6 ms·

The secret lives of snowblowers

115 points by zdw 2y ago

echelon_musk 2y ago
I immediately recalled this scene from Short Circuit: https://youtube.com/watch?v=XLn38HQNSYo https://youtube.com/watch?v=XLn38HQNSYo
MisterTea 2y ago
I once broke a shear pin after a length of old sump pump discharge hose buried under a snow pile became entangled in the auger blades. The spare shear pins were missing, so I figured I'd take a cheap steel 1/4-20 bolt and grind it down until its just about a 1/16 of an inch diameter at the point where the auger tube and drive shaft meet. It did not work as the following snow fall I hit a rock and the damn thing jumped violently and I let go of the drive clutch which prevented it from completely self destructing. The auger tube hole was gouged from the screw on both sides, the screw bent into a Z shape and the housing was slightly bent askew. After some reforming in my shop it was working fine again and still runs to this day. That Craftsman 5HP blower has taken a hell of a beating, is in rough shape but still runs. I keep wanting to up the HP a bit but its seen enough abuse. Pro tip: always winterize the engine to keep it running for years. Drain the fuel completely, and drain the carburetor bowl. Pull the spark plug and put a cap full of motor oil in the cylinder and gently turn the engine over by hand using the pull cord to coat the walls. Also helps to tape over the exhaust and stuff the intake port with steel wool to keep critters out of the passages. I once had a generator suddenly stop working and upon pulling the plug found a dead spider across the electrodes which shorted it.
- germinalphrase 2y ago
  Yes, I made the mistake of failing to winterize and now I've got a tune up job on my hands. Got any good advice there?
  - analog31 2y ago
    The thing I have had to do every winter is drop the carburetor bowl and spray carb cleaner up through the Jets. This means draining the gas into something, which I pre empt by draining it in the spring. Also this year I left the carb bowl off of it. And use the gas in the mower so you can start with fresh gas come winter.
- dgfitz 2y ago
  I'm sure you're tracking: but those shear pins shear for a reason. :)
  - floatrock 2y ago
    In a pinch, you can just put a quarter across your fuse terminals if your fuses keep popping for some reason!
    - SteveNuts 2y ago
      I like to use old .22 bullets, they fit perfectly!
      - genewitch 2y ago
        your name and this comment instantly reminded me of the Lewis Black bit "Other idiots in Arkansas" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIYkaCAsTyw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIYkaCAsTyw For a second i heard lewis black in my head say "Steve shot his nuts off" but he doesn't, he actually says "thurston shot his nuts off"
- AtlasBarfed 2y ago
  Or buy an electric one. The entire array of two stroke lawn tools are obsolete with electric batteries and electric motors that are more compact, higher torque, quiter, and far less polluting. Soon, they will be cheaper. Unfortunately EV based tools slotted in the luxury upscale segment, abut vastly declining battery costs still haven't trickled down to the consumer. High density lfp and sodium ion and solid state should change this. The other crappy thing is that the tools use their differing shapes and molds to lock in you to a single line of tools., so you can reuse batteries across tools only of the same maker (which enables you to have a second set of freshly charged batteries when the primary drains, and you can charge the battery will hold you use the second set) Emer really need formalized standards to force battery companies to use an interchangeable standard like disposable batteries, electric plugs, railroad rails, etc ...and while they're at it, please force the plastic tote business to use a standard lid
  - floatrock 2y ago
    Electric lawnmowers and leafblowers are great, but everyone I know who's tried a (battery) electric snowblower complains it's either underpowered for anything more than a dusting or it burns out after a season. All for electrifying all the things and getting rid of as many polluting two-stroke engines as possible, but heavy wet snow seems to be one place where the energy density of gasoline is the right tool for the job.
    - mikepurvis 2y ago
      Even electric lawnmowers can be a bit underwhelming power-wise. I share one with a few neighbours and it works well enough for our small downtown yards, but I would be pretty annoyed with it if I was trying to do a job any longer than about 30 minutes.
    - hunter-gatherer 2y ago
      I don't know... I watched my grandpa hand shovel heavy wet snow until the year he died. If we really care about polution, we'd just buck up and use a hand shovel.
