Adding Tabs to a Snowblower Auger to make it serrated.
- Thread starter Hilbilly
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Working on Rust
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If the bearings are four bolt flange bearings you may be able to just drill two new mounting holes on each side and put what is now the top of the bearing into the bottom holes. I did that on a old blower and it helped a lot. Make sure the chain will clear, you may need to trim the steel where the chain goes through. I am not sure why so many blowers have the auger high up, all the commercial grade blower around here like Pronovost and Normand have the augers set just about an inch and a half above the ground. Lucknow has the auger low, and on the McKee blowers they are real high.
These two pictures show the old Walco after I lowered the auger. You can see the old bolt holes in the side of the blower box. The auger is just about an inch above the cutting edge and the ground. That blower would go through hard snow and was the easiest pushing blower I have ever had.
These two pictures show the old Walco after I lowered the auger. You can see the old bolt holes in the side of the blower box. The auger is just about an inch above the cutting edge and the ground. That blower would go through hard snow and was the easiest pushing blower I have ever had.
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That's a great idea and would save me having to drill 4 extra holes. I'd have to check to make sure there will still be clearance between the auger and the housing, after lowering it that much. Especially after adding the tabs.
I was rooting around in the snow today, looking for some steel to make the tabs out of but couldn't find what I was after. We've still got about 3' of snow on the ground and the place where I store my steel is also where I store all of my implements. I hit the back of one of my buckets that was buried and luckily didn't damage it. Digging around with a shovel is just too much work. I may have to wait until the snow has melted a lot more before I go digging around any more.
aczlan
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I was looking at doing this on our 84-inch Loftness front mount blower and the plan I had was to get a bunch of nuts (probably 5/16" or 3/8” nuts) and weld them to the outside of the augurs every 6 or 8 in.
that would give enough of an edge to help chew up frozen banks, but wouldn't stick out too much.
Never got much past that point, and now that blower has been replaced with one that fits on the BX2660 and the Loftness is for sale, so I'm not going to do anything with it.
Aaron Z
that would give enough of an edge to help chew up frozen banks, but wouldn't stick out too much.
Never got much past that point, and now that blower has been replaced with one that fits on the BX2660 and the Loftness is for sale, so I'm not going to do anything with it.
Aaron Z
I ended up adding the tabs tonight.
I'm not going to lower the auger because it would involve cutting down into the base plate of the blower, lowering the support arm, making a new shield for the chain and drilling 4 new bearing mount holes on each of the side plates. Too much work on this blower unless I feel it will really improve the performance. First step is to try the tabs.
Here are some pics of the tabs.
Pic of the chain going through the back plate. You can see from this that there would be a fair bit of work involved in lowering the chain.
I'll see how the tabs perform and might consider adding more tabs between these ones if I think it would help.
I'm not going to lower the auger because it would involve cutting down into the base plate of the blower, lowering the support arm, making a new shield for the chain and drilling 4 new bearing mount holes on each of the side plates. Too much work on this blower unless I feel it will really improve the performance. First step is to try the tabs.
Here are some pics of the tabs.
Pic of the chain going through the back plate. You can see from this that there would be a fair bit of work involved in lowering the chain.
I'll see how the tabs perform and might consider adding more tabs between these ones if I think it would help.
Amvcane
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Hillbilly, nice work with those tabs, they look very aggressive and should do fine.
Noticed in your second pic last post, there are two holes top left quadrant of the drum. I am wondering if you are missing a partial closure plate.
Noticed in your second pic last post, there are two holes top left quadrant of the drum. I am wondering if you are missing a partial closure plate.
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Mu Lucknow is the same. No plate. I did add rubber paddles to the impeller however and I'm gonna copy the 'Hillbilly' tabs too.
npalen
Elite Member
What some farmers have done to the auger that goes across the front of the combine header is drive lockwashers onto the auger flight. This is to improve feeding of the crop into the machine.
I tried it out today and it worked well but could be better. I noticed wherever I stopped, the auger left chew marks where each of the tabs were located and there was about a 2" gap between the chew marks. I think I am going to add more tabs. These ones are located with a 6" gap between them, so I will add another tab at the center of the each gap. This will double the number of tabs to 28 on each side. I was surprised at what this chewed through though. There were some areas where the snow has been pushed repeatedly and at the base of those piles there was solid ice, not hard snow but solid ice. You know, the stuff that looks like dirty glass and this thing chewed through it without even bending the tabs. There is still the issue of trying to push the bottom of the blower into the hard stuff but I don't think I will bother with lowering the auger just yet. Tomorrow I'll see if I can get some pics of where the auger chewed into the banks, to clarify what I'm saying about the gaps.
