We tried the Billy Goat Lawn & Litter Vacuum, and we're confident we'll have the most pristine lawn all season long.
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Billy Goat Leaf Vacuum Review
Crisp air, pumpkin spice, apple cider and brightly colored foliage are synonymous with Fall. What’s not to love? Well, if you’re a homeowner, then the answer to that question is an ankle-deep sea of leaves covering your lawn.
Not only do they make your yard look unkempt, but they can produce mold, hinder new growth and provide shelter for pests. Of course, you can use a rake or a leaf blower to clean up fallen leaves. Or, you can opt for a leaf vacuum. The best leaf vacuums suck up fallen leaves and condense them into bags for quick and easy cleanup.
“Vacuums are more effective for cleaning up smaller spaces and tight areas,” explains Francisco Fuenmayor, an insured handyman at LocalProBook. “For example, cleaning leaves in bushes. A leaf blower won’t be able to blow the leaves out of there.” Fuenmayor goes on to add that leaf vacuums are a quick and effective way to get rid of leaves.
We tested close to a dozen leaf vacuums and found one that stood out among the rest: the Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum. This machine has the ability to clear your yard in no time and we don’t think you’d even break a sweat. Here’s everything you need to know about the Billy Goat leaf vacuum.
What is the Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum?
The Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum is a gas-powered, walk-behind leaf vacuum. Powerful suction allows it to clean up huge piles of leaves and other backyard debris and its intuitive design makes it easy to use. In spite of its bulk and weight — it weighs in at 112 pounds — this self-propelled machine is surprisingly easy to maneuver. That’s because most of its casing is plastic, so it’s easy to tilt the machine back and take sharp turns.
Another reason we love this machine? It’s loaded with extra features including an on-board 2-inch chipper, optional hose kit and shredding screen, caster kit, liner sleeve and felt bag. You can even adjust the height to best suit the surface you’re working on. Read on for more on the Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum’s features.
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Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum
This self-propelled, gas-powered machine has a five-blade serrated metal impeller and on-board 2-inch chipper to handle large fall cleanups.
Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum Features
Zipperless Bag
Rather than fumbling with a zipper, the Billy Goat leaf vacuum uses two bottom-loading, marine-style clasps. This allows you to easily open and close the bag when dumping debris. “The snapping pieces work way better than a zipper,” says the product testing team. “The bag comes on and off easily from the machine once you figure it out the first time.”
Integral Dust Skirt
The dust skirt, which is made of breathable mesh, keeps dust down and away from you as you walk behind the vacuum. An optional felt bag is available for even better dust control. Just note that a new felt bag requires a break-in period. According to our testers, this entails running the unit at half throttle for the first half-hour on a clean hard surface.
This will allow the air coming in through the nozzle to create effective pathways through the pores of the bag. If these pores become blocked, the overall suction power of the unit will be greatly diminished. We completed this process on concrete.
5-Blade Serrated Impeller
This blade mulches everything the crosses its path, maximizing both suction and debris reduction.
On-Board 2-Inch Chipper
An optional on-board 2-inch chipper allows you to add branches for even more thorough cleanups.
How We Tested It
The Billy Goat leaf vacuum was a freight delivery and arrived on a pallet. To our surprise, it arrived fully assembled and even had some gas in it. Our first order of business was to complete the bag break-in period. As mentioned above, this necessary break-in period required us to set the machine on concrete and run it at half throttle for the first half-hour. The process is to allow the air in through the nozzle to create effective pathways through the pores of the bag.
We then set out to see what this machine was really made of. We scattered roughly 30 gallons of leaves across two 10-by-4 rectangles of grass. One rectangle had have dry leaves, and the other had wet leaves. Our testers recorded the time it took the Billy Goat leaf vacuum to such up each set of leaves on the highest setting.
For both the wet and dry leaf test, the Billy Goat passed with flying colors, sucking up everything in its path in just two passes. “Of the two walk-behind vacs we tested, this one is much more comfortable to push around. The weight feels more evenly distributed and it’s much easier to make turns with,” explains the product testing team. “Pulling the clutch bar will also propel this thing. It can easily fly out from your hands if you’re not ready for it.”
Once everything had been sucked up, it was time to empty the bag. Though the zipperless design makes it easy to remove the bag, our testers found it difficult to do alone due to its bulk.
“Emptying the bag is hard because it was bulky even halfway full,” explains the product testing team. “It’s a two-person job to remove the bag when it’s full. It’s too large to empty into a paper leaf bag or a standard-size trash can, and we had to use multiple receptacles to clear this one fully. It would be much easier to dump this one directly on a compost pile.”
Another thing to consider is the fact that the wet leaves left stains near the top of the felt bag where it connects to the vacuum. And while our testers note that this doesn’t bear any effect on the actual performance of the machine, it is pretty unsightly.
