G'day Max This brings back memories of very unusual mowers. The Everyman reels are best known; the Hercules rotary gets little mention.
Not too many makers were doing larger domestic rotaries in the late 1950s / early 1960s. The Alex Grahame 21" Automower springs to mind; then the 20" A-V Hercules.
The surprise for me was your finding the patent for the Adaptamatic.! I will see if I can get that into the History Record. Fantastic! - and we have inventor names - Cyril Clifford Fogg and Harold Patrick Sinclair. [Cyril and Harold are not popular names today ]
Many thanks - again - for adding to the record on AUS lawnmowers.
I attach a significant ad on the Hercules' release. Note the 'Teflex cantilever cutter bar' on the Hercules ... meaning that bar blade holder (in your images) appears original!
Here is a pic of my AV Hercules, the colour of the base is a deep plumb and the green Villiers shroud is an interesting contrast. The mower is built like a truck, very heavy duty.
Can you even partly imagine a manufacturer building a base with that much alloy in it these days, you would be locked up if you proposed something like that now
Can you even partly imagine a manufacturer building a base with that much alloy in it these days, you would be locked up if you proposed something like that now
G'day Max, Paul and Norm Hi Norm - I understand why this was named 'Hercules'
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The mower is built like a truck, very heavy duty.
Paul, that's funny ... and I will add that the Hercules appears to have had a front bumper...
The only image I have seen of this comes from the Vintage Mowers website. [see below] My best guess the bumper was purely aesthetic - continuing the automotive theme of fenders and pumpers. Any ideas?
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Cyril and Harold had a lot of patents in the toilet industry (flushing-cistern for lavatories) and I saw one other mower patent.
Max, I've got to digest the info you have supplied. Toilet jokes aside, the wheel scrapers is certainly new information for the record. A-V do appear to have been the first to use wheel scrapers on AUS mowers!
Good to see another Hercules mower survived the test of time.My mower could do with a re-paint, someone has used a paint brush and the colours are a poor match for the original paint scheme.
The Victa Super 24 I think of like a Truck in the mowing world, lots of alloy in that base, not that this Hercules base is lacking alloy.
The Hercules mower weighs 25kg and 25kg is what a Power Torque Victa with a steel base from the late 1980's weighs also the early Victa 18 with the alloy base weighs 23kg.
The engine number on this Hercules mower starts 294X and I think the original engine should be 305X,(I think 294X and 297X are original Pace and Villager numbers because these numbers are on the mowers I have)
Hi Max,one big difference with the 24 and the amount of alloy in it, it is competing in a market of its own as a slasher and is priced accordingly at around $1800 at the moment, the Hercules if was being built in todays market would be up against the many 20 inch mowers available out there now and most have a pressed body except for the Hondas
Hi Norm and all, I'm not disagreeing about heavy duty mowers the base on the Hercules is 4mmm to 5mm thick, just pointing out they don't always weigh a lot more.
I have a Husqvarna mower and the base is 4.3mm thick .
I agree most of the mowers are steel or thin cast alloy bases these days.
Husqvarna advertise certain new models as having a heavy duty base. The old price it says is $1,520. you do get self drive though and a 20.8 inch base. Not sure how thick the casting is on the new Husqvarna.
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