# Bought a New Lawn Mower -- Cub Cadet SC100H -- Long Term Review



## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

I'm hoping I don't end up regretting this, but I actually bought a new rotary lawn mower. I'm still a little surprised. I'm also still expecting it to be a disappointment in the long run, but I guess we'll find out.

I've always been a fan of cheap basic rotary mowers. As a teenager, I mowed lawns on my own as a summer job. I had a basic mower -- no fancy features to break. No self-propelled drive. No single-point height adjustment. No clutch for the blade. No electric start. Just a pull cord and a throttle adjustment. Simple. I loved mowing lawns and that simple mower did everything I needed, reliably.

Then came college in metro Boston, followed by apartment living for a few years. No lawn mowing required.

When it came time to buy a mower when we moved into our home 28 years ago, I went and bought a cheap basic mower. It was probably from HQ. (Does anybody even know what that is anymore? "HQ to the rescue...") Very similar to my "high school summer business mower." Same limited features, except it added a dead-man's handle, as required by law. Red steel deck. Briggs and Stratton engine. Separately adjustable wheels at each corner. I used it for years and years.

I don't remember what eventually went wrong with it after about 10 years. I vaguely seem to recall that the plastic wheels wore away to practically nothing and the deck had a stress fracture in it where the wheels mounted to it. It still ran great and cut well, but age had caught up with the cheap mower. So I went to the big box store and bought another similar mower. The new one, though, didn't have the throttle adjustment. Apparently those had been outlawed in the intervening decade due to emissions restrictions. After getting the mower home and starting it up, the engine rpm hunted continuously, surging and falling, and surging and falling, again and again and again. I examined the carb more closely and became disappointed in the all-plastic construction. I called the manufacturer, who said that some rpm hunting was normal. I said "It isn't normal; just listen to this..." and held up the phone towards the mower so that they could hear it. They insisted it was fine. (It wasn't.) I took it back to the store for a refund. I then went home and kept using my old mower for a while longer -- I'm not sure how long, at least a few months.

Then, however, our neighbor across the street was moving away and put lots of stuff out on the curb that they weren't taking with them. Among the items was an old mower that they had replaced with a new one many years earlier, but apparently had kept the old one. I went over and brought it home. It was a basic mower, with a Briggs and Stratton engine, but it had a throttle adjustment. Old gas had been left in it, but the metal carburetor seemed like it would be fine after disassembly, cleaning, and reassembly. So, I cleaned it up, put in fresh gas, and it started fine. Decided I should probably change the oil and the spark plug, so I did that too.

In the 15+ years since then, that mower has been my friend. Over the years, I've replaced the starter cord about 3 times, replaced the wheels twice, even replaced the deck from a nearly identical donor mower that I got free on craigslist a couple years ago. The carburetor has been cleaned numerous times, but is still the original one. That mower has mowed the grass just about every 4 days during the growing season since becoming "lawn crazies" 7 years ago. It "scalped" portions of the lawn before a half-dozen renovations, has mowed 12-inch tall grass after being on vacation for a couple weeks, has mowed in the rain on a couple desperate occasions, and by headlamp at least a few times in November when the sun sets even before 4:30pm.

This year, though, the deck is again failing from stress cracks where the front wheels attach. It's clearly a design flaw with the mower, as I've now seen it happen to three different mowers of this model. I've looked for identical "donor" mowers on craigslist but haven't been able to find one, so I concluded that it must actually be time to get a new mower.

A couple years ago, I tried to figure out what to get for a mower, but couldn't find quite what I wanted. I knew I wanted a basic mower without fancy features, but also wanted something durable. Alas, without going for a commercial grade model, those seem to be mutually exclusive. The higher quality residential mowers come loaded with features. To my way of thinking, those features just make the mower more likely to break due to increased complexity, and make it heavier. I wanted something basic, light, and simple, yet durable. The closest I had been able to identify was the bottom-of-the-line model from Cub Cadet. A viable alternative was the bottom-of-the-line Honda push mower, but it was significantly heavier and more expensive. Going to a commercial model was an option, but a LOT more expensive.

