Snowblower use question

[jrogers]

Hello,

We just got our first real snow, and I have some questions on my snowblower. It is a 63" two stange front mount on a B2630.

We are building a house, so it is currently a new gravel driveway. In preperation for this, I changed the skids to put the blower in it's highest position. Do you think it is reasonable to use the blower this year, or an I just going to be breaking things? The first bit of plowing I hit something and sheared a auger bolt and broke the chain. To finish the job, I just pushed the snow with the blower and was careful not to go up against anything hard (don't want to damage the auger). This seemed to work fine. Do you think it is OK to do this on the section where there are bigger rocks and blow the rest, or should I just switch back to the FEL for the winter. The driveway is pretty big. I would really like to use the blower if I can do it without wrecking it. I wish I would have take an hour to clear all the loose rocks before it snowed, but too late now. Another option would be to buy a snow blade for it, I am going to see what this costs. The driveway is around 600', with a large parking area.

Suggestions?

 

[srossman]

Hello,

We just got our first real snow, and I have some questions on my snowblower. It is a 63" two stange front mount on a B2630.

We are building a house, so it is currently a new gravel driveway. In preperation for this, I changed the skids to put the blower in it's highest position. Do you think it is reasonable to use the blower this year, or an I just going to be breaking things? The first bit of plowing I hit something and sheared a auger bolt and broke the chain. To finish the job, I just pushed the snow with the blower and was careful not to go up against anything hard (don't want to damage the auger). This seemed to work fine. Do you think it is OK to do this on the section where there are bigger rocks and blow the rest, or should I just switch back to the FEL for the winter. The driveway is pretty big. I would really like to use the blower if I can do it without wrecking it. I wish I would have take an hour to clear all the loose rocks before it snowed, but too late now. Another option would be to buy a snow blade for it, I am going to see what this costs. The driveway is around 600', with a large parking area.

Suggestions?

If you don't have a lot of freeze/thaw cycle, I would suggest you blow with the blower up a few inches above the driveway, and then when that snow freezes and packs down, you would be able to lower the blower to the snow pack.
The other option that you could do is put a rear blade on the back and push the snow with that, and keep the blower in the front. I use a rear blade for my 600' stone driveway and although it isn't great, it does the job just fine.

 

[fish6942]

After the first one or two (hopefully) small snowfalls, we'll intentionally drive over the entire driveway - ditch to ditch - without clearing any of the snow. The idea is to lock down the gravel with this layer of hardened snow/ice then clear the subsequent snow from this bottom layer.

 

[DelSc]

I snow blow on a gravel driveway with a similar blower, but there are no rocks bigger than 3/4 inch so it doesnt seem to bother it. I have broken auger shear bolts on tennis ball sized rocks that I "found" in the road around my mailbox, but they are few and far between.

If you driveway is covered with larger rocks, you might want to pack the first couple inches of snow down until you get a good base to snow blow off of.

 

[terry2shot]

back blades work very well for removing snow as long as its not too deep.

 

[20 20]

I allways let some snow pack in and make sure the ground is froze. Everyone around here that has blowers have gravel drives, no real issues that I know of. If the ground isn't froze and you get a fair snow accumulation you could allways just use a back blade for the 1st couple of plowings until you have a smoother base.

 

[devildog1]

I think you answered your own question when you said you broke the chain and a shear bolt. I would use the FEL or a back blade for the first year until you get the issues of larger rocks from driveway. Then of course the blower would be the way to go.
DevilDog

 

[devildog1]

When you remove the large rocks from driveway you snow blower will work just like this. A breeze to blow when there are no rocks or items to break blower.:thumbsup:
DevilDog

 

[Jay4200]

Suggestions?

You obviously didn't prep your driveway. There shouldn't have been a rock there to break your blower. You can't just let things "fall as they may" - you can get away with a lot more trash using a plow, but with a blower, you have to make sure that large rocks, tree branches, the Sunday Globe, etc. are cleared off of your drive, and the areas immediately next to it BEFORE it snows.

In any case, once you get the cleared area established, with a good cut and a frozen driveway surface, you won't have any more problems. Clean up before the snow flys next year.

JayC

 

[crazyal]

If you don't mind spending the money you can always buy (or rent) a landscape rake and go over your driveway with it. I'm assuming that the ground isn't frozen yet so even with the snow it should still remove the larger rocks for you.