LUBA 2 AWD 3000HX Robot Lawn Mower with 4G, Reception 0.75 Acre, Max. 0.89 Acre, All-Wheel-Drive for 80% Slope, UltraSense AI Vision & RTK Automatic Edge Mapping, 2.2"-4.0" Cutting Height

Each of us in the household has had an area of grass they were responsible for mowing... because our property is a challenge. I've been looking at robomowers off and on for a few years, thinking even if I could just get something to do my small easy patch of fenced-in dog yard, it would make MY life easier. But then Luba 2 came along with no required perimeter wires and advertised being able to handle steep slopes with its AWD and Omni wheels. I proposed the idea to the roommates and they didn't seem convinced. But I said, "Well, I'm getting one, and we'll see how it does. At the worst, I can get my part done, and maybe a bulk of some of the other parts so it's less work for everybody."Once it arrived, it of course took unpackaging, setup, figuring out the app, and the usual. As others have stated, figuring out how to set up boundaries and not cut too close to the edges was the first challenge, but after that, you start figuring it out without a problem. So, the learning curve is an unavoidable part of the process, but I didn't think it was overly difficult. In fact, since the neighbor was interested in learning about it, I just let his kid drive it around like an RC car while we talked. So, it's easy enough to figure out.Once we got it set up, Luba2 has been able to tackle the entire property, and I can monitor from my phone or ipad set up on my desk next to my computer while I work all day. (I do work from home though, so if there's a problem, I can go check on it). In general though, despite all the challenges, it rarely gets into problems it can't work its way out of. Vining brambles (wild raspberries) can sometimes be a problem with the omniwheels, but it seems it's not getting caught in the vines so much as that area is steep and loose anyway, and the vines don't do it any favors, so it is doing its best to get out, but the vines hold it fast, it reads that its tires are spinning and it's not changing position, so pauses and tells you to check on it. But sometimes just manually controlling from a 2nd floor window gets it loose and you can hit continue. The point is, it really doesn't have any issues if you deal with the brambles or teach it to go around and not through them... (so it's user laziness/error in this case, not the Luba's fault. Luba makes a great effort!)Luba's not great in the dark, even though some people say you can set it to work at night. I suspect this is because the RTK station turns off at 6pm. [Edit: it just turns the light off the RTK and still works. The issue at night is the usual 'gets stuck in the edges' problems it has during the day... so if you tell it to simply mow the middle part without the perimeter, it can get the bulk of the open area done overnight without and issue]. As long as it's got view of the satellites, it can handle big open spaces in the dark. It's super quiet (you never hear it even when it's right outside your window working), and you can have a normal-volume conversation right in front of where it's working (and get drowned out by the traditional mower down the street, but not Luba). It sounds like a really quiet strimmer/weed-whacker, but even with that, it doesn't have all the engine noise.It also doubles as property surveillance while it's working. One day, I saw someone walking around our property and was wondering who it was—apparently a tree guy looking for a chainsaw he thought he left behind the day before. But his presence didn't even set the dog off. But watching Luba work at my desk, I saw him.Super-fine clippings mulch the soil without blocking light to the roots, and our poor-quality grass has improved 10-fold in just the month we've had it.I can't even describe how much Luba has improved our lawn, inspired us to do more than 'keep up' with the landscaping (we're actually planning/doing things now that we know the lawn is taken care of), and we have time and flexibility to do things we didn't before! We've been here for 17 years now, and we're getting older, and the lawncare has always been a challenge."Professionals" would just come in, scalp the lawn with no regards for its health, collect a paycheck and leave. We've tried, but due to time, heat, or other constraints, have been able to do little but keep after it in a rudimentary sense. But now... with Luba, we have options and hope where we didn't before.Luba will help with house resale when the time comes, surely, as we got the house cheap when nobody would look twice at the daunting task it would be to mow the steep lawns. But Luba is proving it's not only doable but automatable and convenient. The neighbors have always been 'jealous' of the open space we have to work with, but I'm not sure they appreciate the difficulty of maintaining it. So showing off our beautiful "highland sheep hill" while making it easy will surely help our resale value in the long run.Watching Luba work from my desktop is oddly relaxing, and it makes the whole experience... 