This year, I looked again and eventually settled on getting a Cub Cadet SC100H. It's a simple push mower, with the only added complexity being dual height adjustments (one adjustment for the front and one for the back, rather than separate ones for each wheel). The Honda engine gives hope for a long life of easy starting. The basic Cub Cadet is lightweight, with a shipping weight of 65 pounds, as contrasted with about 95 pounds for a Honda HRX217. The SC100H is a 3-in-1 mower -- I almost always mulch mow, but there are occasional situations where I need to bag (scalping before a renovation or coping with fungus) or want side discharge in case I didn't have anybody mow the lawn while having been on vacation for a couple weeks. The one feature I wish it had was ball-bearing wheels, rather than sleeve wheels. However I'm considering ordering a set of generic ball bearing wheels from McMaster to upgrade the wheels before the axles get worn from the sleeves to address that potential future problem.

I ordered the mower online as there didn't seem to be one available at any of the local stores. It arrived after a few days, and seemed to survive shipping well, other than missing one of the bolts for the handle. I've since requested a replacement from the supplier, who says they have ordered one from Cub Cadet and it should be on its way to me any day now. In the meantime, I substituted a similar bolt from a lifetime's accumulation of random nuts and bolts, so I could start to use the mower.

After assembling the handle, putting in the pre-supplied oil, and filling with gasoline, I gave one pull on the starter cord, and the mower started immediately! I guess the automatic choke feature works fine, at least on the new engine. We'll see how it does over time...

In terms of mowing, the mower is nice and light, making it easy to push, fine to get up to street level at the edge of the lawn, easy to turn while following curved garden borders, and okay to maneuver on an area where I have a steep slope. I've been satisfied with the cut quality while mulching. Seems to mulch the grass blades sufficiently finely. It does seem to occasionally fail to pick up a tree leaf or two that have fallen deeply into the grass, but I think that may be a result of my cutting with the mower deck at the highest or next-to-highest setting for our summer cut height. Hopefully that will be better at a slightly lower cut height when I'm mulching leaves in autumn.

In any case, we've used the basic Cub Cadet to mow the lawn three times, and we're pleased so far. We'll have to see if the mower lasts well -- we tend to expect that with proper maintenance, our tools should last for a long, long time... If this mower isn't still performing well in 15 years, we'll be disappointed, but at just over one week in to owning it, we're still happy!

We intend to have this thread be a long-term review, so we'll make additional posts here from time to time in case others are interested.


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## Blackshirtproud (Apr 7, 2018)

Cub makes a solid mower in my opinion. I have an xt1 42" rider for the last four seasons and other than a battery, it has been flawless. It being my first rider I truly didn't know what I wanted. Went between a John Deere and the cub in the same price point. The Cub was hydrostatic while the JD was not and another 200 bucks. That made my decision.

I would love to have a high end Toro ztr but budgets and all put that off until my 12 yo is out on his own. :mrgreen:

Don't discount Cub Cadet, I believe they are all made in the USA I think.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

Blackshirtproud said:


> Cub makes a solid mower in my opinion. ... I believe they are all made in the USA I think.


Thanks for posting about the Cub Cadet being made in the USA. That is something I had learned before making the purchase, but I had forgotten to mention it in my write-up!

Yes, the specific one I purchased says on the label, "Made in the USA with Global Materials."

Cub Cadet advertises their "Built in America" standard on their website.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

Today, I changed the oil in the new Cub Cadet SC100H for the first time, seeking to remain in compliance with the owner manual's recommendation to change the engine oil after the first 5 hours of use.

The oil change wasn't bad, but I miss the convenience of having an oil drain plug. Rather, the Honda GCV160 engine oil is drained through the oil fill hole, which requires turning the mower on its side, which isn't convenient, but is doable. Ideally, if I had a large shallow sheet pan to use as an oil drain pan, I think the oil change would be easier. Since my oil drain pan is about 3" deep, I instead set the mower on some plastic totes and turned it on its side while up on the totes, which was less convenient, but it worked.

So far, I have mowed with it seven times and continue to be happy with it. The best features so far are that it is light and thus easy to maneuver, has started on the first pull every time whether hot or cold, and has done a good job of not leaving grass clumps, even on the two occasions when I've had to mow with it on damp grass.

There are only two negatives that I've noted with the new mower so far. One is that it seems that it doesn't have quite as much "suction" as my old mower, sometimes leaving a leaf or pulled weed down in the grass instead of vacuuming it up and mulching it into smithereens. Maybe I should consider replacing the factory blade with a higher-lift blade, but I haven't investigated that possibility yet. The other negative is that if there is a leaf on top of the grass, the mower sometimes seems to want to blow the leaf ahead and to the right, rather than just driving over the top of it. This may turn out to be a big aggravation when getting to leaf-mulching season. However, we'll find out for sure in about 3 months...