- nsxwolf 2y ago
  I initially didn't take the "drain the fuel" advice when I got my snowblower, because I never did it for my lawnmower and it was fine year after year. And in its second season, it utterly failed to start. My friend gave me a tip to drain the fuel and put some fresh gas with a little jet fuel in it, and it started immediately.
  - nemo44x 2y ago
    You can always stabilize your fuel too and it will last into the next season. However, depending on your climate it may be worth it to just buy cans of fuel at the hardware store. It's much higher quality than what you'll get at a gas station and doesn't contain additives, which are very problematic for carburetors when left in the tank until the next season. It cost more but if you're not blowing snow too often you probably won't even notice the cost. They also come in smaller cans so you can store nicely if needed.
    - SkyPuncher 2y ago
      I only use the high quality hardware store stuff now. I simply don’t run my snowblower enough for the price difference to be meaningful.
      - nemo44x 2y ago
        It's noticeably better. The engine timing is so good with it compared to the gas station stuff meant for fuel injected automobile engines. Higher octane and compression I believe and the snowblower engine just hums and burns clean.
        dalyons 2y ago
        Huh. I had the opposite experience, bought some canned hardware store fuel for my snowblower out of laziness, and it wouldn’t even run. Seemed to be too high octane or something, kept stalling out. Had to drain it completely, put regular gas in and it’s fine.
- dugmartin 2y ago
  Good tip about blocking the intake/exhaust (I'll do that this year). I normally just hand pump out the gas until there is just a little left and then start it up and let it run dry. I then do an oil change and tape a note over the oil plug that I did the oil change as otherwise I'll not remember the next Winter.
- HeyLaughingBoy 2y ago
  Reminds me of the furnace that kept throwing a low combustion air pressure code (by blinking an LED). Turned out to be a now-dead bird that got sucked into the cold air intake.
itsanaccount 2y ago
Moved to Western Michigan a few years back. I got the tractor for the quarter mile drive in case things get real bad but I'll tell you my strategy of "don't buy a complicated snow blower, wait for it to melt" has so far worked out well. If you're close to any body that averages out temperatures (Lake Michigan, swamps), it melts. People have no idea how fast global warming is happening.
- pragma_x 2y ago
  It never even occurred to me that the "lake effect" would work in the opposite direction. Water's ability to retain heat is really amazing. > People have no idea how fast global warming is happening. For people that live near the Great Lakes, you may have stumbled onto a very compelling bit of evidence. For many, "rising ocean temperatures" is a whole world away. Whereas this kind of phenomenon is much easier to grasp.
  - bitsinthesky 2y ago
    Lake Michigan is famously terribly cold to swim in. However this year I’ve found it mostly comfortable, almost as comfortable as a swimming pool. Looking online, it’s above 70 degrees! https://apps.glerl.noaa.gov/marobs/php/data.php?sta=0 https://apps.glerl.noaa.gov/marobs/php/data.php?sta=0 Up in Door County the lake would freeze enough to ski on, but nowadays, well good luck with that.
  - itsanaccount 2y ago
    The water table is at ground level September to April here. The ground only froze the first year we moved in, the waters keeping the heat. I noticed that same effect with season extenders. They average out the temperatures using the raised soil as the heatsink. We harvested fresh greens from the garden on Christmas Day in Chicago, that was 5 years ago. I just talked to a guy at a bar who's been here since the 70s, he's harvesting grapes a month early. People who grow things know. Its everyone else I think we have to convince.
- apercu 2y ago
  SW Wisconsin. 7% grade, 300 foot driveway that is exposed to North winds. We had a (walking) snowblower and I used that for the first winter. It sucked. With the hill, waiting for a melt isn't possible - there's no way to keep control of a car going down that hill, and at the base of the drive across the narrow road is a line of mature pines. We got very little snow last winter, but what snow we did mostly came in a two week window and it was multiple feet of heavy snow. Subcompact diesel tractor with a snowpusher (not a plow). Driveway takes no time, and I use the bucket and forklift forks all the time. I have a mower deck but I use a little cub cadet instead as the tractor (especially with liquid in the back tires) is kinda heavy for a "lawn". (I have very little lawn, converted the front 3/4 acre to mostly prairie), but I still have to mow some. Every situation is different.
