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What's the Hamer of... snow blowers


Toadroller

Question

My inherited late-80s Toro 824 (with PowerShift!TM and electric start) is old and weak and throws the snow like a public drinking fountain, and dang-it, I'm worth better.

Who out there can weigh in on the popular 24-28 inch $1000-$1400 range machines from Husqvarna, Ariens, Cub Cadet?  What sleeper am I missing?

I have a turn around driveway as well as a down-below large square area to get to the garage, so do need a workhorse.

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The one your neighbor comes over and cleans your driveway with.

 

 

I've been using an Ariens 927LE for the past 5-6 years. Works great! But I think the machines with the shorter wider tires work better than the thin tractor type tires for most paved surface cleaning. I had a MTD, don't remember model, 10horse/26-8" that I liked real well. To me, the important number is the height of the input section. Having a 24-28" wide blower doesn't help much if it's only10-12" tall. If the snow is deep and wet you just bog down. The intake on my 927 is 21". I can handle about any snow I get. If you expect a lot of deep heavy snow I would look for lot's of horsepower and tall as wide in the front.

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Ariens. Simplicity, some Toros.

I bought a cub cadet a few years ago but they are all made by MTD now. Not the quality they used to be. Avoid any brand with a Chinese engine if possible. The carbs are junk. I have used Stabil and Seafoam and every fall I have to pull and clean the carb as the float needle gums up and floods and won't start. I don't see it being a long term solution. 

Another good way to tell quality is by looking at the size of the gear case for the auger most have this little compact case but a good Toro, Ariens, Simplicity etc... will have a gear case almost twice as large, much more robust. 

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4 hours ago, Hbom said:

Having a 24-28" wide blower doesn't help much if it's only10-12" tall. If the snow is deep and wet you just bog down. The intake on my 927 is 21". I can handle about any snow I get. If you expect a lot of deep heavy snow

It's Maine. 

I've worked my way through 18" with my old Toro.  Slowly, but it will chomp away.  It's not uncommon to encounter 3-4 feet of plowed heavy stuff at the mouth of the driveway, and I have two of those.  I've actually bored into them and dug tunnels.  The Toro works, but if I can get the 17 year old to use that while I use the new one (it's my right as a father to use the newer, better tools) we could be done less than half the time I normally take.

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Mr. Shark, sir, with all due respect - shut the hell up. Florida in January is awesome.  ...I mean....Come on over and shovel some time. You'll love it!!

Mr Toad - you could probably put chains and a blower on your tractor for less money than buying a new stand-alone snowblower, and it will likely move more snow faster.

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We bought a new Ariens last year.  It worked fine the first few times, then when we got the 36" the exhaust valve decided to stick (went out when there was 6" on the ground) and would not run so I had to hand shovel the entire driveway.  It was purchased from a local Ariens dealer (actually the guy I sold Taylor Rental to).  Never again. 

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If your blower is weak, check to see if the belt is worn out. Even the bit snow throwers tend to use a lot of belts, and when they get worn, you get weak snow throwing.

We have a Lawn Boy snow thrower, and it's invincible. We've had it long enough for it to get rust on the front edges, which we really should do something about. It's at least 12 years old now, however lawn boy stopped making snow throwers.

Most important would be reliability, and ease of service. I've used TORO lawn mowers for decades without issue. If we didn't have a lawn boy, we'd have a toro. We do have two toro electric things we use for light snowfalls under 4 inches, just because we're lazy.

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17 hours ago, hamerhead said:

Mr. Shark, sir, with all due respect - shut the hell up. Florida in January is awesome.  ...I mean....Come on over and shovel some time. You'll love it!!

Mr Toad - you could probably put chains and a blower on your tractor for less money than buying a new stand-alone snowblower, and it will likely move more snow faster.

We did see it snowing as we were taking off from Pittsburgh a few years ago.  I've seen it "flurry" in Florida a few times, but never anything to play in!

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Snow to Floridogs is what hurricanes are to us - fun the first time but you wouldn't want to live there. Playing in it is great..... for about 5 minutes. Then you take 40 layers off and sit by the fire 'til your balls thaw out. We're not alcoholics - we need the antifreeze.

