to blow or to plow?

[nomad]

the snow. Just confused. Have not understood the advantage of blowing the snow over plowing it. While we have a levelling blade which can be easily used for plowing the snow why pay for another item called snow blower?

 

[Duffster]

You have never moved big snow have you?

 

[nomad]

have done 1 - 2 ft. Not often however. Once a year.
Comparing the time. How long does it take to blow a snow of 1 ft on a 100 ft driveway by a medium size blower?

 

[NSBound]

If you don't get big storms or much snow, plowing or pushing the snow is OK. But if you get lots of snow, a blower is what you should have, to move the snow out of the way all in one pass, without the need to make multiple passes and back-and-forth action with the FEL to pile it up. However, if it snows a lot either all at once or over the winter, you're going to have snowbanks along your drive or whever you push it to, and at some point you'll run out of places to put it, even with a FEL. I'm a fine one to talk, as I am going to give it a try this winter with just a FEL in my first winter with a tractor, and see what I'm talking about first-hand!

 

[rus_geek]

If you're going to plow, you need to have somewhere to push the snow *to* when you take it off the drive. Halfway through last winter I had 4-6' tall snowbanks down both sides of the drive. It is a lot easier to blow over them than to plow through them. Either that or you would have to plow the driveway twice as wide as it actually is (plow grass and probably damage the lawn) to leave room for the banks to build up.

If you have steep enough ditches on the sides of the drive, this becomes less of a concern. Also if you don't get that much snow, etc.

-rus-

 

[Coolnorth]

So here's an idea of what my old Massey is up against - no FEL, just a blade. You can see the pile is about 5 feet high and the plowing is not working well at this point - It's January and there is 3 more months of snow coming. Now what I don't have a photo of is me taking over an hour to plow off the banks when they get too high and close in on the drive. I'm plowing 750 feet of drive, 12 feet wide so a blower would be better IMO, but do I have one? Yes, but it's a walk-behind, 12 hp, 32 inch, so it's not a preferred tool, except when a single snowfall is around the one foot mark.

 

[SPYDERLK]

have done 1 - 2 ft. Not often however. Once a year.
Comparing the time. How long does it take to blow a snow of 1 ft on a 100 ft driveway by a medium size blower?

Around 2 minutes using an 8hp MTD 4 passes to get 8' width....and for all intents and purposes the snow disappears, having been thrown 30-40' away and compacted a bit.
larry

 

[Wis Bang]

Dad worked for the local highway department and when driving Mom on shoping trips would criticize the other towns snowbanks for not pushing every snowfall as far back as possible to leave 'room' for the next snowfall. Once the pile freezes solid it becomes alot harder to plow any additional snow further back with just a simple plow.

He had the neighbors trained; when he came home for coffee, dry socks, etc. they all would dig out their cars and drive around the block while he plowed the block curb to curb b/4 going back to work. They all left their shovels in the bank to get back to the sidewalk.

 

[wedge40]

If they measure annual snow fall in inches, use a plow, if it's measured in feet, get a blower.

Wedge

 

[rut3556]

I like both. I have a 5' blower on the back and a FEL. (bucket) The blower works most of the time, but if the snow is too wet I turn to the front end loader.

 

[billsh96]

I agree with wedge40, once you have seen too much snow to push with a blade, you will know! Once while on a business trip when I lived in Michigan's upper penninsula, I called home and asked how the driveway looked. My wife said "fine, and by the way they get $65.00 an hour for a front end loader!!"
Bill

 

[wedge40]

I agree with wedge40, once you have seen too much snow to push with a blade, you will know! Once while on a business trip when I lived in Michigan's upper penninsula, I called home and asked how the driveway looked. My wife said "fine, and by the way they get $65.00 an hour for a front end loader!!"
Bill

I went to school in the U.P. There they measured snow in feet. My freshman year of college was 1978. We got over 32' of snow that year. I was fascinated watching them clean up down town Houghton with snow blowers and dump trucks.

Wedge

 

[claridon]

I used to plow snow with my backblade. I got pretty good at it but it was a lot of time consuming work.
I now have a blower on the front of my Cub Cadet. Less time clearing snow (about 1/2), less damage to the yard, no big piles to melt down before the next storm.
We get about 10 ft of snow a season. Driveway is about 250' x 12'.
IMO, a blower is a much better way to go.
-Len

 

[Opti-Mist]

I went to school in the U.P. There they measured snow in feet. My freshman year of college was 1978. We got over 32' of snow that year. I was fascinated watching them clean up down town Houghton with snow blowers and dump trucks.

Wedge

I was there about 15 years ahead of you - never had a snow day in my years of commuting there. Spent the first 22 years of my life there, but only the last few at "Ta Tech" Now that I'm retired I call home some 250 miles to the east where as much as 60" of snow has fallen over a weekend and lake effect snow gets plowed every other day at times.

I heartily agree with blowing vs plowing for not leaving banks for drifting snow to level up to and making things worse. That said, I generally plow but break the banks back as soon as the fluffy stuff sets up. So far I've not run out of places for the plowed snow to be stored until spring.

 

[AHNC]

Push snow into a big pile and let the wind come up in just the right way and you can have more deep drifting problems than you can believe. I will always vote for a snow blower. It's an expensive implement but it sure helps to get the snow away from the area you use every day.

 

[Barneyhunts]

I like to use the snowblower because, along with what others have mentioned, I think it is much easier on the tractor!

 

[Tig]

and of course the blower is way more fun!!

 

[Charles Billings]

Most all town roads in Vermont are plowed. In order to do that you need very large trucks with lots of horse power, and keep on plowing so the snow doesn't accumulate too much for even these large vehicles to handle. Same thing goes for tractors. If you have a large tractor and don't mind spending most of the storm out plowing, then maybe a plow is okay. When I first contemplated plow or blower I was persuaded to go with a blower for several reasons: 1. The Buhler Allied 74" PTO blower was less expensive than a plow. 2. I didn't want to stay up all night keeping ahead of the snow--with a blower I can wait until the storm stops, and then clear things out, even if it has accumulated 3 feet. 3. Having a blower on the rear means backing up to accomplish the work, but then you still have full use of your FEL which I find is still very important to clean up areas that would be difficult if you only had a snow plow or blower on the front. An FEL is very useful in keeping snow banks in bay and making sure that they don't become frozen barriers, and providing a bucket to deliver sand when the roadway gets icy. I would suggest that the smaller the tractor the more imporant it is to consider a snow blower.

 

[scuvnut]

blow is the best

 

[irvingj]

"Yee-Ha!"

Blower. No high banks, snow's gone away in one pass.