ryobi expand-it

[Stephen]

Hello,

Does anyone have anything good or bad to say about the Ryobi expand-it
range?

I was thinking about buying one some time ago but I never got around
to it! I thought I had seen it as a kit that included various
attachments but now that I look into it again, it seems all the
attachments are sold separately and are all £70 plus, so perhaps it's
as good a deal as I thought it was. Is it better to buy dedicated
strimmers, hedge cutters, and leaf blowers rather than a jack of all
trades?

Have I imagined it coming with the accessories or have the prices
jumped in the last couple of years?

I would mainly use it as a strimmer. Some of the reviews on Amazon
suggest that the strimmer attachment melts and breaks too easily. Is
this a common failure?

Thanks,
Stephen.

[Tim Watts]

Had one a long time ago - stripped the gears in one of the attachements
(pole trimmer IIRC) because they were nasty and plastic.

Spares cost nearly as much as a new attachment.

So I refuse to touch them again.

[John Rumm]

I had a dabble... first with a two stroke power head, a strimmer head, a
chainsaw pruner, and a hedge trimmer attachment (although that was made
by husqvarna). The power head was ok for a while before it ingested part
of its own carb. The results were not pretty[1]

I picked up a 4 stroke power head since it was very cheap in a local
cash and carry (about £70 IIRC). That was pretty crap really. Less
power, and it did not run consistently at all angles. Eventually the
timing drifted so that it would not run reliably or even rev properly.
Tuning did not help, since it seems that the main problem was plastic
components in the timing that wear.

So did some research on what brands might work with the accessories I
had, and went for a Stihl "Kombi" power head[2]. The difference was
dramatic. It starts, runs, revs, does not care about the angle its held
at, has loads of power and uses less fuel. The interface with the ryobi
tools is not perfect - sometimes you need to fiddle and fettle to get
them working well.

Sometime later the strimmer head flew apart in mid use. A bit of it flew
through the open back door and just missed the top of my sons head! So I
replaced that with a stihl line trimmer head (and yes that's better and
much lighter as well).

So YMMV, but I won't be buying any more!

[1] http://internode.co.uk/ryobi/

The one I got in the end:

[2]
https://www.frjonesandson.co.uk/products/stihl-km-94rc-e-engine-unit-24-1cc/

(would have been cheaper and better to buy it in the first place!)

--
Cheers,

John.

/=================================================================\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\=================================================================/

[Chris Green]

In uk.d-i-y Stephen <re...@to.newsgroup.invalid> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Does anyone have anything good or bad to say about the Ryobi expand-it
> range?
>
> I was thinking about buying one some time ago but I never got around
> to it! I thought I had seen it as a kit that included various
> attachments but now that I look into it again, it seems all the
> attachments are sold separately and are all £70 plus, so perhaps it's
> as good a deal as I thought it was. Is it better to buy dedicated
> strimmers, hedge cutters, and leaf blowers rather than a jack of all
> trades?
>

I've had Ryobi Expand-It stuff for ten years or more. We have a 9
acre smallolding. I have strimmer, brush cutter, tiller, hedge
trimmer and pruning attachemnts. The most used are strimmer, tiller
and pruning. They're not top-notch professional but they're pretty
sound in general. I've worn out quite a few strimmer heads but they
do get really heavy use here. The pruning attachmenet is *very*
useful and the tiller is a nice step down from the big Howard
Ratavator we have.

For power I have both eletric and petrol 'heads'. The electric ones
haven't been all that reliable, the 2-stroke petrol was OK, the
4-stroke petrol I now use almost excusively is good.

--
Chris Green
·

[ne...@loampitsfarm.co.uk]

On Wed, 2 May 2018 01:12:09 +0100, John Rumm
<see.my.s...@nowhere.null> wrote:

>On 01/05/2018 19:33, Stephen wrote:
>> Hello,
>>
>> Does anyone have anything good or bad to say about the Ryobi expand-it
>> range?