Pros:
- Maneuverable
- Excellent performance
- Handles huge piles of dry and wet leaves
- Built-in chipper
- Mulches as it vacuums
Cons:
- Bag is incredibly bulky when full
- Wet leaves can stain the bag
- Pricey
FAQ
Will a Billy Goat vacuum pick up wet leaves?
Yes! We used the Billy Goat leaf vacuum on roughly 15 gallons of leaves that had been misted with a hose. It sucked them all up in under a minute, though wet leaves did stain the felt bag. That said, Fuenmayor cautions that wet leaves are heavier and can clog the vacuum more easily, requiring more frequent maintenance and clearing. He suggests waiting for the leaves to dry as much as possible before vacuuming.
Does the Billy Goat vacuum pick up acorns?
Yes. According to Fuenmayor, leaf vacuums can handle small debris like acorns, twigs, and pine needles. However, larger or very hard objects like small stones may damage the machine or clog the vacuum. He recommends familiarizing yourself with the model’s specifications for debris size limitations.
How to use a Billy Goat leaf vacuum?
During testing, our product testing team found that the Billy Goat leaf vacuum is quite intuitive. All you have to do is start it up and push it around your yard until all of the leaves and other small debris are gone. Then empty the bag and you’re good to go until your next cleanup.
What Other Reviewers and Experts Had to Say
Admittedly, the Billy Goat leaf vacuum doesn’t have a ton of reviews. In fact, Amazon user JW almost didn’t buy this leaf vacuum for that very reason. “I have been eyeing this machine for the past year or two and always decided not to buy it due to lack of reviews,” writes JW in his five-star Amazon review. However, he took a chance on this machine and was glad he did. “This unit has more than met my expectations. It can quickly and easily handle tons of leaves, twigs, trash, acorns, and stray mulch,” he raves. “…It is infinitely faster than a rake. After about an hour, I had cleaned up half of my backyard, a task that would have taken me four or five hours by hand.”
According to verified user Richard O’Brien, the Billy Goat leaf vacuum is the best he’s owned over the year in his five-star review. And yet another refers to the Billy Goat leaf vacuum as “a tough little machine.”
Billy Goat Lawn & Litter Vacuum vs. DR Leaf and Lawn Vacuum
Our experts on the product testing team tested two leaf vacuums: The Billy Goat Lawn & Litter Vacuum and the DR Leaf and Lawn Vacuum. While the team loved the DR lawn vacuum’s chipper, they found that it was more difficult to maneuver than the Billy Goat lawn vacuum. While the Billy Goat is self-propelled and easy to to move and turn, our testers noted that the DR is too stiff to be able to easily tilt the machine back for quick turns.
Moreover, the DR is harder to start. “The big issue here is the choke lever. It’s a flimsy-feeling piece of metal that you’re told needs to be pushed inward,” explains the product testing team. “In reality, it needs to be pulled more to the side when starting the engine, then slowly released per the engine noises until it sounds good. There’s a choke lever on the Billy Goat as well, but it’s way more automated, as it’s just a flip of a switch.”
Additionally, there’s the issue of dust. According to Fuenmayor, leaf vacuums can create a lot of dust in hot, dry weather. “The dust passes through the bag’s membrane and sticks to any exposed, sweaty skin, leaving you dirty,” he says. Our testers didn’t run into any noteworthy issues with dust while using the Billy Goat lawn vacuum. But when testing the DR, Fischer took quite a bit of dust to the face. “No matter what amount of leaves you’re running over, you WILL be taking some debris to the face due to the tubing that spits out debris toward the top of the vacuum instead of the bottom,” says the Product Testing Team.
Overall, the Billy Goat lawn vacuum is the better choice here because of its performance and ease of use.
Final Verdict
“If you have a big lawn that requires heavy-duty equipment, then you’ll find a lot to like about Billy Goat’s surprisingly maneuverable walk-behind leaf vacuum,” says associate product tester Dylan Fischer. And there certainly is a lot to like. Between the large 40 gallon bag, built-in chipper and 5-blade impeller that mulches leaves and debris as it sucks them up, the Billy Goat leaf vacuum will have your yard clean in no time.
Where to Buy the Billy Goat Lawn & Litter Vacuum
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Billy Goat Leaf & Litter Vacuum
This powerful vacuum cleared roughly 30 gallons of wet and dry leaves in under two minutes.
The Billy Goat lawn vacuum sells for $1,795 on Amazon with the mesh bag and dust skirt. The on-board hose kit can be purchased separately for $350 on Amazon. The leaves will be falling before you know it, so go ahead and add this dream machine to your cart ASAP.