mauvehaus 2y ago
This is your friendly reminder to never clear a jammed snow blower with your hands (or any other part of your body). Even with the engine stopped, there can be enough energy stored in the drivetrain to make a mess of your fingers when it's suddenly released. This reminder is brought to you by the guy I knew who had two deformed fingers from two different snow blower jam-clearing incidents.
- mikestew 2y ago
  Two separate incidents? Some people really don’t learn, huh?
  - shwaj 2y ago
    He didn't do it a third time.
    - immibis 2y ago
      No hands left.
- glitchc 2y ago
  Snowblowers usually come with a spade-like attachment clipped to the top of the auger housing for precisely this reason. Please use that instead of your hands.
teslabox 2y ago
I picked up a Honda snowblower for my dad's house this past winter. He shares a non-maintained road with his neighbors, and for the past few years I've helped them with shoveling. Dad always tried to do his part with clearing the snow, but wasn't able to shovel this year, so he opened his wallet. In February I got a call from the snowblower shop that their first shipment of wheeled snowblowers had arrived. If I wanted to wait they were supposed to be getting a shipment with tracks. I measured the percent grade of our driveways and roads and decided we needed the tracked version. Our snowblower arrived two days before a pair of back-to-back storms that dumped almost 2 feet of wet, heavy snow. It's a game changer. I asked the one neighbor, who'd said previously "the only snowblower I'd buy is a Honda" [1], what he thought as he was plodding along behind the new snowblower : "You didn't cheap out, and it's the right tool for the job." The other neighbor was out shoveling around their car, to hopefully be able to get out for her daughter-in-law's surgery. We blasted through the steep part of her driveway. I got a text message that night: 'where did you get that thing?' The advantage of Honda's tracked snowblower over their wheeled version is that there's a lever-operated piston that adjusts the height, while the wheeled version has no adjustment. Over those two storms, we probably would have spent at least 12 hours shoveling (breaks included). The snowblower cleared the road in an hour. As someone says below, it's important to drain the gasoline at the end of the winter, so it doesn't gum up over the summer. Even if there was a battery-powered two-stage snowblower, why would anyone get one? It'd be a waste of lithium. Edit: When my mom & her husband moved to Flagstaff, their first two-stage snowblower was whatever Costco had for sale that winter. It worked for a few years, then threw a rod through the block on a particularly heavy storm. He returned the unit to Costco, read up on snowblowers, bought himself a big Ariens, and was completely happy with it. His Ariens used a motor from Tecumseh. Tecumseh went bankrupt around 2008 and got split up [2]. Somewhere I read that Tecumseh's engine manufacturing was relocated to China, and that all the post-2009 Ariens use Chinese engines. Someone said the Chinese Tecumseh engines aren't so bad, because they got all the IP about how to make them properly. Or maybe Tecumseh's engine design was obsolete, needed to be redesigned to comply with emission regulations, and the new Chinese Tecumseh engines are better. ??? Harbor Freight sells knock-off Honda engines, as their Predator engines. There are some youtube videos that compare genuine Honda engines to the knock-offs. Edit2: Found some forum posts that tells of how Honda's approach to manufacturing engines has changed over the years [3]. [1] https://powerequipment.honda.com/snowblowers https://powerequipment.honda.com/snowblowers / https://www.reddit.com/r/HondaSnowblowers/ https://www.reddit.com/r/HondaSnowblowers/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tecumseh_Products#Gasoline_engine_components https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tecumseh_Products#Gasoline_eng... / https://www.snowblowerforum.com/threads/made-in-the-usa-versus-made-in-china.1364/ https://www.snowblowerforum.com/threads/made-in-the-usa-vers... [3] https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733694/ https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733694/ / https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733738/ https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733738/
djmips 2y ago
If you are interested there are repair videos like those of Mustie1 which do a good job of touring you through the mechanics of a snowblower. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mustie1+snowblower https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mustie1+snowblo...