So, in sum, I'm still happy with the mower, and see it as an improvement over my prior one. We'll follow up with another status update by at least the time we are doing leaf mulching in the fall.

Below is a pic of the lawn from last night, before today's mow.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

It has been a few months since I've posted an update on the Cub Cadet SC100H mower, and @Green noticed the mower being listed in our profile in one of the posts in our 2020 renovation lawn journal so I figured it was time to add some more thoughts about the mower to this thread.

I continue to be very happy with the new mower. I've come to appreciate that its light weight makes it easy to push and maneuver. I definitely prefer a non-self-propelled mower as it's always going exactly the speed I want it to go without any fuss.

The mower has started for me on the first pull every single time, whether cold, partly warm, or fully warmed up.

I have also noticed that the mower is definitely more fuel-efficient than my old one. It's nice to not have to refill the gas can quite as frequently, especially since I mow every 3rd or 4th day for most of the growing season.

The two issues I mentioned in my posting from July (less suction and causing leaves which would be about to be mowed over to be blown further forwards and to the right) remain an issue, even now that I've dropped height of cut down from the highest setting, 3.75" with notch 6 of 6, to notch 4 of 6 which gives 2.75" HOC. I have wondered if switching to a high-lift blade would help with either of these problems but haven't taken any steps to pursue purchasing a different blade.

Looking forward to see how the mower handles the leaf-mulching task in a few months. We mulch up many cubic yards of leaves every fall, so how well the mower does at that task will be an important factor for our year-round happiness with the mower...


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## Vtx531 (Jul 1, 2019)

ken-n-nancy said:


> I definitely prefer a non-self-propelled mower as it's always going exactly the speed I want it to go without any fuss.


Thanks for posting. I enjoyed reading this review. Have you ever tried the Toro Personal Pace?


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

Vtx531 said:


> ken-n-nancy said:
> 
> 
> > I definitely prefer a non-self-propelled mower as it's always going exactly the speed I want it to go without any fuss.
> ...


Glad to hear that you enjoyed reading the review.

Regarding trying the Toro Personal Pace, the short answer is that I haven't. It would be nice if there were a way to try out somebody else's mower to see how it works on one's own lawn!


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

@ken-n-nancy, thanks for pointing out this thread. Another comprehensive post coming...

This MTD mower is available in many brands with slight styling differences, most of which don't affect function or performance meaningfully, and therefore is almost identical to my "old mower" (a Crafstman) from 2014 or so. The differences are the brand name, color, style, and engine (Briggs vs. Honda). But same deck, blade, etc. Both are made by MTD. Great design; I like it, too.

I bought a gator G3 blade for mine last year for leaf mulching. It's really nice and a little heavier. Don't try tilting the deck differently than the default. It doesn't work. Keep the height adjusters for the back and front the same.

The blow out the right side will require you to do extra passes for a clean look with the leaves. I'm not a fan either (no pun intended), but all mowers with doors on the side for discharge probably do this. My Toro does, too...but the MTD is a superior leaf mulcher anyway, with the Gator blade especially, compared to the Toro 22" recycler. Overlap your passes a bit more, etc. to cope partially.

Long grass can leave buildup of clippings in the right wheel path, necssitating double mowing. Likely not an issue for you, mowing every 3 days, though.

I have the Honda engine on my Toro (aka the "new mower"): https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=3351&p=159795&hilit=Honda#p159795
I like it. Not a fan of the high rear wheels though. The old mower is much easier to tilt for turns. That's why I was surprised you were able to find a non-high wheel version of the MTD mower under the Cub Cadet brand. It seems to never be in stock anywhere. My old mower hasn't been made in years, and the last time I saw a low wheel version of a similar model being sold was over a year ago on the Ace website. I think it's 5-10 lbs lighter than the Toro too, but it's also much better balanced than the Toro and I think the shallower deck makes tilting easier too, because I tried a low wheel Toro version of mine at HD this Summer. It was easier to tilt, but not like the MTD. 7 lbs of weight can't be the reason. But a deeper deck is needed for a 4 inch HOC, which is really a huge height difference from 3.75 in terms of Summer performance, honestly.

What shape cutout does your blade have for the bolt? The star, or the rectangular star? Mine has the rectangular star, and I haven't yet figured out how to get a good balance check due to that shape cutout.

Finally, I think Snapper mowers do still have a throttle adjustment, maybe. Everything is auto choke I believe, though, at least on consumer and some pro 21 and 22 inch models.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

Green said:


> I bought a gator G3 blade for mine last year for leaf mulching. It's really nice and a little heavier. Don't try tilting the deck differently than the default. It doesn't work. Keep the height adjusters for the back and front the same.