'fun'? I'm actually inspired to wake up early to open the gate and check how damp the grass is so I can send Luba out working.The rain sensor does work, and the time it takes to evaporate/dry is also a gauge for how wet your grass is. The neighbor's sprinklers at the edge of the property have set it off though, so if you have sprinklers, time your mowing accordingly. But in actual rainfall, the sensors work great. YouTubers have done a lot of cutting of wet grass, but I haven't. I do periodically check the cutting blades to make sure everything's loose and moving freely, and it surprisingly doesn't get anything gummed or jammed up if you mow dry. Check them after 'bushwhacking' through really high weeds/grass though, as this obviously is not a normal use-case, and you can get some jammed and it'll keep the blades spinning. But with normal usage under dry conditions, there's really no need to check the undercarriage (though I do occasionally out of curiosity).All the advanced positioning stuff works great and seemingly improves the more it does the yard, so maybe there's some AI in there. I have noticed when weeds are particularly large and Luba comes up to them, it slows down, must do some sort of analysis as to what it is, and then decides it's a weed and drives over it. Spots I've forgotten to 'no-go-zone' like the mailbox post, well-head, or leech-field vent, it bumps into them and goes around. It will damage saplings, but the one I'm thinking of is wild and we just haven't gotten around to cutting it down yet, so we don't care... but if you have fragile bark, you may want to train Luba to go around trees, even if it'll bump into them and go around.The other day the recycle truck dumped the empty bin on its side in the lawn, and Luba just mowed around it. (So, it deals with unexpected stuff too).Problems? It doesn't do wire fencing well. It doesn't 'see' it, and the bumper can get caught up in it. There's also a bale of the stuff that it will push around either not seeing it as a solid object or because it rolls it's not triggering the bumper. In any case, if you have wire fencing, you'll need to give it some space so it doesn't get caught up in it. Other than that... I can't think of a single challenge it hasn't overcome.Re: PhotosIt's always hard to capture how ridiculous this hill in the backyard is in photos. But trust me, it's pretty dang steep. (Use the house and trees to see the level and tilt head accordingly). It's impossible to mow with a ride-on because it's a serious roll-risk, and the walk-behind slips the entire time and you're walking sideways. It's a nightmare for anything with a high center of gravity, and I'm not even sure a low-slung zero-turn would be safe on it. But Luba cuts through it like a champion sheep, and is not threatened by the coyotes in the surrounding woods. (Or the ticks or mosquitoes or deer-flies or...)Recommendation: YES!

UPDATE: I've now owned the mower for 11 months. About 3 months into operation it started having issues docking to recharge. It would attempt/fail then retry two more times before parking a foot or two in front of the charging station. I would have to go out, sometimes in the middle of the night, to fight with it and place it just right on the charger until the light would begin to flash.I contacted support and at the end of last year's mowing season and they were initially very responsive and sent me a new power brick. I put the mower away for the winter and brought it back out in March of this year to work again. When I noticed that the problem remained, I contacted support again, explaining that the issue was not fixed. They tried a firmware update, made me upload logs twice (45 minute upload each time that you have to babysit), then, after dozens of emails, they finally agreed to replace my base station. I confirmed my shipping information on April 22 and waited. It's now almost a month later and I haven't received any shipping information or parts. I've emailed twice with no response. I called their "hotline" waited on hold for 5 minutes after which I was only given the option to leave a voicemail.At this point I'm fed up and I'm looking into what my credit card will do for a charge back. When it works it's great, but I'm tired of having to go out in the yard and fiddle with it for 10 minutes to get it to charge. It will randomly fail mid-mow when it can't charge. It's just unreliable. I think Mammotion may have grown too quickly to support their products properly. If you're reading this I would strongly recommend you consider another brand, especially one of the competitors that offer 3 year warranties.ORIGINAL REVIEW: We recently moved to a house with a 1+ acre yard. Coming from the desert I had no lawn equipment. Trying to save a bit of money I initially bought a used riding mower. That things was loud, slow, uncomfortable, and stunk up our garage. I then started looking at electric riding mowers when I came across the Luba 2. I figured it was worth a shot, since it was a bit over half as much as the electric rider we were thinking about. A month later and we're very happy with our purchase.Setup was very easy. There are a couple of components to either snap or screw together. I had planned to mount the RTK antenna on my roof, using the existing DirecTV pole, but the packaging did not include a mount to allow that. I decided to try placing it on the side of my house and it worked great the first time. It took maybe an hour to trace my four areas to mow and build the channels for the robot to navigate.We've had the Luba for about a month and it's been working steadily in that time. It took a few attempts to figure out what works best for my mixed grass lawn, but now it's largely fire and forget. It has some problems with several of my crab grass clumps, as the long shoots tend to get bent instead of cut, but this would be a problem for any robot mower and I'm working on solving the crab grass. The unit seems very durable and my only concerns are eventual battery replacement (years away I'm sure) and theft. The robot goes to sleep fairly quickly when not on its charging station, so if it's stuck outside my gate I have to go find it.Overall we're very happy, but a few things could make it much better. First, open the API or provide a native Home Assistant integration. Second, allow a remote wake or at least a periodic ping feature to locate the device if not on the charger. Finally, provide some kind of battery replacement program or battery warranty so that it doesn't turn into a giant paperweight in a few years.