115 points by zdw 2y ago

I immediately recalled this scene from Short Circuit: https://youtube.com/watch?v=XLn38HQNSYo https://youtube.com/watch?v=XLn38HQNSYo

MisterTea 2y ago

I once broke a shear pin after a length of old sump pump discharge hose buried under a snow pile became entangled in the auger blades. The spare shear pins were missing, so I figured I'd take a cheap steel 1/4-20 bolt and grind it down until its just about a 1/16 of an inch diameter at the point where the auger tube and drive shaft meet. It did not work as the following snow fall I hit a rock and the damn thing jumped violently and I let go of the drive clutch which prevented it from completely self destructing. The auger tube hole was gouged from the screw on both sides, the screw bent into a Z shape and the housing was slightly bent askew. After some reforming in my shop it was working fine again and still runs to this day. That Craftsman 5HP blower has taken a hell of a beating, is in rough shape but still runs. I keep wanting to up the HP a bit but its seen enough abuse. Pro tip: always winterize the engine to keep it running for years. Drain the fuel completely, and drain the carburetor bowl. Pull the spark plug and put a cap full of motor oil in the cylinder and gently turn the engine over by hand using the pull cord to coat the walls. Also helps to tape over the exhaust and stuff the intake port with steel wool to keep critters out of the passages. I once had a generator suddenly stop working and upon pulling the plug found a dead spider across the electrodes which shorted it.

germinalphrase 2y ago
Yes, I made the mistake of failing to winterize and now I've got a tune up job on my hands. Got any good advice there?
- analog31 2y ago
  The thing I have had to do every winter is drop the carburetor bowl and spray carb cleaner up through the Jets. This means draining the gas into something, which I pre empt by draining it in the spring. Also this year I left the carb bowl off of it. And use the gas in the mower so you can start with fresh gas come winter.
dgfitz 2y ago
I'm sure you're tracking: but those shear pins shear for a reason. :)
- floatrock 2y ago
  In a pinch, you can just put a quarter across your fuse terminals if your fuses keep popping for some reason!
  - SteveNuts 2y ago
    I like to use old .22 bullets, they fit perfectly!
    - genewitch 2y ago
      your name and this comment instantly reminded me of the Lewis Black bit "Other idiots in Arkansas" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIYkaCAsTyw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIYkaCAsTyw For a second i heard lewis black in my head say "Steve shot his nuts off" but he doesn't, he actually says "thurston shot his nuts off"
AtlasBarfed 2y ago
Or buy an electric one. The entire array of two stroke lawn tools are obsolete with electric batteries and electric motors that are more compact, higher torque, quiter, and far less polluting. Soon, they will be cheaper. Unfortunately EV based tools slotted in the luxury upscale segment, abut vastly declining battery costs still haven't trickled down to the consumer. High density lfp and sodium ion and solid state should change this. The other crappy thing is that the tools use their differing shapes and molds to lock in you to a single line of tools., so you can reuse batteries across tools only of the same maker (which enables you to have a second set of freshly charged batteries when the primary drains, and you can charge the battery will hold you use the second set) Emer really need formalized standards to force battery companies to use an interchangeable standard like disposable batteries, electric plugs, railroad rails, etc ...and while they're at it, please force the plastic tote business to use a standard lid
- floatrock 2y ago
  Electric lawnmowers and leafblowers are great, but everyone I know who's tried a (battery) electric snowblower complains it's either underpowered for anything more than a dusting or it burns out after a season. All for electrifying all the things and getting rid of as many polluting two-stroke engines as possible, but heavy wet snow seems to be one place where the energy density of gasoline is the right tool for the job.
  - mikepurvis 2y ago
    Even electric lawnmowers can be a bit underwhelming power-wise. I share one with a few neighbours and it works well enough for our small downtown yards, but I would be pretty annoyed with it if I was trying to do a job any longer than about 30 minutes.
  - hunter-gatherer 2y ago
    I don't know... I watched my grandpa hand shovel heavy wet snow until the year he died. If we really care about polution, we'd just buck up and use a hand shovel.
nsxwolf 2y ago
I initially didn't take the "drain the fuel" advice when I got my snowblower, because I never did it for my lawnmower and it was fine year after year. And in its second season, it utterly failed to start. My friend gave me a tip to drain the fuel and put some fresh gas with a little jet fuel in it, and it started immediately.
- nemo44x 2y ago
  You can always stabilize your fuel too and it will last into the next season. However, depending on your climate it may be worth it to just buy cans of fuel at the hardware store. It's much higher quality than what you'll get at a gas station and doesn't contain additives, which are very problematic for carburetors when left in the tank until the next season. It cost more but if you're not blowing snow too often you probably won't even notice the cost. They also come in smaller cans so you can store nicely if needed.
  - SkyPuncher 2y ago
    I only use the high quality hardware store stuff now. I simply don’t run my snowblower enough for the price difference to be meaningful.
    - nemo44x 2y ago
      It's noticeably better. The engine timing is so good with it compared to the gas station stuff meant for fuel injected automobile engines. Higher octane and compression I believe and the snowblower engine just hums and burns clean.
      - dalyons 2y ago
        Huh. I had the opposite experience, bought some canned hardware store fuel for my snowblower out of laziness, and it wouldn’t even run. Seemed to be too high octane or something, kept stalling out. Had to drain it completely, put regular gas in and it’s fine.
dugmartin 2y ago
Good tip about blocking the intake/exhaust (I'll do that this year). I normally just hand pump out the gas until there is just a little left and then start it up and let it run dry. I then do an oil change and tape a note over the oil plug that I did the oil change as otherwise I'll not remember the next Winter.
HeyLaughingBoy 2y ago
Reminds me of the furnace that kept throwing a low combustion air pressure code (by blinking an LED). Turned out to be a now-dead bird that got sucked into the cold air intake.

