Snow blower for my quad...

[Hghgrad]

I've seen these things for $2000 or so, and I thought it looked like a good idea...just not at that price. I've got $150 invested...

I stumbled across this blower that somebody dumped off near my work. I went and scooped it up the next day on my way in.



Old simplicity single stage blower...but the price was perfect

Picked up a 13hp honda motor for $125 and started figuring out the mule drive and stuff..





Had to mount it, already have a plow and loader bucket that mount to the same bracket, figured I'd make this one do the same.



And this is the final product, besides some red paint and some finish welding on the motor mounts.

 

[jhn9840]

Cool project. The blower looks pretty heavy duty.

jhn9840
John

 

[malibu101]

Looks great and what a back saver.

Obviously you know what you're doing, I'm just saying, be careful to go slow and let the blower do the work. Don't jam it up with more load than it can handle if you go too fast.

I guess you can't wait for winter now, however I can.

 

[Hghgrad]

I can wait, but my driveway got substantially longer...and my barns are 500ft from the road. This is just an add on to the plow and loader bucket that I already built and used the last few years at the old house.

Just wanted to make sure I'm ready

 

[theoldwizard1]

Make sure to keep an eye on the "shoes" for wear during the season. You might even want to fab up a spare set made with heavier gauge steel.

 

[rslaback]

I always thought about doing that myself but I was planning to mount the engine behind the atv and run a belt to the front.

 

[p_mori7]

Those are heavy duty snowblowers. My neighbor across the street has one for his Agco-Allis 16hp lawn tractor. The augers need to spin REALLY fast for it to throw well. Check the center of the augers...you will see that it's shaped like 2 paddles...they are often worn out over time...you might have to build them back up or tack on a little strap of steel to compensate for the wear.

He drives his pretty hard into tough frozen snowbanks and it chews them up right quick...but he can't keep it in there for long without the engine wanting to stall out.

I would never attempt bashing into snowbanks with my blower...but mine is a two-stage...and it throws snow MUCH farther than a single stage.

I suggest you look at adding weight to the back of your ATV when using the blower. It will help with traction...and relieve stress on the front axle from all that weight up front.

That was a VERY NICE score !

You **** !

 

[Hghgrad]

The castor wheels keep all the weight off the front of the quad. The suspension doesn't really move a noticeable amount when I tip the blower back with the winch. Much less movement with this than the plow blade.

The shoes shouldn't really be touching the ground at all since it's a gravel drive and I will be leaving a bit of snow on top as a base.

I'm looking forward to playing around with it. I like the snow, but I can definitely wait

 

[ADSR]

awesome build!

 

[raddksn]

Very nice You have inspired me, last winter I ran out of places to push the snow! A blower would make my life easer!

 

[Hghgrad]

Same here. Ran out of room way too early in the season and we didn't get the melt offs like normal. If the snow is as bad as it was last year, I'm definitely ready.

 

[jim1987]

Back when atvs were atvs. 86-88 Honda forman 350 awd. Only bad thing is the awd. Lol. After a day of riding.that bike your arms feel 3' longer! But it takes some serious stupidity to get it stuck!

 

[Hghgrad]

It's an absolute tank. Turning radius comparable to my ccsb f250

The key to turning around when plowing is a lot of throttle and a quick yank on the bars. Comes right around.

I've never been stuck on it. Normally using the winch to pull something else out.

 

[jim1987]

Sad thing, that's 99% accurate. On the weight AND the turning radius..

 

[p_mori7]

The shoes shouldn't really be touching the ground at all since it's a gravel drive and I will be leaving a bit of snow on top as a base.

if you want to use it on a gravel drive, I suggest you fabricate or purchase some "extended" shoes. The ones on your blower are about 4" long wheras the extended ones are about 12" long.

When moving forward with blower, they will ride up over the uneven gravel surface before the cutting edge of the blower gets there, minimizing gravel ingestion. Also set them 1/2" or more of clearance for the cutting edge.

 

[kelpaso1]

Good luck with that. Those things are useless in my opinion. You will burn up the clutches and or belt on your atv because of the very slow speed in which you have to drive (which means lots of slipping). You cant go any faster with than than a regular walk behind blower and it is more of a pain in the *** to turn around.
I work on these things for a living (small engine tech) and have used them and I think it's a terrible way of blowing snow. But these half assed contraptions that people use keep me in business. Clutches and belts are a big money maker for me

 

[Hghgrad]

No question it be slower. There's no belts on this quad, it's shaft driven and solid front and rear axles. This isn't a machine that was meant to be ridden around the lawn by your grandpa

I regularly move my 2000lb jet ski trailer, plow snow, pull cars in and out of the garage, trees out of the woods, and much more with this machine. It's got a low first test that can damn near pull a house...and it'll do it all day long.

There is a clutch pack, and it's original 1986 to boot. If it goes out, I'll replace it and try something else. Not a huge loss. I'll probably plow the drive for the most part. This is basically to get through the really drifted stuff that ends up between the drive and the barns. I'm ok with slow, but I'm sure not walking behind a blower to clear a path wide enough. 3 passes at 800ft per is a half mile, I'd much rather ride with my heated grips.


If it doesn't work I'll scrap the blower and put the motor on something else. It wasn't a big investment and I can always use a spare motor on a go cart or something. I'm not afraid to admit defeat, but I'm pretty confident that this will work as I want it to...

 

[scrumpy]

High,

Single stage blowers work better with it pretty much loaded up. Also look into adding rubber extensions on the center of the auger where it throws the snow. You want close up the gap to the shell. I have seen people use a section of old conveyer belt bolted on. It will toss the snow much better

-scrump

 

[Hghgrad]

Good idea. I'll definitely look into that.