Not much good IMO
<snip>

>I picked up a 4 stroke power head since it was very cheap in a local
>cash and carry (about £70 IIRC). That was pretty crap really. Less
>power, and it did not run consistently at all angles. Eventually the
>timing drifted so that it would not run reliably or even rev properly.
>Tuning did not help, since it seems that the main problem was plastic
>components in the timing that wear.

...and on mine the lobe of the plastic cam actually melted. Should
have been a simple fix but parts are not listed.

I only bought it as a lending out tool so as not to have to loan my
working kit. Still have the chainsaw head, hedge cutter head, strimmer
head and extension should anyone want to collect them.

I was interested in it mostly to see how it worked as a small 4 stroke
and it was good enough but not as good as a 2 stroke. Plus the obvious
benefit of not breasting in 2t exhaust (which must be worse then
diesel exhaust surely??),

Interestingly it differed from the Stihl 4mix, we used these in the
pole saws, which are similarly valve operated 4 strokes but they
imbibe a petroil mix which has a parallel path for the crankcase, via
the rocker box and push rod tunnel. This means the big, small end and
piston are lubricated from the oil mist in the crankcase but also as
the piston descends and the inlet valve opens some air:fuel mixture is
forced back and down the intake valve.


AJH

[Andy Burns]

ne...@loampitsfarm.co.uk wrote:

> I only bought it as a lending out tool so as not to have to loan my
> working kit.

I sometimes keep old kit for my own rough jobs or for lending, rather
than risk my good stuff, but actually buying kit, so you don't have to
lend out your good stuff ... wow.

[Muddymike]

On 01/05/2018 19:33, Stephen wrote:

I have the Lidl equivalent, now into its third season. Originally cost
about £130 complete with strimmer, hedge cutter, pole chain saw,
extension pole and 3 years warranty. I had to replace the strimmer head
last year and Lidl replaced the on-off switch early on. Otherwise its
been no bother, starts easier than any other 2 stoke I have owned, but
is a bit heavy.

Mike

[newshound]

I have the strimmer and the tiller too. They don't get heavy use but I'd
put them in the "reasonable value" category.

[Stephen]

On Tue, 1 May 2018 21:35:36 +0100, Tim Watts <tw_u...@dionic.net>
wrote:

>Had one a long time ago - stripped the gears in one of the attachements
>(pole trimmer IIRC) because they were nasty and plastic.

That's a shame, I was looking forward to buying a new toy :(

Does anyone make one with metal gears or is it a case of building down
to a price/built-in obsolescence?

[Tim Watts]

Dunno - but it's the same deal with kitchen mixers. Takes some research
to find one that isn't full of nylon gears and might actually "last a
lifetime" as the old Kitchen Chefs used to be advertised in the 70s.

People bitch and moan about the environment and ladfill but still go and
buy (and allow to be made) junk products that last a couple of years and
are then economic to repair.

That stripped gear in mine - the damn gear costs a few pounds at most
but when I made enquiries, the replacement would have cost nearly as
much as the whole attachment.

[Chris Green]

In uk.d-i-y Stephen <re...@to.newsgroup.invalid> wrote:

My 4-stroke Ryobi Expand-it head is now 5 years old and still going
strong. It gets fairly heavy use here on our 9 acres powering the
strimmer, pruning and tilling attachments.

The 4-stroke head does suffer from 'mixture drift', you need the
special 'Pacman' tool to adjust the mixture. It always seems to drift
towards a weaker mixture which makes it feel as if there's something
seriously wrong but all it needs is a little tweak of the mixture
screw. Mine seems to have settled down now and hasn't needed
twiddling for quite a while.

The other issue is that the timing belt sometimes falls off on these
4-strokes. I don't think it's due to wear or anything, just a rather
marginal design. I've added a little bit of plastic which stops it
drifting off and haven't touched it for years.

--
Chris Green
·