It's such a broad question, but here's what we're running at Freshcut Lawncare.... Line Trimmers - Husquvarna's, Echo's, & 1 Honda (Heavy) Hedge Trimmer - Stihl's, formerly Kawa's Stihl Line trimmer with Roto-tiller (amazing) and Hedge trimmer attachments Mowers - Exmark ZTR's, Exmark WB, Kubota Mid-Mount(Money pit), John Deere Front Mount Push Mowers - Honda 21" HRX's Blowers - Echo PB 650's ...Don't know if this helps....
Shindaiwa and RedMax are #1. They are more reliable and smoother because the engines are better balanced. They are truly the king of the hill with Stihl being right at their door.
HK45Mark23 is right on point. I don't know how true it is but a Shin dealer was telling me that after having all these companies spend millions on research in order to comply with the new emission standards Cali went and changed its requirements and now only the C4 technology from Shin and the Strato from Red Max comply. I demoed the C4 it's powerful but a bit heavier than my Red Maxs. I'm looking to purchase some new hedge trimmers so I'm very interested in the replys to this one. As far as blowers there's no competition for Red Max right now which is why Shin buys thier engines. I'm partial to Ferris WBs and don't have ZTR yet so looking forward to feedback here as well
I own shindaiwa because I've opened up both stihls and shindaiwa's, and have seen the quality and high standards that shindaiwa has. the stihl was well built, but I think shindaiwa has a bit of an edge. I have not gotten a chance to look inside a redmax engine. the distributor is extremly slow on parts, or so says the dealer, so I haven't bothered to buy one.
We had some old echo stuff - went to Kawa. Great machines. Dealer dropped them b/c of sales and stirctly has Red max and maruayma. Since last fall we have 6 handheld blowers and 8 trimmers - all red max. I still like of Kawa hedge trimmer though. The design, the feel of the machine, and it takes a beating but keeps going all day. All our chainsaws our husky and Jonsreed - the newer saws being a jonsreed.
String trimmers >Shindawa no contest...Bulletproof hedge trimmers>shindawa...see above 21' commercial mowers>Toro...great cut...Honda's are too heavy Blowers> Echo...takes alickin and keeps on tickin chain saws>echo, stihl can't go wrong with either ZTR's undecided...i have had two still not sure walk behinds> not sure, Toro, exmark
