I have a pretty narrow road verge (strip of grass between sidewalk and road, had to look up what that was called… lol). It’s about three feet wide so I’d say a few passes should get it, but not sure how it would auto map such a long and narrow area.
Are there any best practices for mapping this? Should it be mapped as a separate area and a path be added to it crossing the sidewalk, or just mapped together with the main lawn crossing the sidewalk and let the Yarbo “mow” the sidewalk (this option seems like the easiest other than for pedestrians)? Or is it better to just do that strip with a push mower / drive the Yarbo manually?
I made a graphic illustrating the two options but doesn’t look like there is a way to upload it on here.
By the way, so far I have mapped the small fenced in portion of my yard which I actually thought would be the most problematic, and there have been 0 issues, worked better than I expected the first go. Front and bigger unfenced back / side yard next up.
Have you looked at manually mapping a Deadend? It’s a pathway where the mower goes in and reverses back out so there are no turns. Perhaps two of those in parallel would do the trick for something about 3’ wide.
As you suggested, you could do it as an Area with a Pathway to navigate over the existing sidewalk, but I don’t know how narrow Yarbo can work well. You could give it a try and see how it does. If the sidewalk is really low, you could make the Area on the verge a little wider and let Yarbo straddle the sidewalk. That may do it for you. And it’ll cut the edge. My driveway’s like that.
You could also have it as all one big Area and put a No-go Zone on the sidewalk, but I suspect at that point the Yarbo wouldn’t be able to get past the No-go Zone and get to the area on the verge. And who knows how it’ll do turns on the verge. Or, yep, you can keep it as one big Area and just “mow” the sidewalk, another suggestion you had. If the sidewalk is low, it’s not a big deal, and you get those edges cut.
I think many options would work. I’d just do what feels right for yourself and the complexity or simplicity level you would like to have. If you try something and it isn’t great, re-map and try something else. The more you map, the quicker and better you get. I went through a few iterations with my snowblower, but it’s pretty well dialed in now.
Thank you for the detailed explanation! As Ken mentioned, both methods are definitely workable. Feel free to try both options and see which one works best for you.
If needed, you can use the “edit map” feature to adjust your current setup, which will save you from having to remap everything.
Thanks again for sharing your experience, and we’d love to hear how your trials go!
Appreciate the suggestions and ideas, did not think of the Deadend option at all, that sounds like it might work. I’ll do some testing and see how it goes. I mainly wanted to ask in case there were some things that were known bad ideas / wouldn’t work to avoid trying those.