The Tower of London is one of the Capital’s major tourist attractions with more than 400,000 visitors on a typical bank holiday weekend in the summer.

As the crown jewel in the Royal Palaces portfolio maintaining the 40-acres of grounds is a major task which is handled by a three-man team from Ground Control Limited, the national grounds maintenance contractor.

Ground Control has recently equipped their Tower of London crew with Makita Outdoor Power Equipment machines to benefit from the performance and environmental advantages of the Makita MM4 mini 4-stroke petrol engines and 36v cordless ground maintenance tools. These new Makita machines have rapidly become favourites of the Ground Control team:

“These Makita tools are real stars,” says John Vail, head groundsman of the Ground Control Tower team. “The 4-stroke 43cc strimmer has so much power that you don’t have to keep it screaming as we would with a 2-stroke machine. This means it is quieter to use as it is not required to run at maximum RPM and this gives a much better exhaust tone.

“This is also important when you have as many tour groups going around the property as we do here at the Tower with guides trying to explain all the history here. The Makita 4-stroke back-pack blower is far better than a previous competitor brand we have used, with at least 20 -30% more power. I think you could move a house-brick with it!”

The Ground Control team is also using Makita 36v cordless line trimmers and hedge trimmers to take advantage of the virtually silent operating and zero admissions. These attributes are especially useful when work needs to be carried out within the Castle walls and when the many hundreds of tourists are visiting the site.

“The Tower is actually a small village with 150 residents living here,” says John Vail of Ground Control. “If we want to start cutting at 7am before the gates open at 9am we have to be mindful that there are people still sleeping. Using the Makita battery machines during this time helps us to keep the programme on schedule. It’s the same with some of the resident’s dogs.

“They really do get upset by the noise of 2-stroke machines; it must be the high pitched tone. With the cordless tools we can carry on working while they stay calm!”

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