First snow managed

[atitus74]

Well this is my first snow fall with my Kubota BX1880 and I'm pretty pleased. We got 6+inches of medium-weight snow and I was able to clear 1200 feet of driveway in about an hour. I took it a little slow being the first time but no shear pins sacrificed yet. I have to say that this is the first time in 35+ hours on this tractor that I felt I could have benefitted from the 26 HP or 23 HP engine instead of the 18 but not sure even now I would have parted with the extra cash. I wish I could have made a video but it was still snowing when I was out there and my phone isn't one of those fancy waterproof ones. Oh well I'll get one next time. Hope everybody in this north eastern storm is warm safe and dry take care.

 

[mpham]

Nice write up! Hopefully you will be pleased with your tractor for a long time.

 

[oosik]

atitus - you cleared the entire 1200 feet without blowing a shear pin. That means you did an initial FOD (foreign object detection) inspection and that also was a success. Usually - if I was going to blow a shear pin, it was always on the initial run down the driveway. Thereafter - clear sailing.

 

[LouNY]

Well we got our first plowable snow last night, 4 or 5 inches so far forecasting 1 to 3 more this morning.
Went out and shoveled and brushed snow of my wifes car, so she can go to work, started the tractor to warm it up.
Time for another cup of coffee, then go shut it down for a few hours till I start plowing.

 

[CobyRupert]

Spent an hour snow blowing driveways (partially), shoveling porches and walks and sweeping off cars this morning just to get out of driveway. More will be required tonight.
....but first I had to spend 1/2 an hour putting on the tire chains and weights, lubricate
....but first I had to spend 1-1/2 hours last night putting on the snowblower subframe, handles, attaching the snowblower and getting the belts to turn in the right direction....
....but first I had to spend 1 hour rearranging the garage so I could even get to the snowblower!!

So yeah, 4 hours invested just for 2" of snow :banghead:

 

[Oaktree]

It seems the more hyped the storm, the bigger the bust it is here in northern N.H. Portland tv meteorologist's map was showing 5-8" for here, we got maybe 2.
On the contrary, Tuesday's storm, which was supposed to be mostly sleet and rain dumped 10+" of heart attack cement on us. My driveway isn't so long that the loader doesn't work just fine, but it was such joy laying in that putting on the chains. Didn't think I'd need 'em for another couple weeks. R4's are pretty useless in snow.

I have to say that this is the first time in 35+ hours on this tractor that I felt I could have benefitted from the 26 HP or 23 HP engine instead of the 18 but not sure even now I would have parted with the extra cash.

I dunno. Before I got the Kioti I had a JD750, which I think was 18hp, and I didn't notice a big difference between the two when it came to clearing snow other than the bucket is 1' wider on the Kioti (and has a float function).

 

[leonz]

atitus - you cleared the entire 1200 feet without blowing a shear pin. That means you did an initial FOD (foreign object detection) inspection and that also was a success. Usually - if I was going to blow a shear pin, it was always on the initial run down the driveway. Thereafter - clear sailing.

Well this is my first snow fall with my Kubota BX1880 and I'm pretty pleased. We got 6+inches of medium-weight snow and I was able to clear 1200 feet of driveway in about an hour. I took it a little slow being the first time but no shear pins sacrificed yet. I have to say that this is the first time in 35+ hours on this tractor that I felt I could have benefitted from the 26 HP or 23 HP engine instead of the 18 but not sure even now I would have parted with the extra cash. I wish I could have made a video but it was still snowing when I was out there and my phone isn't one of those fancy waterproof ones. Oh well I'll get one next time. Hope everybody in this north eastern storm is warm safe and dry take care.

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Hello aititus,


You managed to kill off the END OF DRIVEWAY MONSTER and feed the moat monsters with the remains of the END OF DRIVEWAY MONSTER without breaking a shear pin.
You did the FOD disposal work without finding any wood bombs that the squirrels would have left, good for you.

