How to change oil in Agro Trend snowblower gearbox

[herringchoker]

Remove the 4 bolts holding the pump. Remove it from the blower assembly. Find the drain plug and just gravity drain it. Add proper volume of gear oil and reinstall pump. Finally reinstall on the snow blower.

That would be the hard part.... have to remove the impeller which is probably seized on the output shaft. Been there, done that to replace the output shaft seal. Not fun. Ended up having to split the impeller hub and then rebuild the impeller. I used a suction gun to drain the gearbox of water-contaminated lube before re-filling, several times before I had a chance to replace the seals.

 

[lungdoc]

There's also the fan and auger shafts to deal with, not sure if they simply slide off the gearbox or not. Given how older stuff in particular sometimes gets 'stuck' on I would still think rotating the entire unit would be faster and easier if you have the gear.

 

[doxford jim]

If you can find a way to remove the oil by suction, go for it. Also, for piece of mind, try replacing the fill plug with one that has a magnet on it (or is magnetic). This will catch metallic particles while the blower is being used and can be removed (plug) for inspection and cleaning. That way your oil should be kept in pretty good condition.

 

[oldpilgrim]

thinking more and more about uncoupling the blower and picking it up, rotating the entire unit to drain the gearbox and then rotating it fully 180º to refill the gearbox. I'd love to get any metal fines out of there with the old oil.

that's what I'd do.

 

[Clipse3GT]

Turn the unit on the side with the FEL and then drain it. Then once its drained turn back to level ground and fill with oil til it starts to seep out of the fill/drain hole.

 

[sixdogs]

Recently I picked up a used AgroTrend snowblower and face the dilemma of draining the gearbox to replace the oil. How did others wind up changing the oil? Did you just rotate the snowblower and let gravity drain it or did you remove the gearbox from the machine? That seems like the worst option because it's such as hassle.

I would like to drain it completely but tipping the machine may just have to work for now. How did others make out?