itsanaccount 2y ago

Moved to Western Michigan a few years back. I got the tractor for the quarter mile drive in case things get real bad but I'll tell you my strategy of "don't buy a complicated snow blower, wait for it to melt" has so far worked out well. If you're close to any body that averages out temperatures (Lake Michigan, swamps), it melts. People have no idea how fast global warming is happening.

pragma_x 2y ago
It never even occurred to me that the "lake effect" would work in the opposite direction. Water's ability to retain heat is really amazing. > People have no idea how fast global warming is happening. For people that live near the Great Lakes, you may have stumbled onto a very compelling bit of evidence. For many, "rising ocean temperatures" is a whole world away. Whereas this kind of phenomenon is much easier to grasp.
- bitsinthesky 2y ago
  Lake Michigan is famously terribly cold to swim in. However this year I’ve found it mostly comfortable, almost as comfortable as a swimming pool. Looking online, it’s above 70 degrees! https://apps.glerl.noaa.gov/marobs/php/data.php?sta=0 https://apps.glerl.noaa.gov/marobs/php/data.php?sta=0 Up in Door County the lake would freeze enough to ski on, but nowadays, well good luck with that.
- itsanaccount 2y ago
  The water table is at ground level September to April here. The ground only froze the first year we moved in, the waters keeping the heat. I noticed that same effect with season extenders. They average out the temperatures using the raised soil as the heatsink. We harvested fresh greens from the garden on Christmas Day in Chicago, that was 5 years ago. I just talked to a guy at a bar who's been here since the 70s, he's harvesting grapes a month early. People who grow things know. Its everyone else I think we have to convince.
apercu 2y ago
SW Wisconsin. 7% grade, 300 foot driveway that is exposed to North winds. We had a (walking) snowblower and I used that for the first winter. It sucked. With the hill, waiting for a melt isn't possible - there's no way to keep control of a car going down that hill, and at the base of the drive across the narrow road is a line of mature pines. We got very little snow last winter, but what snow we did mostly came in a two week window and it was multiple feet of heavy snow. Subcompact diesel tractor with a snowpusher (not a plow). Driveway takes no time, and I use the bucket and forklift forks all the time. I have a mower deck but I use a little cub cadet instead as the tractor (especially with liquid in the back tires) is kinda heavy for a "lawn". (I have very little lawn, converted the front 3/4 acre to mostly prairie), but I still have to mow some. Every situation is different.

