JD 316 with 49 Snowblower

[jgbanshee]

My friend uses his 316 with 49 blower on his gravel driveway and it is constantly sucking up gravel. The gravel is at most 1/2 inch in size. The hydraulic cylinder on the lift seems like it can only pick the blower all the way up or lower it all the way down. It takes some time to get the blower to hover over the gravel. I was thinking of adding something to bottom side on the shape "cutting" edge. Has anyone done something like this before?

 

[JDFANATIC]

jgbanshee,

Years ago I had a JD425 with a 46" snowthrower and a gravel driveway. I chose the single stage blower based on my dealers recommendation. With the gravel drive, I think he was right. What he did do, was take the side shoes and weld some 3/16" steel (kind of like skiis) to the base. This raised the blower and gave it more room to ride on. After 10+ years (and yes I had to rake lots of gravel out of my lawn each spring) I had the driveway paved! /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif This is the best fix and I've already forgotten how much it cost. Short of this, here is something I saved from another forum and a poster wiz487 who had this on his walk-behind. If I were doing it all over again, I would be fooling around with some permutation of this: /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif Note the wheels:

 

[TimberXX]

does that blower say 3 stage? what is that?

 

[JDFANATIC]

Timber,

Yeah, that is a 3 stage blower. My neighbor had one that just joined the great snowblower in the sky club after ~ 15 years. There is the main auger, and the one in the chute common to 2-stage units, but also a auger in between and across the top of the intake mouth. I'd have to say it worked great, but probably over-engineered. /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif