I tested a robot lawnmower that mulches at the same time – 1 thing blew my mind

When it comes to the garden, I must it... I'm lazy. I'm usually the last person you’d expect to see pushing a weeds, but don't worry, this is a judgment-free zone.

I'm sure we all dream of a beautiful backyard where we can galavant barefoot and carefree without the stress of having to put in the effort. So when I heard about the "world’s first" robotic mulching lawnmower, I couldn’t resist putting it to the test. As my back garden is under renovation, I headed to my best friend's house, who was also eager to sort out her unkept garden - the results were surprisingly impressive and a little unexpected.

The smart home technology company Airseekers has developed Tron, a lawn mower designed to mow and mulch in "one seamless process, making lawn care easier, greener, and smarter".

How does it work?

The most impressive aspect of Tron is its ability to cut grass without fear of damage to your plants, garden accessories, or furniture.

The Airseekers website says: "Tron is made with two precision-aligned cutting blades, the dual-layer deck enables faster, cleaner, and more thorough frass trimming. Each delivers double cutting action - dramatically reducing grass fragment size up to 70% compared to standard mowers, ensuring finer mulch for better soil absorption and healthier growth."

Tron also has a high-power function fan which lifts grass blades upright before cutting, an aerodynamic mulching chamber, and a 360° airvision navigation system. 

This lawnmower has obstacle recognition, which means the system detects static and dynamic objects, including trees and flower beds.

It will also recognise when a task can not be completed. With a built-in voice, the machine will declare "task failed" and return to the decking board. 

Setting it up 

If there's one thing about me that needs to be changed, it's that I hate instructions. I get immediately frustrated when I have to build anything. Luckily, Tron came all intact, but some set-up was required that was a bit tricky. 

Airseekers will provide two instruction manuals: one large, simple manual with pictures, a QR code to the important app, and a measuring tape on the bottom of the page (a nice touch for knowing how long your grass is), and then a second in-depth manual with more information.

Before you are able to use Tron, the machine needs to be charged for at least an hour (two hours for full battery life) before you are able to get three hours of run-time. Building the charging deck was easy.

Keep in mind, the plug head is suitable for China and Australia, but this is easily fixed with a world adapter that costs less than £13 on Amazon.

While charging, Tron drains little electricity, which was completely surprising. My house runs on a meter; we started with £15.80 and ended with £14.80 after one hour and a half charge, this was also charging alongside three televisions being on, lights, fridges and game consoles, etc.

Next was setting up the app. Simply , and then you can get going, but as I have an Android, this was trickier for me. The Airseekers app is iOS-friendly but is not on the Google Play Store, meaning you have to it through Apkpure, and if you have never used this before, it's a headache.

However, once up and running, you will be fine. The next problem I faced was not knowing what the parts were. Being very silly and not reading the manual properly, I only took the lawnmower and the charging deck to my friend's house, but did not realise there were important pieces necessary for Tron to work. 

To make Tron move, you need it placed at the charging deck plugged in, and you need to have the ariel plugged in to the charging port also. The ariel comes with a long wire and two poles to place in your garden.

It also has a base to stick into your garden, but I also left this at home, leading to me placing the poles against the garden fence. The charging deck and the ariel also come with equipment, so it can be mounted to your garden.

Finally, the app was up and running. You go through some processes before being able to manually map out your garden, which will allow Tron to then work on its own without your assistance. During this process, you can block out any areas you would not like the machine to go, but once completed, you have the green light for the machine to start.

Results 

As stated before, my friend's garden is quite unkept, and Tron can only work with grass up to 15cm. However, after its first round in the garden, which took under 20 minutes for a small garden, the grass impressively became more even and looked more tamed. 

We did end up using a manual lawnmower for the really unruly areas that were extremely long and thick. The robot avoided colliding with the corded lawnmower, but is strong and durable enough not to be damaged if a crash does occur.

Tron works better when the grass has been trimmed before. I suggest using Tron after your first big cut before summer and using the machine for maintenance throughout the warmer months.

During the second test, we left it alone and grabbed a cup of tea indoors. The robot is much quieter than a normal lawnmower; it sounds just a bit louder than a refrigerator, which means we weren't disturbed at all. The only thing I would fix is a notification setting that tells you if the task fails, as we only knew Tron stopped once we clicked into the app.

The machine did the middle of the lawn before making its way around the edges. Some parts of the garden needed extra time and TLC, which we manually controlled Tron to fix. It felt like playing a game, having to use two buttons on your phone to move the robot.

Tron has different cutting heights, which you can manually control on your phone, but we chose the lowest cutting height. After the job was done, it looked like a professional had mowed the lawn. Once completed, Tron will return home to the charging port. It was so impressive seeing the little thing reverse and back up into its home on its own.

I walked onto the grass barefoot, and there was no mulch on my feet or on my hands. This blew my mind as I couldn't believe that the grass was cut so finely that it disappeared. Tron also doesn't require any emptying and was completely clean by the end of its job.

Ultimately, Tron is the coolest thing I've ever experienced. Not only does it boast a sleek design with headlights that resemble a car and has a built-in voice, but its ability to cut grass without leaving mulch is completely revolutionary. 

Tron retails for roughly £1,544 — discover more about Airseekers' device on their Kickstarter.

Alternatively, you can browse other robotic lawnmowers on Amazon, such as the MAMMOTION YUKA mini 500 Robot Lawn Mower for £849.