If you want to get the most use out of your cordless lawn mower and ensure it lasts as long as possible, you’ll need to commit just a few minutes every week to a few simple recurring maintenance jobs.
In this ultimate cordless lawn mower maintenance guide, we’ve shared all the maintenance tasks that apply to cordless mowers. Keep this list on hand if you need to jog your memory on your lawn mower maintenance duties.
📌 How to Maintain a Cordless Lawn Mower
Here are the 7 basic maintenance tasks that you should commit to for your cordless electric lawn mower:
Clean the mower after each use
Charge the battery
Inspect and sharpen the blades
Check and tighten the nuts, bolts, and screws
Clean the air vents
Inspect the mower for damage or wear
Store the mower and batteries properly
Table of Contents
🚿 Clean The Mower After Each Use
Like any lawn mower, a cordless electric mower should be thoroughly cleaned after every use.
Cleaning your cordless lawnmower will remove grass clippings, dirt, and debris from the cutting deck and mower blade. This prevents mud and grass from clogging the mower deck and impacting its performance, ensuring that your mower can continue to run efficiently, properly circulate airflow, and cut evenly.
Follow these steps to clean a cordless electric mower:
Put on a pair of protective gloves.
Remove the mower’s battery and safety key, then position the mower on its side.
Use a brush to sweep dirt, debris, and grass clippings off the deck, blades, and wheels.
Take a damp cloth and wipe down the mower’s surface to remove lingering dirt, taking care to avoid the motor and any other electric components.
If you find large chunks of caked-on dirt, use a paint scraper or a dedicated lawn mower scraper blade (<Amazon link) to scrape it off before cleaning with a damp cloth.
Flip the mower back to standing.
Note: Don’t use a hose or pressure washer to clean your lawn mower deck. Water will damage your mower’s motor, batteries, and other electric parts, potentially leading to system failure.
🔋 Charge The Battery
Another essential maintenance task for a cordless electric lawn mower is to charge the mower’s battery.
Unlike corded lawn mowers, cordless lawn mowers run independently and don’t need constant access to a power supply. However, what they do need is a charged battery.
Most lawn mower batteries have a run time of around 25-35 minutes. Depending on the size of your lawn, you may need to charge your mower battery once after every use, once every other use, or after every 3 uses.
Your mower might have a battery indicator light. Check this the day before you plan to mow, and if the status is low, charge the battery.
To charge a cordless electric mower battery, follow these steps:
Locate the mower’s charging port. This is usually on the mower body near the batter compartment.
Connect the charger and plug it into a power outlet.
Alternatively, if the battery is removable, remove the battery, place it in the charging port, and plug the charger into a power outlet.
Unplug and disconnect the charger as soon as you notice that the battery is charged.
You should even charge the battery when the mower isn’t in use, especially if your mower uses lithium ion batteries. These batteries wear out faster if they’re allowed to drop to 0% charge. Make sure to charge your lawn mower batteries every 2 months over the winter months while your mower is in storage. Check your user manual for specific advice on this matter.
Read more: Can You Overcharge A Lawn Mower Battery?
🧐 Inspect And Sharpen The Blades
A cordless electric lawn mower uses a horizontally rotating blade, called a rotary blade, that cuts grass with a chopping or smashing action.
Over time, lawn mower blades lose their sharpness due to normal wear. If the blades come into contact with rocks, sticks, and other debris on your lawn, they’ll become blunt at a faster rate.
After you’ve mowed your lawn, take a few minutes to inspect your mower’s blades. They should be about as sharp as a butter knife. If they look or feel dull or blunt, or you can see dents, nicks, and other signs of damage, it’s time to sharpen them again.
Ensure you wear the right safety gear when handling your mower’s blades. We wear these Chainsaw Protective Gloves (< links to Amazon), which are about as reassuringly sturdy as it gets.
Ideally, you should sharpen your lawn mower blades once or twice a year. Or, if you routinely mow rough terrain or subject your mower to heavy use, sharpen the blades as often as four times a year.
To sharpen a cordless mower’s blades with a flat file or a lawn mower blade sharpener, follow these steps:
Put on a pair of protective gloves and goggles and gather your tools. You’ll need a clamp or a vice, a ratchet or socket set/ spanner, rags, and a blade sharpening tool.
Follow the instructions in your user manual to remove the lawn mower’s blade.
Clamp the blade in your table vice. The cutting edge should point up to the ceiling.
Take your flat file or blade sharpener (we use the SHARPAL 103N All-in-1 Blade Sharpener) and sharpen the blade by dragging the sharpener diagonally along the blade edges, from one end to the other.
Continue until the blade is about as sharp as a butter knife.
The above guidelines are general, and your specific mower might require a different method of blade sharpening. Check your user manual for the instructions recommended by the manufacturer.
Read More: How To Sharpen A Lawn Mower Blade
🔧 Check And Tighten The Nuts, Bolts, And Screws
Vibrations and movement during mowing can cause your cordless lawn mower’s nuts, bolts, and screws to gradually loosen over time.
Before every mow, check these fasteners and tighten them if necessary. This will prevent wear, damage, performance issues, and safety hazards caused by loose components.
Use a socket or screwdriver to tighten the fastenings when required. Make sure all screws and bolts are tight, but don’t over-tighten them. Check your user manual for more information.
💨 Clean The Air Vents
All lawn mowers, including cordless electric lawn mowers, have air vents. These help to regulate the mower’s internal temperature and keep its important components cool, which, in turn, enables your mower to continue to operate efficiently without overheating.
Check your mower’s air vents while performing other regular maintenance tasks, either before or after mowing your lawn.
Inspect the air vents for a buildup of grass clippings, dirt, or debris. If you notice that the air vents are looking dirty, take a couple of minutes to clean them.
Here’s how to clean the air vents on a cordless electric lawn mower:
Make sure the mower is switched off and the battery is removed before you get started.
Use compressed air or a soft brush to remove debris from the air vents.
Wipe down the exterior of the air vents with a damp cloth.
Cleaning your mower’s air vents is a simple task that will help to extend its lifespan and maintain an efficient performance for as long as possible.
🔍 Inspect The Mower For Damage Or Wear
Over time, your cordless electric lawn mower may sustain damage due to normal wear and tear.
This is especially likely if you regularly use your mower to cut rough terrain, or if your mower often comes into contact with gravel, rocks, obstacles, and other debris on your lawn.
Before you start mowing, inspect your mower for damage. Look for dents or cracks in the mower deck and handle, and check the wheels for misalignment or wear.
Make sure to remedy any problems you encounter as soon as possible. This might be as easy as tightening a screw, or you might need to consult your user manual and work on a bigger repair job.
Contact the manufacturer if the problem is beyond repair. Don’t use the lawn mower if it’s not safe to do so. Your mower might still be under warranty (the average warranty length for cordless electric mowers is 2-3 years), so you might be eligible for a replacement part (depending on the warranty terms).
Also inspect the mower batteries for damage or wear before every use. Look for cracks, bulges, or other abnormalities on the battery casing. If you have a multimeter, use this to check your battery voltage and compare it to the manufacturer’s specifications.
🏠 Store The Mower And Batteries Properly
Perhaps the easiest cordless lawn mower maintenance job is to simply make sure your mower is stored properly between uses.
Store the mower in a dry location away that doesn’t have access to water, direct sunlight, or extreme heat or cold.
You don’t have to store your cordless electric mower inside. Just make sure it’s housed in a watertight garage, shed, or outhouse.
You can store the mower batteries inside the lawn mower. We recommend bringing the batteries inside in the winter and storing them in a dry, protected location, which will prevent damage over the colder months.
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