Thanks, @Green, for the tip on an alternate mulching blade. Thanks also for the tip on not trying to fix the issue by tilting the deck.



Green said:


> The blow out the right side will require you to do extra passes for a clean look with the leaves.


The blow-away I'm getting isn't out the right side -- that is, I'm not having trouble with leaves getting blown out from under the deck. Rather, leaves out in front of the mower get blown to the front right just before the mower drives over them. I decided to take a closer look at the deck design today, and found that the front side of the deck comes down about 1/2" less far than the sides or back. It's almost like air is intentionally being allowed to escape from the front of the mower. There are some convenient bolts along the inside front of the deck, used to retain the front portion of the mower. I think I could probably cut a piece of 1/8" or 3/32" lexan sheet to the appropriate size, drill a few holes in it, and fashion a lowered skirt for the front of the mower. I may very well cut a piece of cardboard to size first to see if that helps and then fabricate the lexan piece if the cardboard fixes the air flow issue.



Green said:


> Long grass can leave buildup of clippings in the right wheel path, necssitating double mowing. Likely not an issue for you, mowing every 3 days, though.


I did notice some clipping depositis along the right wheel path when I let the grass get longer over vacation, but in general, I try to mow the lawn sufficiently frequently to avoid that issue.



Green said:


> I have the Honda engine on my Toro (aka the "new mower"): https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=3351&p=159795&hilit=Honda#p159795


That is the same engine on this mower, the Honda GCV160. I'm very happy with it so far, too.



Green said:


> I like it. Not a fan of the high rear wheels though. ... and the last time I saw a low wheel version of a similar model being sold was over a year ago on the Ace website.


I also prefer the low wheels all around, which was a significant factor in my choice of this specific mower.



Green said:


> What shape cutout does your blade have for the bolt? The star, or the rectangular star? Mine has the rectangular star, and I haven't yet figured out how to get a good balance check due to that shape cutout.


The blade cutout is one I haven't seen before (photo below). Calling it a rectangular star seems about right, but with the center of the long pieces of the rectangle being curved. I was able to do a balance check using a round-shaft screwdriver to balance the blade with the mounting hole.

I think a higher-lift blade would help with picking up leaves or hand-picked weeds from within the grass. Does the Gator G3 blade you have include the appropriate holes for mounting the blade? (It appears that not only does the central hole need to be the odd rectangular star shape, but the lateral holes are needed, too, to engage with protrusions on the mounting hub.)

Cub Cadet SC100H Original Mower Blade Hub









Cub Cadet SC100H Original Mower Blade Profile


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## dwaugh (Aug 25, 2020)

@ken-n-nancy as far as improving the suction, have you tried using the side discharge? My old Honda didn't have the option, but just before I got a new mower I partially propped open the bagging door (not enough to be a safety issue) to give the air somewhere to go rather than back out the bottom, it seemed to help with the lift.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

dwaugh said:


> @ken-n-nancy as far as improving the suction, have you tried using the side discharge? My old Honda didn't have the option, but just before I got a new mower I partially propped open the bagging door (not enough to be a safety issue) to give the air somewhere to go rather than back out the bottom, it seemed to help with the lift.


Hmm. I haven't thought of trying that. When you tried that, did grass escape there instead of getting mulched up?


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## dwaugh (Aug 25, 2020)

Hmm. I haven't thought of trying that. When you tried that, did grass escape there instead of getting mulched up?
[/quote]

I was cutting frequently enough that I never really saw blades of grass causing an issue (i.e. I didn't really see them) on the lawn, but were they mulched, and at what percentage, I have no idea. With my new mower that has side discharge, I am again cutting often enough that clippings are not an issue and the suction/lift is much improved.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

@ken-n-nancy

Side discharge is good if you're getting buildup in the right wheel path from longer grass. Other than that, I have no other use for it. But I do use it a lot on my low input area for this reason. As long as you mow slowly, the mower does a good job of chopping up the clippings small enough that they dry out and disappear in a few days. Plus, you're going back over the discharged stuff with a normal mowing pattern. I now consider the feature essential, so Honda mowers were a no-go.

Interesting about the right side. I'll have to check mine, but I expect the same design underneath.

Yeah, that's the same blade cutout. If you look carefully, the blade will say MTD on it. I can't get a good balance check with a standard balancer due to that cutout. Please go over your method in detail.

