SILENO City 5400 sq ft

We bought this for my dad. He is a retired aerospace engineer but even he had trouble assessing how to lay the guidewire in his yard. He emailed Gardena and, after some time, they referred him to a specific person who never contacted him back. We returned it. I did not realize there is no phone listed for Gardena so if you need advice, plan to wait.

I owned a robotic lawnmower ("Robomower 500") 15+ years ago and I did the installation myself; it was a fairly easy process. More recently, I owned a competitor to this mower, and it was professionally installed. Installation of this mower is identical to both, so the self-installation is a viable option for most people. I used the existing wires that were installed for my last mower since they were identical wires, except for color, and the two systems had the same general design of a boundary wire and a guide wire.I am breaking this review into three sections: Installation, Features, and Operation.INSTALLATION:It is important before doing any installation that you call the 811 (Call-Before-You-Dig) number for your area, to ensure that all underground utility lines are identified and marked before the installation. You should do this even if you are self-installing. Other items to do include filling any holes in the lawn, removing sticks, toys, and other debris that might interfere with the mower. You also want to preplan the installation so that you know exactly where the boundary and guide wires will be installed.Installation consists of determining a location for the mower’s charge station, installing the perimeter boundary wire and the center guide wire, wiring them to the mower’s charge station, and running power to the charge station. Installation of the guide wires can be done yourself, or you can hire an outside company to do the installation. Since many other robot mower manufacturers use the same type of wiring system, there are generally installers out there that can do this for you.If you do the installation yourself, you can either lay the wiring on top of the grass or rent a cable installing machine from your local big box store. I would rent the machine so that the wire is buried, which is what was done with my current installation. Installation on top of the grass consists of laying out the wire and stapling it down with the included staples. It is important to get the wire as close to the ground as possible to avoid the mower cutting it or it being otherwise damaged. The lawn should be mowed as short as possible in the areas where the wire will be laid to get it as close as possible to the ground. Eventually the grass will grow around the wire, and it will disappear. There is an included template that provides the measurements of how far from the lawn’s edge, fences, gardens, house, etc., that the boundary wire should be installed. Since the mower runs past the boundary wire a bit before stopping, it is not to be installed closer than recommended to these objects. Do not worry about trees, swings, utility boxes, etc. in the yard – the mower will bump into them, stop, then change directions.Once the wires are installed, and the charge station is installed and wired for power, the mower is placed into the charge station to charge. While charging, you can program the basic settings necessary for the mower to be operational, such as language, country, date, time, and PIN code. Afterward, and once fully charged, the system goes through a calibration process to establish the corridor width then runs along the guide wire to where it connects to the boundary wire. If the calibration is successful, the mower starts to mow.FEATURES:One of the features of this mower is the ability to set a daily schedule of when the mower will start and end its mowing. The manual has a reference for determining how long the mower should operate each day based on the size of the mowed area. Since my mowed area is about 4000 square feet, I set the schedule to run 10 hours each day. My mower runs from 3am to 1:00pm. I like to avoid the heat of the afternoon, so it runs mostly overnight and in the morning. I will change to a later time as we move into Fall.Operational settings can be set from either the mower’s menu or from the Gardena app. I did not download the app because it only works via Bluetooth, so its range is limited. I would just as soon do the programming on the mower. Operational settings such as adjusting the schedule, enabling SensorControl, selecting a security level, setting the lawn coverage and corridor cut functions, setting how far it drives past the boundary wire, etc. can all be set. I believe that the PIN can only be set from the mower.SensorControl allows the mower to operate based on its determination of how fast the grass is growing. If you have the schedule set for 8 hours, but it determines that it does not need to run for more than 6 hours to properly cut the grass, it will stop at 6 hours. It will never run for more than your set time, so if more than 8 hours are needed, it will still stop at 8 hours. With SensorControl on, you should increase the scheduled hours so that it can run longer if needed.The only security with this mower is the PIN. If it is stolen, it cannot be operated unless the PIN is known. Unfortunately, this does not help you get it back. I am not sure, but if you report it stolen to Gardena, it might be recovered if it is brought to a dealer for a PIN recovery.The lawn coverage feature allows you to allocate a percentage of the cutting time to certain areas of your yard. This might be helpful if you want the front yard mowed more than the back yard. The corridor cut feature is used for narrow passage mowing.The mowing height ranges from 0.8”- 2.0”. If you have grass that you like to keep taller than 2”, then this mower is not for you. In my case, the 2” setting is perfect.OPERATION:Since being installed, the mower has been mowing almost daily for a week. While it is capable of running during periods of rain, I decided to not have it mow during mostly rainy days. So far there have been no tracks left in my lawn. Since I have experience with robot mowers, I know what to expect, and this mower is performing as I would expect. My lawn looks consistently cut to the exact same length throughout the entire property. There are areas of grass along my sidewalk, privacy fence, and the house which are not cut because a system such as this is not designed to get that close to these obstacles in order to avoid damage. I just need to weed whack in these areas occasionally. The mower is exceptionally quiet. I do not hear it running except when I am close by, and even then, it is not really noticeable.

