Product review

Bosch Ciso cordless secateurs

The gift for the gardener who has everything?

Faced with winter pruning and tidy-up chores around the garden? The Bosch Ciso cordless secateurs could be just what you need … charge them up and off you go. “Effortless pruning” says the packaging. “One cut per second.”

The secateurs will cut hardwood branches up to 9 millimetres thick and softwood branches up to 14 millimetres. To operate you simply pull a trigger (after releasing a safety catch).

We asked a user panel of 7 gardeners – 4 men and 3 women – to try them out at home.

What we did

Our gardeners checked the Bosch Ciso’s cutting performance on hardwood and soft wood and rated their balance, manoeuvrability and comfort. Finally, they said whether they’d buy the secateurs.

Several people suggested they might be suitable for a gardener with weak hands, because no force is required. So we also asked 2 people with arthritis to assess the secateurs.

What we found

The secateurs generally produced perfectly clean cuts on softwood and acceptable to perfectly clean results on hardwood. Comfort and balance were OK, although a couple of our gardeners found the secateurs tricky to manoeuvre.

However, the trigger was a bit too far away for people with small hands and the cutting action was slower than expected. At 590 grams the secateurs were much heavier than the manual secateurs in our 2005 test – where the heaviest weighed just over 300 grams.

For people with weak hands our 2 assessors found the secateurs were “too heavy to hold and operate.” They couldn’t stretch their finger across to the trigger and hold the secateurs at the same time.

Battery life

The secateurs claim to last for 500 cuts on a single charge. So we charged up the secateurs and counted the cuts on 8mm-diameter pine dowelling.

The secateurs lasted for 632 cuts, much better than the claim – but there’s a potential problem. They kept going strong until the last 10 cuts and then lost power and died very quickly. There’s no charge level indicator and a full recharge takes more than 6 hours, so you’ll need to keep your old secateurs in reserve – or put off pruning for another day.

Our verdict

2 people said they would buy the Bosch Ciso secateurs, commenting that they produced a great cut on roses and would be useful for someone who did lots of pruning. But at $160 the secateurs were just too expensive for the other testers. You can buy a good pair of ordinary secateurs for less than $60.

And check the grip and weight first if you’re tempted by the Bosch Ciso secateurs.