Snow Equipment Owning/Operating Cutting / Groving / Siping R-4 for snow
- Thread starter gladehound
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Glrret
Silver Member
I plan to do mine this weekend, but I'm considering a double groove on my rear tires. I haven't settled on a pattern for the front tires yet.
I plow 2 really long drives that have trees on both sides with limited space for snow banks so I have to push snow a long ways. When the sides of the drive open up so that I can pivot the blade to the left or right, the blade is pretty loaded up with snow. That's normally when I get a lot of sliding on the front end. So I need a pattern that will give me maximum traction any suggestions?
I plow 2 really long drives that have trees on both sides with limited space for snow banks so I have to push snow a long ways. When the sides of the drive open up so that I can pivot the blade to the left or right, the blade is pretty loaded up with snow. That's normally when I get a lot of sliding on the front end. So I need a pattern that will give me maximum traction any suggestions?
greif
Silver Member
Does anyone practice on an old car tire 1st.... ?
OP
gladehound
Veteran Member
Very nice! Now let us know how it works!
OP
gladehound
Veteran Member
I run a hydraulic rear blade and previously had a problem with the rear sliding sideways when angling too much. So I did one groove down the center of the rear and then made three grooves perpendicular to the first.
The front lugs don't have nearly the real estate to work with. So I would probably only do the grooves perpendicular across the lugs if using a front blade. Someone did that early in this thread on their front tires and they looked really good. I also noticed you have a back hoe. All the weight behind the rears takes some weight off the fronts and will make the front slide sideways more easily. If you take off the backhoe, it will steer better but won't push as much with the blade strait. So I'd leave the BH on and just add some weigh on the frame in front of the front axle to help steering with the loaded up angled blade.
crazyal
Super Member
I run chains so I don't need to do this but has anyone thought about doing short narrow cuts vs the long ones being posted here? I would think copying what snow tires do with their sips might work better.
OP
gladehound
Veteran Member
That was exactly my thinking when I started this thread. BTW - snow tires have both grooves and sipes (as well as soft porous rubber). I started with grooves, planned to do sipes also. Never did the sipes because the grooves provided so much additional traction that there was no point to doing anything more. Just with grooves I've driven on an inch of ice and had enough traction to push the loader though the ice and rip it up off the driveway - have never needed chains since.
If interested, go back and read the first several pages that talk about the modern snow tire tech and theory behind this thread.
Glrret
Silver Member
Gradehound.... I understand what your saying about the backhoe, but I don't have the backhoe on in the wintertime. When I'm plowing the most I have on the back is my log winch, have a few tight spots to get into so I keep as little on the back as possible.
The blade I use on the front is an old Myers that I've modified to make it as short as it can be.
I'm not sure how the plowing will change this year because I now have the rear tires filled which I didn't have last year.
I guess we'll see, but I think I'm going to do two groves in the rear and three alternating groves in the front.. hopefully I'll have time to do it this weekend....
crazyal
Super Member
Sooner or later the nice sharp edge on your grooves will get worn down. My ag tires worked great the first winter but after 5 years with lots of miles they are not so good in the snow. I have lots of hills and a gravel driveway so chains are required so I really don't have anything to gain by experimenting. Do you find the snow sticking inside the grooves?
Glrret
Silver Member
Well after making a pattern of the lugs I felt that a double grove on the rear would lead to chunking so I came up with a different pattern that would give me a double grove where the lug was thicker and would also allow for the most traction. On the front tires I used a pattern that was shown earlier in this thread, if it doesn't offer enough traction to prevent sideways slide I can always add another grove.
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