Since your new at this; when you make your first pass make it on the side of the driveway where the plow passes your home and dumps the snow AWAY from the driveway.

Doing it in this manner lets you clear off the END OF DRIVEWAY MONSTER to feed the moat monsters with its remains and also flush the salt laden crap out at the first pass where you clear off the salt laden crap completely by just concentrating on the end of the driveway first and and then when you do your next passes you are flushing the all salt laden crap out of the snow blower and end up with nearly no salt laden crap in the snow blower as each succeeding pass just pushes clean snow through the snow blower.

If you have access to hot and cold water you will be money ahead washing the snow and ice off the tractor and snow blower.

OH and buy a spray can or two of Fluid Film to spray everything that contacts snow as it will slick up the chute, spout, impeller etc. and you can blow the crap across the road or down the block as long as you do not drive too fast. Keep the fluid film warm in the house and it will mix faster and coat better.

If you have a warm storage area you can spray the spout and chute with several coats of Fluid Film and let it dry between coats.

Short of that turtle wax in several coats can also work well but it will not be as slick as ski wax or fluid film.

Be happy the moat monsters down the road just got a free meal that did not involve a car wandering into the ditch.

What made you decide to purchase a front mount instead of rear mount that would have been less expensive and required less power?

 

[leonz]

It seems the more hyped the storm, the bigger the bust it is here in northern N.H. Portland tv meteorologist's map was showing 5-8" for here, we got maybe 2.
On the contrary, Tuesday's storm, which was supposed to be mostly sleet and rain dumped 10+" of heart attack cement on us. My driveway isn't so long that the loader doesn't work just fine, but it was such joy laying in that putting on the chains. Didn't think I'd need 'em for another couple weeks. R4's are pretty useless in snow.
I dunno. Before I got the Kioti I had a JD750, which I think was 18hp, and I didn't notice a big difference between the two when it came to clearing snow other than the bucket is 1' wider on the Kioti (and has a float function).

======================================================================

I have an LA115 with 216 hours that has a junk RAD snow blower that eats parts and I also found out from a friend at another JD dealer that there was a service bulletin stating the bloody things were shipped short of parts from Canada.

 

[chim]

As has been the case in recent times, our weather forecaster blew it. Until it was actually happening, the forecast was for some snow, then sleet and freezing rain, then warming and rain with little accumulation.

Both my tractors still had the mowers attached. First order of business late yesterday afternoon was to get the Kubota ready for something other than mowing. Of course it was already dark before starting on that. There was no reason to put the blower on because of the heavy wet snow that was falling. The rear blade was the weapon of choice. I had an awful time swapping things around. We did get some rain as I was wrapping up for the evening. Thank goodness the wiper worked. It's just jammed on the arm after I broke a clip when I knocked it off with a rag a few weeks ago while doing a quick windshield wipe. Figured there was plenty of time to fix it before we got any snow.

In a strange twist of fate, my BIL texted me earlier in the day and asked if I could help out at their place because his Kubota is in the shop - having a snow blower installed! He wanted the dealer to do the intial install because of the chute controls.

 

[leonz]

Its warming up around here so I will wait on doing anything as its supposed to rain and................................
I have the chains in the truck and my collapsable snow shovel I just have to buy a new small tarp.

 

[atitus74]

Spent an hour snow blowing driveways (partially), shoveling porches and walks and sweeping off cars this morning just to get out of driveway. More will be required tonight.
....but first I had to spend 1/2 an hour putting on the tire chains and weights, lubricate
....but first I had to spend 1-1/2 hours last night putting on the snowblower subframe, handles, attaching the snowblower and getting the belts to turn in the right direction....
....but first I had to spend 1 hour rearranging the garage so I could even get to the snowblower!!

So yeah, 4 hours invested just for 2" of snow :banghead:

Wow Coby it sounds like you were busy! Fortunately with the kubota is much faster to get the front snow blower on. 1 minute to take the bucket off, 1 minute to put the hydraulic lift on (though **** that thing is heavy) then just drive up and pick up the blower. To be fair though I had already taken off the mower deck last week. That does take a bit longer. What is funny is that I almost tried to use it without installing the pto shaft from the mid pto to the front lift. Would not have got very far that way!

