Whacking it off AND getting it blown...

[Mark_88]

Snow...

Had to whack it off my truck today because it wasn't just snow but a layer of ice with it...and instead of shoveling the driveway like I usually do I used the snow blower because it was just too much...even though the driveway is only about 60' long and two cars wide...

 

[MastuhWaffles]

I see what you did there.

 

[Will]

Snow blower is always the best way. I can't get people to understand that. You get an 8hp blower and it does a really good job. It's like a snow vacuum cleaner. You blow it off into the neighbor's yard. You don't have to fight with it by stacking it up on the edge of your driveway. Then, you can do the sidewalks.

I use my trackloader with a snowblade, but it's because my drive is 400ft long. It's only okay. It pushes the gravel off the drive sometimes. I also hit my van once when it slid around farther on a turn than I wanted. It might be Ford Tough, but it isn't ASV Tough.

My dad has a Toro blower and it's too small to do my driveway in such a time as to not freeze to death. But I've used it at his house in town and it's a really great machine. It's like magic. I was walking around town, pro bono, clearing sidewalks.

 

[Mark_88]

I used to have a Mastercraft (Canadian Tire) snow blower with a 6.5 HP motor and that thing was pretty amazing. Did the pro bono with that one for a few neighbors a couple of winters and they really appreciated it...one guy let me store my Ranger on his property for a whole year free and another guy gave me a small freezer because I did his driveway while he was in Florida for a month.

Yesterday I was using a small Honda blower...the one with the tracks instead of wheels...it is very slow and I can see frostbite setting in if the driveway was longer...lol...but it is a pretty amazing little machine. Starts up first crank with the pull handle and I could never do that with the Mastercraft...fortunately, that one had an electric starter that worked every time.

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

Yep, plows are nice a lot of the time and a truck mounted plow can be pretty quick. But you have to have somewhere to push the snow to without a lot of effort and a lot of residential driveways do not have a good easy place to push to. At least around here. That doesn't matter with a blower though.

 

[det107]

I used to have a Mastercraft (Canadian Tire) snow blower with a 6.5 HP motor and that thing was pretty amazing.....Yesterday I was using a small Honda blower...

I thought the Canadians had V8-powered blowers -

 

[Mark_88]

I thought the Canadians had V8-powered blowers -

lol...too much touque, er, torque, with a v8...but they are good for blowing in a circle while you do doughnuts...just no application other than small hockey rinks on frozen ponds...hmmm...

 

[Andy D]

Heh heh. I used my Franken blower yesterday on 6" of glop that routinely would kill my two 24 " Ariens. I bought a Chonda and grafted it onto the best one. Throws snow waaay better, Starts waaay easier, is smoother and quieter. 101$ out the door at Harbor Freight. My drive way is 125' plus the parking area for 5 cars. Still needs tweakin , but it has proved workable as is. The frame and front end of the Rat would die if I put a plow rig on it.

 

[Ledphoot]

LOL with that title I had to come read the rest.. and to think I've been bitching about days in the 40s*F. We even had 5 inches of snow last week and school was out 3 days! LOL..

 

[Chris_North]

I'd agree snowblowers beat plows for anything but maybe the lighter snow accumulations where a plow would be faster. I just can't justify the price of the machine plus storing and maintaining it and then possibly only using it a few times a year. If not for the truck plow the way this year's been I might feel different.

What I would really love is a blower for a lawn tractor. I don't understand where they come up with the prices for these things though. Have thought about making my own...

But you have to have somewhere to push the snow to without a lot of effort and a lot of residential driveways do not have a good easy place to push to. At least around here.

It's the same way here. Most of the houses have garages or sheds at the end of the driveway so it's impossible to straight push everything back, and what little room there is to put the snow quickly fills up. With these last few storms at work even the parking lots are filling up. I wish these guys would plan ahead a little bit and push things back as far as possible and not put piles up against buildings. They don't seem to care that what seems convenient at the time becomes a big problem for the guy that has to sit on the cabless front loader the next day for 7 hours straight moving piles of snow around. I probably wouldn't care as much if that guy wasn't me...

 

[lil_Blue_Ford]

I'd agree snowblowers beat plows for anything but maybe the lighter snow accumulations where a plow would be faster. I just can't justify the price of the machine plus storing and maintaining it and then possibly only using it a few times a year. If not for the truck plow the way this year's been I might feel different.

What I would really love is a blower for a lawn tractor. I don't understand where they come up with the prices for these things though. Have thought about making my own...



It's the same way here. Most of the houses have garages or sheds at the end of the driveway so it's impossible to straight push everything back, and what little room there is to put the snow quickly fills up. With these last few storms at work even the parking lots are filling up. I wish these guys would plan ahead a little bit and push things back as far as possible and not put piles up against buildings. They don't seem to care that what seems convenient at the time becomes a big problem for the guy that has to sit on the cabless front loader the next day for 7 hours straight moving piles of snow around. I probably wouldn't care as much if that guy wasn't me...

Yea, I thought about a blower for the tractor too until I saw the prices.

I think one thing with a lot of plow guys now is that places want to hire someone "cheaper" and cheaper usually results in "we'll just push it here because it's easy."

I do mostly residential and always try to push things as far out as I can get away with so that I have room to work the next time. But I've also run into people (especially this year) that wait waaayy too long to want their driveway plowed. Two nights ago we got a heavy snowfall, then freezing rain and then rain. The 8" of fluff with a crust on top became slopping wet and super heavy and now is dried out a little but it's like 5" of concrete now. And now I'm getting calls to plow out something that would be better suited for bucketing out with a machine (and nobody wants to hear those prices!).

 

[huh?]

LOL with that title I had to come read the rest.. LOL..

ha! me, too!

open the thread and first impression is, "oh, these guys are talking about snow moving devices." then i see between the lines and you guys are actually posting in some kind of code. "plowing" vs. "pushing", "cheaper blowers". "walking around town pro bono". someone with 2 24" something or other. lol, i'm expecting that "boner donor" dude to chime in soon.

too much cold + ranger ownership = the biggest group of hodads in the northern hemisphere haha!

yeah............ really got nothing useful to post. i don't have much experience with snow or freezing temps. however, last week the temps got down to the lower 60s, and i must say it was a really, really chilly 60s.

 

[Rowdy Fitzgerald]

ha! me, too!

open the thread and first impression is, "oh, these guys are talking about snow moving devices." then i see between the lines and you guys are actually posting in some kind of code. "plowing" vs. "pushing", "cheaper blowers". "walking around town pro bono". someone with 2 24" something or other. lol, i'm expecting that "boner donor" dude to chime in soon.

too much cold + ranger ownership = the biggest group of hodads in the northern hemisphere haha!

yeah............ really got nothing useful to post. i don't have much experience with snow or freezing temps. however, last week the temps got down to the lower 60s, and i must say it was a really, really chilly 60s.

Ha ha ha ha ha!!!! This guy is alright!

 

[naford]

I thought maybe he had put a supercharger on a snow blower. I still have my Ariens from 97. Finally had to do a little work on it. The spring that provides tension for the drive broke so it was either fix it or push it. It pushes downhill fine it's coming back up that's the b!tch.

 

[Mark_88]

I thought maybe he had put a supercharger on a snow blower. I still have my Ariens from 97. Finally had to do a little work on it. The spring that provides tension for the drive broke so it was either fix it or push it. It pushes downhill fine it's coming back up that's the b!tch.

Isn't this the reason that ski lifts were actually invented? Long before skiing was a favourite sport the snow blower crowd with wonky drive cables figured it out...it's also where Popeye got the saying "Well blow me down" but he left out the "and pull me up shaking"...