Billy Goat...or?

[MowovErthis]

I'm wanting to get a lawn vacuum. Many of my customers have a lot of leaves and don't want them mulched up. Since I don't have a tractor I'm thinking about a walk behind, self propelled style, like a Billy Goat. Do they work well? Is it easy to empty the bag and go on? Any suggestions on a different brand? How much can I charge?

Thanks Guys![]

[Zack.]

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Lawn Vacs are garbage. Too small, difficult to maneuver, & they generally do a worse job than a mower with a bag.

Use a mower with gators & a bag attach such as the Accelerator or Grass Gobbler with leaf extension.

Or a Trac Vac or Peco Vac of some kind for your tractor.

http://www.trac-vac.com/

[Galashiels]

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I use a Walker mower which picks up leaves really well, can get a hand held blower/vac but too small for any volumn of leaves. Have seen the councils with big vacs on trucks but looked expensive and was around 12" suction pipe. Worked well though.
What about blowing on to a tarp?

John[8)]

[Bill645]

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My set up for fall clean up's is this... 10hp Giant Vac walk behind blower... 5hp walkbehind blower... backpack blower and a Giant Vac 5hp Vacume (6" hose, a bit on the small side, but it works for me)I have sides built onto the pickup and I put a industrial grade tarp on the top and built doors out of plywood for the back on my truck... Last year I used just the back pack and tarps to load the leaves onto the truck... very time consumeing and a lot more work... With the vac and the blowers, it is much easier. In my area there are 2 options... blow the leaves in the woods or blow them into a pile curb side and suck them up in the truck and haul them away... I use the LOAD HANDLER to unload the leaves since I don't have a dump body on the truck, yet.

[grasshopper]

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Lawn vacs do suck. I bought a Billy-Goat about 7 years ago and that thing was a piece of crap. You can't really pick up heavy leaves with it cause it clogs up too fast. We almost took the shredder off of it to see if that would keep it from cloggin up so fast. The commercial WBs with a bagger like Zack said work much better. Get yorself one of those with a grassgobbler w/ leafgobbler attachment or an Accelerator and you'll be fine. BTW I saw those Accelerator cathers this weekend in a shop, and those things are extremely light and big. There made of aluminum, but the damn thing was $425. Hard to justify spending that much on a cather, but hey, if you have a bad back or something, that light one will work better.

[Comrade Stalin]

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[8D] I Love My Billy Goat Vac!!!! [8D]


I don't use it on leaves though... we use the truck loader vac.
I use my Billy Goat for trash pick up, ( it really will pick up glass bottles and tin cans )and best of all- shrub pruning pick up. We rake into lines and the goat picks up ALL the cuttings and reduces the size of the pile as it chops them up.... couldn't live without it!!!
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[Zack.]

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Little Wonder makes a 13hp Honda. Too heavy IMO unless you're only running on hard flat surfaces.

I have the 9hp Honda LW. Dealer tells me it outperforms higher hp Billy Goats & he sells both. I believe the BG has some type of air direction flow control feature that the LW doesn't.