honda calls it the MicroCut� Twin Blade. Additionally, the inside of the Xenoy^� mower deck has been aerodynamically designed to maintain a high vacuum inside the mowing chamber, keeping the severed grass blades elevated and churning through the blades until they are virtually dissolved into their molecular constituents. The results are pretty amazing, actually. As long as your lawn isn't severely overgrown, you can mow it in full mulch mode and you will not see a stray clipping anywhere. How does it work?? Well, I'm no physicist, but I think it operates on the same priniciple as a supercollider, smashing grass atoms into each other until grass fission results. Or something very similar to it. The resulting grass "gamma particles" literally vanish into the lawn. After living for years with two other so-called mulching mowers that left my lawn looking like The Donald's coiffe after a long night with a hopeful pageant contestant/prospective spouse, I found this aspect of the HRX to be quite appealing. All kidding aside, this part of the mower is truly remarkable. The HRX's mulching performance is superb, which means zero trips to the curb with your lawn bags, and it's healthier for your lawn to boot. This is what I call a win-win.

The 10-position "Clip Director" is a pretty nifty feature too. If you mow your lawn on a proper schedule, your best bet really is to leave it on the full mulching setting and let those MicroCut� grass atom smashers do their thing. But if you're like me and are sometimes unable to mow on an appropriate schedule, or you wish to vacuum up leaves or other debris from your yard, you will appreciate the ability to quickly direct some or even all of the clippings into the bag. I would like to tell you that this is due to an ingenious design, but to be honest the "magic" of the clip director boils down to a relatively simple rotating shutter scroll. The various settings between "Bag" and "Mulch" simply vary the aperture of the shutter from fully open to fully closed. This system works fairly well, though I'm not sure how much of a difference there really is between fully open and the eight detents before you reach "mulch". The clipping bag seemed to fill at roughly the same rate regardless of which detent I selected. One limitation I noticed was that if you're in one of the "in-between" modes, the mechanism can get all gunked up (for lack of a better description) in the hollow area behind the scroll shutter, making it impossible to swing the shutter fully open. You have to remove the bag and reach down into the bagging chute to clear the debris (grass clippings, small twigs, etc...) before you can again fully open the clip director. A small nit to pick, but something to mention.

With two different types of grass to mow in our test yard, we have different mowing height requirements for the front and back yard. Fortunately, adjusting the mowing deck height of the HRX is a cinch - you can easily adjust the mower's ride height at all four corners.

Living With the HRX

As you might expect, living with the HRX was quite simple. I do have a few things to note: The mower started on the first pull, EVERY time. Well, unless I forgot to put gas in it. Which brings up another point - either this mower is thirstier than my past mowers, has a smaller capacity fuel tank, or perhaps it's a combination of both. I say this because it seems to require slightly more frequent refueling than my past mowers. I wish I could support this with some scientific evidence, and in fact maybe one day I'll fill the HRX and a "control" mower with exactly the same amount of fuel and start them up side by side and see which one runs out first. But for now, that's the impression that I have. As I mentioned earlier, the handlebar adjustment mechanism could be improved - the HRX wouldn't fit in the spot in my garage that I had reserved for the mower that it replaced, so I had to surrender some floorspace in another area. A better quick release design would remedy this situation in a jiffy. And finally, we actually had TWO HRXs during our long term test. Somehow, the drivebelt popped off on the first one while the mower was traversing some bumpy terrain in the back yard. It didn't appear that there was any permanent damage, but without the belt in place, the drive mechanism was out to lunch. Honda promptly replaced it with an identical mower and this one's been over the same terrain at least 10 times as much as the first mower and has not had a problem.

Conclusions

The HRX is one heck of a piece of lawn maintenance equipment. And for around $700 it SHOULD be. As a leading consumer magazine has also concluded, we think the HRX delivers a strong value for the money. Particularly if you're serious about lawncare, or you're just a Honda fan, or perhaps both. With its nearly indestructible construction and Power by Honda, the HRX should provide years of excellent service. Plus, it looks great parked next to your S2000 and TSX A-Spec in the garage. By the way, since we took delivery of our HRX, Honda announced an upgraded model (HRX217HMA) which makes life that much easier by including an electric starter. A single charge of the battery is said to be good for 300 starts.

Pros
	Easy starting, easy to operate
	Excellent mowing/mulching performance
	VersaMow system is very convenient (change from bagging to mulching, and in between by merely moving a lever)
	Durable construction
Cons
	At $700, it's a bit pricey (but it is worth the money)
	Folding handlebar mechanism needs a better release mechanism (this isn't much of an issue if your designated storage space is sufficient)
	Grass clipping bag opening is too large for easily pouring contents into typical lawn waste bags.

Video Clips

A season highlight reel of life with the HRX:

Windows Media V9

More Information

Please be sure to visit Honda's official HRX website to learn more about the HRX.

Special Thanks

Honda Power Equipment

What's Next for Project HRX

As you can see in the photos, we're currently prototyping a cold-air intake from a big player in the aftermarket industry. We haven't figured out how to strap the HRX to a dynojet yet, but this baby definitely delivers torque that you can feel between 500-700 rpm. It wouldn't surprise me if the dyno shows a gain of at least an 1/8th of a horsepower from this modification alone. Seriously*. Once we figure out an improved mounting mechanism for the cold-air intake, look out for our next mod, which will be our custom equal length header and cat-back exhaust system (shhh, don't tell anybody or the EPA, but we're gonna ditch the cat!).

* Heck no, we're not serious!