I dunno. Before I got the Kioti I had a JD750, which I think was 18hp, and I didn't notice a big difference between the two when it came to clearing snow other than the bucket is 1' wider on the Kioti (and has a float function).

Using the loader, it makes little difference I think all three kubota models have same hydraulic lift capacity. Its the PTO which makes a big difference at least that is what I have heard.

 

[Thomas]

Glad you got good feel of the BX before old fashion nor'easter comes a knocking.

 

[atitus74]

OH and buy a spray can or two of Fluid Film to spray everything that contacts snow as it will slick up the chute, spout, impeller etc. and you can blow the crap across the road or down the block as long as you do not drive too fast. Keep the fluid film warm in the house and it will mix faster and coat better.

Leonz thanks for the tips. I got the same advice on spraying lubricant from the dealer when they dropped it off this summer. I do have some fluid film, I wanted to see what it was like without it, I plan to spray before the next storm and see how much of an improvement it makes.

What made you decide to purchase a front mount instead of rear mount that would have been less expensive and required less power?

I've read through a few threads where this comes up a lot. I know personally there is no way I could drive backwards that long. I'd break my neck. I certainly see the advantage in the lower cost -- not sure I understand on the power though. As I understand it you get pretty much the same power on both PTO (though faster RPM on the mid) . Now if you are saying a bigger than 50" blower in the back -- I get that. [/QUOTE]

 

[tiktock]

I live just north of you in Plaistow, NH and coincidentally also used my brand new BX 1880 with a front mount blower for the very first time last night moving about 7" of absurdly heavy, wet snow and I was blowing in a full rain this morning.

My first course of action was to rip off that stupid safety cage on the chute. Its there to prevent a person from putting their hand into a moving impeller but I dont see how that would be possible since you cant get out of the seat with the PTO engaged. The moment I removed that, my clogging issues ceased.

I also need to experiment with using 'float" with the blower. It took me a bit to find the sweet pot of downward pressure to get a nice clean pass while not sacrificing front tire traction.

I'm surprised you seemed to feel the HP. How did you determine that? Even running at about 3/4 full RPM I was able to take a full 50" wide pass through the snowbank at the end of my driveway without a hint of power loss or bogging and the reality is we rarely get quite this level of water content.

I'm 100% with you. There is no alternative reality in which I would even remotely consider spending hours on a tractor snowblowing in reverse. I'm still young and my neck hurts just thinking about it.

One big help was the work I did to install LED spots and a lightbar on the ROPS. Stock headlights nicely illuminate the back of the snowblower but I felt much better lighting up half my neighborhood with ~150W of LEDs and didnt worry once about the bleary-eyed plow guys hitting me.

 

[atitus74]

I live just north of you in Plaistow, NH and coincidentally also used my brand new BX 1880 with a front mount blower for the very first time last night moving about 7" of absurdly heavy, wet snow and I was blowing in a full rain this morning.

My first course of action was to rip off that stupid safety cage on the chute. Its there to prevent a person from putting their hand into a moving impeller but I dont see how that would be possible since you cant get out of the seat with the PTO engaged. The moment I removed that, my clogging issues ceased.

I also need to experiment with using 'float" with the blower. It took me a bit to find the sweet pot of downward pressure to get a nice clean pass while not sacrificing front tire traction.

I'm surprised you seemed to feel the HP. How did you determine that? Even running at about 3/4 full RPM I was able to take a full 50" wide pass through the snowbank at the end of my driveway without a hint of power loss or bogging and the reality is we rarely get quite this level of water content.

I'm 100% with you. There is no alternative reality in which I would even remotely consider spending hours on a tractor snowblowing in reverse. I'm still young and my neck hurts just thinking about it.

