I'm a landscaper and we have this as our backup for our Echo trimmer. This thing is pure garbage. First to clear up some of the problems I'm reading with getting it started. If go through the steps and get it started the problem I'm having is it dies if you don't let it warm up. Once started hit the throttle..if it sounds like it's dying let go. Keep doing this until it stops doing that dying off sound when you hit the throttle. Now my review: You have to keep the motor in between your arm and your body. If you don't parts of the engine that protrudes out will bump into your arm and cause irritation after a while. And that's in both orientations. When you bump feed you can't be in any grass. You have to do it in an inconspicuous place where you won't patch the grass. That's because the knob that locks the cartridge in doesn't give much stability. And it's easy to dip the side into the grass when bump feeding it. Speaking of the cartridge. Worse design ever. Why they didn't put a divider in there to keep the two sides separate is beyond me. It makes for refilling it with new line unnecessarily difficult. And it's very suscep to the line getting pinched and having to respool it multiple times. It eats your line fast. I can do two or three houses with my Echo with the same amount of line this thing uses. The handle sucks. The bolt with butterfly nut came loose from the vibration and I lost it. And it's just not comfortable. The bend on the shaft makes things harder for taller people. The only thing I would use this for is whacking down high grass and weeds. It has a high throttle (which also burns a lot of gas) and makes this a better choice than the Echo.

WeedWhipMaster

Detroit Michigan

Have to take it to a mechanic every season to start and clean. Spent more money on maintenance than on the original product.

Grendel1950

Bartlesville, OK

I was looking for an inexpensive straight shaft trimmer for hard to reach places in my yard, I thought the Bolens fit that need. I ended up with a pretty much worthless item. From day one it was horribly difficult to start, after a few months it finally ended up that only an average of one out of five times I tried to use it was I able to get it started. I have small chainsaws that are easy to pull the recoil start, this thing was really hard to pull and it would wear you out. I finally gave up and bought another trimmer, it is easy to pull and starts easily every time. I was very pleased with the way it cut, if it would start right I would have been happy with it, as it turned out I am very disappointed, I wasted my money.

JohnO18

Central Oklahoma

We needed a gas trimmer to string trim two yards at approximately an acre or so each.  We have had commercial grade trimmers before all the way to the super-cheap, break-in-one-year models.  We decided on the Bolens by MTD BL 100 2-cycle gas trimmer and it has been a very wise purchase and a good investment.  I love this trimmer because it's easy for me- as a woman- to start.  No sexism intended, but I have tried to start gas trimmers that require the Incredible Hulk to pull the start rope and they are very hard to get started.  This trimmer starts well almost every time and doesn't require a tremendous amount of arm strength.  It is easy to use for a non-mechanically-inclined person and the controls are very simple.  It usually starts for me on the third or fourth pull of the rope.  Occassionally it needs to be choked again or restarted after a bad start  but after I get it started it runs really well, is easy to feed the line, and does a great job.  I'm really glad we bought this trimmer.

ncbunnie

Yadkinville, NC