A string trimmer, often known by brand names like Weed Eater, is a handheld power tool designed for precision lawn maintenance. Instead of a metal blade, it uses a rapidly spinning nylon line to slice through grass and weeds. The primary purpose of a string trimmer is detail work, such as edging along sidewalks and driveways, and trimming foliage in tight spaces a traditional lawnmower cannot reach. This tool excels at cleaning up around trees, fences, and garden beds to give a lawn a finished appearance. The core question remains: can this tool be used to cut an entire lawn effectively?
When Using a Trimmer is Practical
It is physically possible to use a string trimmer as a primary mowing tool, but this application is severely limited and generally not recommended for large areas. The most practical scenario is for extremely small, urban yards—sometimes referred to as postage-stamp lawns—where the total area is less than a few hundred square feet. In this limited context, the effort of pulling out a full-sized mower may outweigh the time spent using the trimmer.
A trimmer becomes a reasonable substitute when a conventional lawnmower cannot safely access the area. This includes heavily terraced gardens, steep embankments, or sections of lawn with numerous obstacles, where the trimmer’s lightweight design and maneuverability offer a distinct advantage. It can also serve as a temporary solution if the main lawnmower is broken or undergoing maintenance. For any significant acreage, however, the inefficiency of this approach quickly makes it impractical.
Techniques for Achieving an Even Cut
To use a string trimmer to cut a broad area, attention to technique is necessary to approximate the even finish of a mower. First, ensure you are wearing the proper safety gear, including eye protection, long pants, and closed-toe shoes, as the trimmer will fling debris more widely than a mower. For a cleaner cut, the length of the exposed monofilament line should be managed; while longer line increases the cutting swath, it also causes more string deflection, which results in a less clean cut.
The goal is to maintain a consistent cutting height across the entire lawn area. A good method is to hold the trimmer head parallel to the ground and use a fixed object, like a piece of wood or a brick placed on the lawn, as a temporary height guide to establish your desired turf length. The actual cutting motion involves a sweeping, side-to-side arc, moving the trimmer head across the grass with a smooth, rhythmic motion.
You should move forward slowly and deliberately, overlapping each previous pass slightly to ensure no strips of uncut grass are left behind. It is often more effective to trim tall grass in stages, working from the top down, which prevents the grass stems from wrapping around the trimmer head and causing it to stall. To avoid scalping the turf, which damages the grass and encourages weed growth, avoid holding the head too close to the soil.
Inefficiencies and Tool Limitations
The fundamental design of a string trimmer makes it ill-suited for large-scale mowing, primarily due to the severe time penalty and physical strain involved. The narrow cutting width means the user must make significantly more passes to cover the same area compared to a typical lawnmower. This increased effort leads to rapid user fatigue, making it difficult to maintain the consistent height needed for a uniform appearance over an extended period.
Furthermore, the quality of the cut itself is compromised when using a trimmer for an entire lawn. Unlike the sharp shearing action of a mower’s blade, the rapidly spinning monofilament line tends to tear or fray the tips of the grass blades. This ragged cut leaves a jagged wound on the grass plant, which requires more energy for the plant to heal and can lead to browning or a stressed, unhealthy-looking lawn.
Repeatedly using the trimmer for large areas puts excessive wear on the equipment, potentially leading to motor overheating and high consumption of monofilament line. A trimmer also disperses grass clippings across the lawn, making effective mulching or bagging impossible and necessitating a separate cleanup process. The overall result is a labor-intensive process that yields a poorer quality cut and strains both the operator and the tool.