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2 hours ago, tbonesullivan said:

If your blower is weak, check to see if the belt is worn out.

You know, you've got a point there.  I had to tighten the slack in the chain drive last year, but hadn't considered the belts.  They've got to be the originals.  I'll check them out and replace.

...But I'm still going to buy another one.  :)

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On ‎12‎/‎18‎/‎2018 at 4:23 PM, Toadroller said:

It's Maine. 

I've worked my way through 18" with my old Toro.  Slowly, but it will chomp away.  It's not uncommon to encounter 3-4 feet of plowed heavy stuff at the mouth of the driveway, and I have two of those.  I've actually bored into them and dug tunnels.  The Toro works, but if I can get the 17 year old to use that while I use the new one (it's my right as a father to use the newer, better tools) we could be done less than half the time I normally take.

Ouch! That hurts! If it freezes hard before you get to it, you might need dynamite! Or at least a truck and blade.

I use mine to relocate the snowplow's piles, 1st gear crawl, move it around, consolidate, whatever. But once it's frozen hard it's a whole different deal. My dad told me "That's what 17 year old sons with shovels are for!

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On ‎12‎/‎18‎/‎2018 at 1:51 PM, JES1680 said:

Ariens. Simplicity, some Toros.

 I have used Stabil and Seafoam and every fall I have to pull and clean the carb as the float needle gums up and floods and won't start. I don't see it being a long term solution. 

 

I run my engine completely out of gas in Spring and fill it up in the Fall. Usually starts 1st pull. Same with my lawn mower only in reverse order. Stabil works well if you are going to have fuel sitting unused for a long time but in my experience leaving any fuel in the tank will gum up eventually.  

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Yeah I'll have to start draining the carb on the blower which is just about as invasive as cleaning it thanks to all the shields, cowlings, etc..  However my trimmer, car, bikes, pressure washer, leaf blower, and every other IC motor I have is fine with the fuel stabilizer. 

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From my experience, carburetors should always be run clean, regardless of whether you have a stabilizer in or not. The problem is that last float bowl full eventually evaporates slowly, and somehow always gums something up. Heck my motorcycle would get mad if I didn't run it every 2 weeks at least.

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The Hamer of snow blowers are Honda's, You will be looking at almost double the price but it was well worth it for me. Honda engines are the Hamers on small equipment. They make a badass snowblower.  3 year warranty. 

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Update:

Belts were loose.  Though there was adjustment room available, why not swap them out; they're original.  Dated the machine: looks like a 1998, which coincides with the great ice storm of '98 in Maine that left folk without power for a few weeks, and buying a snowblower would have been my father in law's reaction to such an event.  

Upon removing the old ones, I noticed the auger bearing all loosey-goosey, which has led to me watching more youTube videos of fellers with deep Maine, French-Canadien, and Boston accents showing how they fix 'em, and adding one of the bearing/bushing set to my belt order and taking the machine half apart. 

Easy enough, something to do, and keeps me from taking the front end off Mrs. Toadroller's S4 to replace the alternator.  Fairly big job, that.  I'll tackle it during my Christmas break.  Glad we have too many cars.

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I've watched my share of the guys with hoser accents working on these things. 🤣.  Mine's a Craftsman (probably an MTD) 24 x 18 opening, dual stage, lotsa horsepowers, electric start option.  I did some research (rather quickly) knowing I some surgery coming up that I knew was going to leave me unable to shovel about an 1,100 square foot driveway for at least a while.  Got it home just ahead of a 12" or so snowfall and it performed just fine.  I use premium gas, Marine-grade Sta-Bil,  and start it up once in a while then shut the fuel off and run it dry. 

Our vehicles are both Subarus with better than 8.5" of honest ground clearance, so I really don't use the throw snower until it gets pretty deep.  As a result, I haven't used it all that often (maybe once last winter).  And admittedly, we've only had a couple of snowfalls that would challenge this thing in the past 20 years.  But my approach has been, if you can afford it, buy a little more tool than you really need for the job at hand.  That way, if you get surprised by a job, the tool will still be up to it.  And it's likely to last longer under normal use too. 

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