One big help was the work I did to install LED spots and a lightbar on the ROPS. Stock headlights nicely illuminate the back of the snowblower but I felt much better lighting up half my neighborhood with ~150W of LEDs and didnt worry once about the bleary-eyed plow guys hitting me.

Wow tiktock we have very similar setup! I have added LED light bar to my ROPS and it works great. I left the "cage" on mine. Maybe that is what might be robbing the power a bit. In my case I could hear a change in the engine sound and see the rpm dropping at which point I would just slow down a bit and the rpm would go right back up. It could be as much of a function of me being impatient and driving too fast vs anything else. I went as high as about 2800 maybe 2900 rpm, which is actually below the 'optimal' operating range for PTO but I was a little nervous didn't want to break pins. Now that I am more comfortable with it I might try to put the RPM up to optimal next time.

 

[atitus74]

I also need to experiment with using 'float" with the blower. It took me a bit to find the sweet pot of downward pressure to get a nice clean pass while not sacrificing front tire traction.

I forgot to add in my previous post -- I used float the entire time, and I was very happy got nice clean passes. The metal shoes scrape the pavement a bit, however you can cut down on that by raising it up when going in reverse or swinging it around. Push the loader control all the way forward in a swift motion (you'll feel a click when it opens the valve up) and you won't get any lift on the tires. If it started riding up and over hard pack snow usually I just back up and then go forward again and I'd be right back on the ground with a clean scrape. Good Luck !

 

[ultrarunner]

Just read of massive traffic jams and kids spending the night in school because roads were closed. It really hit New York and region hard.

The kicker was the snow plow operators were not able to work straight through as they have in the past because of mandatory meal breaks, rest periods and limit on hours worked???

 

[tiktock]

I forgot to add in my previous post -- I used float the entire time, and I was very happy got nice clean passes. The metal shoes scrape the pavement a bit, however you can cut down on that by raising it up when going in reverse or swinging it around. Push the loader control all the way forward in a swift motion (you'll feel a click when it opens the valve up) and you won't get any lift on the tires. If it started riding up and over hard pack snow usually I just back up and then go forward again and I'd be right back on the ground with a clean scrape. Good Luck !

Good to know. I've used float quite a bit with the loader and it just didnt even occur to me to use it with the snowblower for some reason. It being 5:00am might have had a lot to do with it! I have another 250' to blow tonight if there's anything left so I'll experiment.

The only thing I've considered was getting a back blade just wider than my tires but after today, I dont think I'll ever need it.

 

[cabover4us]

Just read of massive traffic jams and kids spending the night in school because roads were closed. It really hit New York and region hard.

The kicker was the snow plow operators were not able to work straight through as they have in the past because of mandatory meal breaks, rest periods and limit on hours worked???

I remember in the 70s and 80s in the am hours city and state plows would be running through the night to keep roads clear for morning commute. But, if you were unlucky enough to work over in Bennington, Vermont, you knew as soon as you hit the border you would be in snow, normally Vermont waits for snow to end except for the truck route across Woodford, Searsburg Mountains on route 9, been stuck a few times myself on that road.
Flabbergasted, that in 2018 we cant seem to get full funding on what I consider safety subjects, like snow plowing, now the news media is teaching and coaching us on how to drive in snow.

 

[Jstpssng]

It seems the more hyped the storm, the bigger the bust it is here in northern N.H. Portland tv meteorologist's map was showing 5-8" for here, we got maybe 2.
On the contrary, Tuesday's storm, which was supposed to be mostly sleet and rain dumped 10+" of heart attack cement on us. My driveway isn't so long that the loader doesn't work just fine, but it was such joy laying in that putting on the chains. Didn't think I'd need 'em for another couple weeks. R4's are pretty useless in snow.



I dunno. Before I got the Kioti I had a JD750, which I think was 18hp, and I didn't notice a big difference between the two when it came to clearing snow other than the bucket is 1' wider on the Kioti (and has a float function).

I don't think that the tire style has anything to do with it. That wet heavy crap that you just described renders pretty much anything useless.