mauvehaus 2y ago

This is your friendly reminder to never clear a jammed snow blower with your hands (or any other part of your body). Even with the engine stopped, there can be enough energy stored in the drivetrain to make a mess of your fingers when it's suddenly released. This reminder is brought to you by the guy I knew who had two deformed fingers from two different snow blower jam-clearing incidents.

mikestew 2y ago
Two separate incidents? Some people really don’t learn, huh?
- shwaj 2y ago
  He didn't do it a third time.
  - immibis 2y ago
    No hands left.
glitchc 2y ago
Snowblowers usually come with a spade-like attachment clipped to the top of the auger housing for precisely this reason. Please use that instead of your hands.

teslabox 2y ago

I picked up a Honda snowblower for my dad's house this past winter. He shares a non-maintained road with his neighbors, and for the past few years I've helped them with shoveling. Dad always tried to do his part with clearing the snow, but wasn't able to shovel this year, so he opened his wallet. In February I got a call from the snowblower shop that their first shipment of wheeled snowblowers had arrived. If I wanted to wait they were supposed to be getting a shipment with tracks. I measured the percent grade of our driveways and roads and decided we needed the tracked version. Our snowblower arrived two days before a pair of back-to-back storms that dumped almost 2 feet of wet, heavy snow. It's a game changer. I asked the one neighbor, who'd said previously "the only snowblower I'd buy is a Honda" [1], what he thought as he was plodding along behind the new snowblower : "You didn't cheap out, and it's the right tool for the job." The other neighbor was out shoveling around their car, to hopefully be able to get out for her daughter-in-law's surgery. We blasted through the steep part of her driveway. I got a text message that night: 'where did you get that thing?' The advantage of Honda's tracked snowblower over their wheeled version is that there's a lever-operated piston that adjusts the height, while the wheeled version has no adjustment. Over those two storms, we probably would have spent at least 12 hours shoveling (breaks included). The snowblower cleared the road in an hour. As someone says below, it's important to drain the gasoline at the end of the winter, so it doesn't gum up over the summer. Even if there was a battery-powered two-stage snowblower, why would anyone get one? It'd be a waste of lithium. Edit: When my mom & her husband moved to Flagstaff, their first two-stage snowblower was whatever Costco had for sale that winter. It worked for a few years, then threw a rod through the block on a particularly heavy storm. He returned the unit to Costco, read up on snowblowers, bought himself a big Ariens, and was completely happy with it. His Ariens used a motor from Tecumseh. Tecumseh went bankrupt around 2008 and got split up [2]. Somewhere I read that Tecumseh's engine manufacturing was relocated to China, and that all the post-2009 Ariens use Chinese engines. Someone said the Chinese Tecumseh engines aren't so bad, because they got all the IP about how to make them properly. Or maybe Tecumseh's engine design was obsolete, needed to be redesigned to comply with emission regulations, and the new Chinese Tecumseh engines are better. ??? Harbor Freight sells knock-off Honda engines, as their Predator engines. There are some youtube videos that compare genuine Honda engines to the knock-offs. Edit2: Found some forum posts that tells of how Honda's approach to manufacturing engines has changed over the years [3]. [1] https://powerequipment.honda.com/snowblowers https://powerequipment.honda.com/snowblowers / https://www.reddit.com/r/HondaSnowblowers/ https://www.reddit.com/r/HondaSnowblowers/ [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tecumseh_Products#Gasoline_engine_components https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tecumseh_Products#Gasoline_eng... / https://www.snowblowerforum.com/threads/made-in-the-usa-versus-made-in-china.1364/ https://www.snowblowerforum.com/threads/made-in-the-usa-vers... [3] https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733694/ https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733694/ / https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733738/ https://www.snowblowerforum.com/posts/1733738/

djmips 2y ago

If you are interested there are repair videos like those of Mustie1 which do a good job of touring you through the mechanics of a snowblower. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mustie1+snowblower https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mustie1+snowblo...