 

[kelpaso1]

High,

Single stage blowers work better with it pretty much loaded up. Also look into adding rubber extensions on the center of the auger where it throws the snow. You want close up the gap to the shell. I have seen people use a section of old conveyer belt bolted on. It will toss the snow much better

-scrump

I do that to my own and other customers blowers and they are amazed at how much farther it blows the snow. Hell it'll even blow big water puddles

 

[VC455]

High,

Single stage blowers work better with it pretty much loaded up. Also look into adding rubber extensions on the center of the auger where it throws the snow. You want close up the gap to the shell. I have seen people use a section of old conveyer belt bolted on. It will toss the snow much better

-scrump

section of old conveyer belt OR, old tire sidewall.

 

[Hghgrad]

I've got some old tires around the shop. I'll definitely give this a try. I'll probably set everything up and wait for it to snow then do a before and after. It'd be interesting to see how much it helps with a back to back comparison.

 

[kelpaso1]

I've got some old tires around the shop. I'll definitely give this a try. I'll probably set everything up and wait for it to snow then do a before and after. It'd be interesting to see how much it helps with a back to back comparison.

On my blower this mod makes it shoot the snow an easy 25 feet further. It also greatly increases the distance with the wet slushy stuff by the road the snow plow leaves.

This mod differs though on different blowers. The key is how much space between the impeller and the blower housing. The more space between, the more difference you will get with this mod. I use big rig mud flaps and just use self drilling/taping screws to attach to the impeller.

Since my driveway is 3/4 crushed rock I pick up the rock sometimes and have to usually replace the rubber paddles 2 or 3 times during the winter. If you have a smooth driveway they should last for years. Best way to cut the rubber is with an upright bandsaw with a metal blade. Usually just have to remove the chute to get access to the impeller.

 

[Hghgrad]

It's a gravel drive, so I'm sure they'll get ripped up pretty quickly. No big deal though.

I planned to cut a chunk out with my recip saw and using the band saw to clean it up. It'll give me a reason to put the new blade on.

 

[ahm1127]

Thats great idea, hope it works great for you. Thanks for the info on the blowers, I hate using mine & prefer the plow on the quad. I will look into the auger for wear to see if I can improve my snow blower.

 

[arrowhead]

I always though that would be the best of both worlds. I've used a big ATV to plow (Sportsman 500) and it worked great except there was a limit to how much I could push and how far. I spent more time "managing" the snow and making sure I'd have room to put it if we had a long snowy winter. Long story short now I use a 32" snow blower. It clears slower, but it actually takes less time since I don't have to manage snow banks.

Please update us when you get to use it (hopefully never)

 

[Hghgrad]

Exactly the issue. Managing the snow a few storms in becomes quite a task. I used to plow at the city house, but would quickly run out of places to put it. Last winter was a bear, and I spent quite a lot of time pushing old snow around weeks later.

A blower would have been much faster there, but not as much fun

I've got plenty of room for as much snow as we can possibly get at the new place. Plowing shouldn't be a problem, but the path to the shop is what concerns me the most.

 

[kelpaso1]

Thats great idea, hope it works great for you. Thanks for the info on the blowers, I hate using mine & prefer the plow on the quad. I will look into the auger for wear to see if I can improve my snow blower.

I always though that would be the best of both worlds. I've used a big ATV to plow (Sportsman 500) and it worked great except there was a limit to how much I could push and how far. I spent more time "managing" the snow and making sure I'd have room to put it if we had a long snowy winter. Long story short now I use a 32" snow blower. It clears slower, but it actually takes less time since I don't have to manage snow banks.

Please update us when you get to use it (hopefully never)

I'm actually going back to blowing my driveway. I bought a plow for my Honda 420 and it does have limitations on how much snow it will push. Up here it is usually heavy wet snow and it has trouble pushing more than 4-5 inches. Also as arrowhead stated you have to manage huge piles of snow and I ran out of room to plow it. Also the other complaint I had with the plow is half my driveway rocks were in my grass in the spring even though I had the skids holding the plow up an inch. Raking rocks out of the grass doesn't work so I had to get down on my hands and knees with a 5 gal bucket and hand pick them all. There were thousands and took me a week

Plows are a lot faster but blowing you don't have huge piles of snow in your yard. My driveway takes at least 4 hours to blow. Oh well

 

[kelpaso1]

Thats great idea, hope it works great for you. Thanks for the info on the blowers, I hate using mine & prefer the plow on the quad. I will look into the auger for wear to see if I can improve my snow blower.

Its not really wear, its manufacturing tolerances. If you have any more than 1/4 inch clearance then adding the paddles will help a great deal. I mount the rubber paddles on the impeller so they are lightly touching the housing. You will notice some noise when dry but in the snow the snow lubricates the paddles. Look up "snow blower impeller mod" in Google and You tube to see how it's done and the difference it makes.

 

[Hghgrad]

Now that I've got this mostly complete, I'm moving forward with the next project...

A drag behind deck for the ditch line and trees. I've got about 800' of like trees lining the sides of my yard, and I can't get very close with the zero turn without getting beat to hell, and the zero turn doesn't come out of the ditch very well. So, a drag behind offset mower seems to be the answer. Probably used on the quad, maybe the zero turn. Depends on the day I guess.

The beginnings of something magical





All from an old cub cadet that is in horrible shape. Got it for free along with another mower from the father in law when he was cleaning out the barns. Got the motor fired then stripped it out of the frame. Need to get another pulley since I stole the one off of this motor for the blower, but I think I've got one lined up for free.

Probably start a new thread when I get some progress made.

 

[gus1962]

That is some fun build. Very functional.