STIGA Collector 140e Kit Review

Introduction

European lawncare experts STIGA produce a dizzying array of cordless lawn mowers, ride on lawn tractors, and robots too. One of their entry level offerings, the Collector 140e kit boasts excellent value mowing in a handsome package that comes with a pair of batteries.

Design and Features

• Comfortable and well balanced
• Three working heights
• No charge level indicator

The standout design feature of this compact, lightweight cordless mower is its obvious nod to car design. Where some cordless lawnmowers are boxy and boring, STIGA has called on its Italian credentials to design something a bit more desirable.

The Collector 140e kit is definitely easy on the eye, with plenty of curves and aerodynamic lines as well as a height adjustment lever straight out of a sports car. Providing a 38cm cut width, it’s well-designed for small to medium-sized gardens.

The handsome lever changes the cut height from 25 mm to 75 mm in six useful steps. The sprung cutting deck takes no effort to change either. It means you can go from an almost bowling-green low to a longer meadow-like lawn easily.

The handlebar is wrapped in foam which makes it pleasingly comfortable to use. And the wide safety lever makes this cordless lawn mower useful for right- and left-handed gardeners too. The handle gives you three working heights to choose from, and folds in half for easy storage.

Power comes from a pair of 20V 4.0Ah batteries, connected in series, producing an impressive 40V. Combined with a brushless motor, this means the 140e can cut through just about anything without getting bogged down.

The batteries live side by side in a compartment on the mower chassis. It’s good to see a safety key included keep the mower safe when not in use. The only thing missing is a charge level indicator on the outside of the compartment.

Recharging the batteries is simple too, as it comes with a handy dual charger. The only problem with a dual charger is that it splits the power between both batteries, slowing down charging times.

On the back of the mower is a 40 litre grass collection box. It’s plastic on top with a large handle made from fabric underneath. It folds down nicely for storage; however, it lacks a “full” indicator that I find useful on other cordless lawnmowers.

Performance

• Needs a little bit of assembly
• Very powerful
• Comfortble to use

Before taking the collector 140e kit out for its first mow, I needed to assemble the handle section. Fortunately, it took five minutes to attach both handle sections to the chassis and secure them with big yellow cam levers.

When compared with some budget cordless lawn mowers, the quality of the fittings is excellent and feel like they’re built to last. A mark of a good mower, in my opinion, is all in the balance. The Collector 140e is easy to adjust to a comfortable working height and feels very well balanced.

The short overall length makes it easy to push around and even over little steps, even if the 140e isn’t quite as dinky as the Gtech SLM50. And even though the 38cm cut width isn’t ideal for huge lawns, it’s easy to manoeuvre around shrubs and get into tight corners.

Weighing just over 11 kg with the batteries in place, this mower is easy to carry around the garden. Picking it up to carry over a low garden wall was easy thanks to the handle on the top. The plastic wheels aren’t huge and scratch up easily, but work fine on a reasonably flat lawn.

Something that impressed me about this compact cordless lawnmower is the power. The dual batteries produce 40V of power that can chop through long, damp grass without missing a beat. And the cut quality is great: the lawn mower doesn’t leave tufts, and it’s easy to mow in straight lines.

The 4.0Ah batteries can power this mower for up to 25 minutes. I managed about 20 minutes of mowing in a test garden, but I pushed through quite a lot of long grass along the way. The 140e is rated to cut up to 450m², but that would only work for a maintenance cut if done once a week.

The only annoying thing about this mower is the lack of a mulching plug. I personally prefer cutting my lawn often during the growing season with the plug installed. It results in a healthier lawn, and I don’t need to dispose of grass cuttings.

The 40litre collection box is fine for a small garden. I needed to empty it twice in my roughly 250 m² test garden, which is fine, but it would be simpler with a full-level indicator. Without one, I needed to stop a few times to check the grass collection box.

When it was time to recharge, the dual charger splits the power coming in by half. It results in a slow recharge time of 140 minutes, so make sure you don’t have a lawn bigger than this mower can cope with.

Should you buy it?

FAQs