Frugality nearly kills me.

The art of frugal living involves making the most of what you have got, thinking outside the square, knowing and having what you need rather than what you want, thinking through the options and making the right choices. Frugality is not specifically about penny pinching. Penny pinching almost killed me.

A wheel barrow gets a lot of use around our place. It hauls wood, brings the shopping in from the car, moves dirt, is used to mix concrete, move plants, haul stones and so on. It was therefore somewhat of a shock when my much traveled wheelbarrow (we brought it to Australia from New Zealand) was unable to have a new tyre fitted and was therefore at the end of its normal working life. Sob, and it had served me so well! A replacement was needed and quickly. A house without a wheelbarrow is like a rose without a thorn, a dog without a tail, a fish without water, a tree without soil.

I confess I let my barriers down, simple as that.
"Who needs to spend a fortune on a wheelbarrow" I thought.
"I will check them out and buy the best for the cheapest price."
 Luckily the local hardware supermart had a good variety to check over. Plastic tray versus metal, Metal handles versus wood. Sturdy enough. Big enough. Got to assemble it myself but for $49.95, what could go wrong?

Exhibit A, the new wheelbarrow.

The assembly was more difficult than expected and one piece just would not fit. Oh well, I improvised and soon I had my new wheelbarrow ready to go. I chucked some firewood in and went for a spin around the block to check out the performance of my new machine. 

Performance? Passable but less than what I had hoped for and expected. Hey, beggars can't be choosy right? Seriously, it is a wheel barrow. What could go wrong really other than a little barrow envy?

As I teetered high on the back of my wheel barrow, my right leg throbbing intensely, presumably broken, other bones sure to go as I continued to fall, internal injuries not yet ascertained but expecting something, I had a moment as my life flashed by in slow motion of what in the hell was I going to say to the staff at the hospital about how I had managed to injure myself.

The silly thing was, in a very short space of time I had realised my new wheel barrow was in fact a lemon and was a hazard. It's one redeeming feature was the large expansive bowl and that is what tempted me into using it again, despite the issues with safety. And that is why I was left hanging mid air ruminating on my life, considering my explanations and anticipating the additional pain that was surely going to come as I succumbed to the pull of gravity. Moreover, my wife was going to give me a rollicking!

"Wheelbarrows for dummies" or "How to chose the right wheelbarrow for you", would have been good titles to read before I had bought my new wheelbarrow. However, in much the same way as men do not need maps, books such as Wheelbarrows 101 are not available. Consider now my newest wheelbarrow, the one that replaced the one with the expansive bowl, the one that nearly killed me.

A good solid sounding name, red handles and a bright blue bowl, it has to be good.

And now consider the new and the old side by side. Sherlock the mighty on the left  and the black death star or trap on the right.  A wheel barrow is a wheel barrow is it not? What is the issue?

Looking from the back first. With the Sherlock we have strong cross braces welded to the frame. The frame itself is rigid. No torsion or movement within the barrow itself even under load. As the operator you do not have to compensate and adjust for a flexible wheelbarrow.

Welded cross brace, two cross braces, solid steel construction.

Only one cross brace that is screwed into place. Frame is flimsy and allows flexibility, not a good thing in this case.

The view of the front tells us something else. Construction is sturdier, the bowl is metal and not plastic again helping with rigidity and the support to the front is placed further forward making tipping the load easier and less energetic.

The side on view again shows the most critical aspect, the feature that lead to my near death experience. Admitedly I am tall at just over two metres in height but even a much shorter person could still run into issues.

The very front section or nose is used to pivot the wheelbarrow when tipping. The nose hits the ground as you lift at the back enabling you to tip the wheelbarrow up to tip out the contents of the bowl. 

With the  blue barrow, the load is positioned over the front wheel and means the tipping is easy and the nose is some distance from the ground as you are carrying or moving the wheelbarrow. The black barrow has the load positioned towards the back making it harder to lift and move and the nose is then only a short distance to hitting the ground when you do not want it to.

So you can imagine with the black wheelbarrow, having realised the carrying capacity was limited owing to weight distribution, flimsy construction and flexibility in construction the only thing a frugal gardener might consider using the barrow for was to collect leaves for mulch. It would utilise the large expansive bowl but at the same time, the concerns of weight were minimal as the load was large but very light.

It was a beautiful day, the sun bright but the day not yet hot. It was such a wonderful morning and I, two barrow man, oh that immense feeling of power and entitlement, two wheel barrows, could life get any better? I ran lightly down the hill to collect the leaves that had fallen under a large tree.

Suddenly the sharp and sudden pain in my leg, the suspension in mid air, the terrible moment as the brain catches up to events and you realise you are in trouble, pain has occurred and is going to occur again and there are only brief milliseconds left to consider saving ones bacon. The front of the wheelbarrow had hit the ground and as a wheelbarrow is designed to perform, it had gone straight into tip mode. As this was not a planned action my leg had smashed into the strut running along the back,as I stumbled forward to lie draped over the back of the barrow with it in full tilt emptying position. Luckily it fell to the side and yes whilst I was bruised and battered, my leg pulsating with pain but no bone protruding through the skin, I landed moderately intact. My leg was not broken I realised soon thereafter and I swore never to use the damn black barrow again.

It took weeks for the bruise and swelling to subside but in short when buying a wheelbarrow, go for rigidity, welded construction where possible, check the load distribution and how high the nose is from the ground as you are moving about. That will narrow your choices down considerably with which one to buy and don't worry about the cost,. A wheelbarrow should last a lifetime and the right one is money well spent, wisely spent and will lead to safe utilisation. When you go out to do the gardening you can expect to get home!