My gator blade has the correct cutouts. No adapters needed. It was tough to find the right model on the Oregon website. I actually bought the wrong blade initially and had to return it. I'll post a photo of it and get you the info.


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## ken-n-nancy (Jul 25, 2017)

The above quoted text came from a post in my lawn journal thread, but I'm replying here, as it relates to the Cub Cadet SC100H mower being reviewed in this thread...



ken-n-nancy said:


> Green said:
> 
> 
> > @ken-n-nancy, couple quick questions:
> ...


@Green, well, this last weekend when mowing the lawn, I decided to see if I could take that silly red thing out of the fuel tank. Much to my surprise, I found that it was just sitting there, not being held in by anything other than gravity. Yes, you can just touch it with your finger and lift it right out without any trouble at all.

I removed it and came to the conclusion that the tank seals just fine without it there. It's even easier to see to fill the tank, and having the red plastic thing out of the fill tube makes the opening significantly larger. I put the red plastic piece in the storage box I have with a big ziploc bag in it for the original mower manuals and extra spare handle bolt that was sent to me after having one missing from the original order, just in case I ever find a reason to reinstall it or want to do so if we ever sell the mower.

I'll be happily filling the gas tank without that silly "fuel level gauge" in the way anymore. Actually, I think with the piece now out of the mower, it's easier to tell the change in sound when the tank is nearly full and thus easier to stop pouring at the right time.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

@ken-n-nancy,

Thanks. I actually did the same last week. I think instruction number 1 should be to take it out before doing anything else when you get a new mower.

I have even overfilled the tank several times and had no issues.

Now if someone comes along and says it actually has a purpose and can convince me that the mower will explode or something without it, then we're in trouble.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

Oh, and filling with ear protectors on in the doorway of a dark shed (with the red thing in the mower tank) is a darn good way to overfill. Lucky I stopped right at the brim of neck that time, right before it overflowed out.

I once saw a statistic for how much gas is spilled per year in the US when filling mowers. It's staggering.

Folks, never fill up your push mower on your grass, unless you're absolutely certain you won't overfill or drip. Even then, don't make a habit of it.

@Powhatan


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## billw (Jul 19, 2020)

Hey there just stumbled upon this thread! I have the Cub Cadet SC100HW. I believe only difference is the engine is Cub Cadet OHV & the rear wheels are larger.

I replaced the original blade with the Oregon replacement mulching blade and it's quite impressive - Part #198-049.

Now that we have quite a few leaves, I've again noticed how annoying it is that the mower blows them out ahead of you.

I'm in year three with this mower and no issues. Only thing currently is that when I turn the mower on it's side to change the blade, it leaks a small amount of fuel. Not sure if I didn't tighten something correctly or what when I was cleaning the carb.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

billw said:


> I replaced the original blade with the Oregon replacement mulching blade and it's quite impressive - Part #198-049.


That reminds me...

I looked up the part number for the Oregon G3 mulching blade that I use.

98-631


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## billw (Jul 19, 2020)

Green said:


> billw said:
> 
> 
> > I replaced the original blade with the Oregon replacement mulching blade and it's quite impressive - Part #198-049.
> ...


How is that blade? I tried a cub cadet mulching blade similar to G3 and I think it produced such a fine cut, that it would clog under the deck.


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## Green (Dec 24, 2017)

billw said:


> Green said:
> 
> 
> > billw said:
> ...


It's excellent. I need to sharpen mine and get it back on the mower, as the amount of leaves is increasing. It absolutely obliterates them. It's a big, heavy (but not too heavy) blade and has special cutouts on the opposite side. Much better results than the 22 inch Toro Recycler with the stock blade, too. I'm currently using the regular blade.


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## 440mag (Jan 29, 2018)

Great thread!

Question: what is the - if any - advantage or disadvantage to the larger wheels in rear?

And those blade profiles - and hub for that matter - are identical to my Bowen's 19" push mower (w B&S engine)

Really appreciate this thread as I detest waiting til I need a mower to start shopping alternatives!


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## billw (Jul 19, 2020)

440mag said:


> Great thread!
> 
> Question: what is the - if any - advantage or disadvantage to the larger wheels in rear?
> 
> ...


To be honest I'm not sure if there is an advantage or disadvantage to the larger wheels in the rear. I actually would prefer the smaller rear wheels that match the front but I didn't do much research before buying this mower. It was my first time owning a home and my friends dad owns a Cub Cadet dealer/shop so I just bought whatever he had!


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