I picked this item due to the promoted ability to handle a 30 degree slope. My yard is uneven. The robot has been great to identify holes in the yard by getting frequently stuck. By day two, i had identified and filled them all. The yard is already starting to look more uniform. The mower has a fairly quick but rather steep learning curve. My best recommendation is to have a plan for burying the guide wire. Stakes alone are insufficient or the mower will cut the line. With no guide wire sensing, mowing stops until reconnected. The operation is very quiet. You hear it cutting grass, but its nowhere near as loud as an electric string trimmer. The bluetooth app will automatically sync the mower's time. The app allows for monitoring charging, configuration & easier scheduling than the mower's onboard interface. I see no problem with scheduling runs in the middle of the night. Its that quiet. The lawn used to take me at least an hour of constant mowing. Now the job is 10 minutes of edge trimming. Despite it taking Amazon three tries to send me a working model & despite that working model only lasting 3 weeks, I can still recommend this product. The problems are easily identifiable and repairable. The two most common problems are firmware upgrade and battery death. The firmware upgrade requires a new Windows or Mac machine, a torx bit and a USB cable. It is not always necessary to upgrade the firmware but be prepared for some rare circumstance. The battery death problem is more common & requires the torx bit as well. When the battery dies, the bluetooth application will report charge at 100%, but upon disconnection from the docking station, the mower will immediately power down. The battery module is an arrangement of five 18650 cells and a built-in charge controller.Although Gardena is not selling a replacement battery pack on their website, there is one available on Amazon. It is not a Husqvarna branded battery pack, but uses the same part number, configuration and dimensions.https://www.amazon.com/Cameron-Sino-Husqvarna-Automower-Modell/dp/B07JJPNXXYIf you are feeling desperate or adventurous, rebuilding the battery module with new 18650 cells requires a spot-welding iron and voltmeter. I would recommend taking a photo of the wiring layout prior to removing the existng wiring.The ease of maintenance & widely available power supply significantly extends the longevity of this product. Due to this and despite the manufacturer failures, I can still recommend this product 4 stars.

I have had my eye on robot mowers for decades after seeing one operate as a young adult. Now I finally bought one and am a bit disappointed. The mower initially did not charge so after 2 months of trying to get help from the MFG, I turned to Amazon for help and was assisted right away. Now, 4 months after purchase and full replacement, the promise of help came from the MFG-- too little too late.Set up is a big deal... mapping out the yard and placing the guide wires. OK. Once done, then you need to make sure there are no pitfalls in the yard upon which the mower might stall or hang up. The mower needs to have a short lawn which is not thick in which to properly function. When docking, it sometimes does not charge and sometimes has trouble finding the docking station. So be aware, it is not as easy as it would seem. I am somewhat happy but also somewhat frustrated.

I’ve tried creating a schedule on my phone connected to device and the device itself and it refuses to work. Not sure why.

after i installed evrything i discover that the mower was not able to charge ! i tried to speak with gardena online... after 15 days, there is still no answer