Good afternoon picklerick, welcome to the forum,
One question comes immediately to mind, would your neighbor that owns the field(assuming you are no the land owner),
install snow fence? One to three rows of snow fence separated at least one hundred fifty feet apart would catch and hold a huge amount of snow.
The other option would be to purchase a used 3020 or 4020 John Deere with the slide shift mechanical transmission which will allow you to provide much more power to a brand new wider rear snow blower and a brand new flail mower.
Many of the members have rear mount snow blowers on the Kubota BX class of sub compacts and move a lot of snow with out a heated cab.
My fathers neighbor had a
BX2350 with front mount snowblower and a fully enclosed weatherproof cab and a kubota heater defroster and she loved it. she could get in the cab in without wearing a heavy coat and drive out of the garage and clear out her huge driveway whenever she wanted to in winter with her front mounted snow blower.
Unless you invest in a very high horsepower hydrostatic drive mule you will be losing a lot of power to heat and a mechanical drive transmission mule will not have that issue.
What it all comes down to is money and more money.
A Kubota RTV 900 or 1100 with a motorized 2 stage snow blower would let you clear snow but the issue is clearing it every couple of hours while it is snowing if the wind is not an issue with visibility.
A john deere 3020 with a loader and quick attach mounting system would let you mount the larger motorized RTV snowblower up front and also remove it whenever you wanted to use the loader.
You have time to examine this very well before you open your wallet and you have to decide how much money you want to spend or can afford to spend for a piece of machinery.
Many of the members have small hydrostatic drive kubota mules, chains, loaded tires and wider rear mount snowblowers which lets them clear snow effectively but at a bit slower pace. this allows lets them clear snow more quickly with a wider rear mount when the snow is not deep or for that matter take half cuts driving faster.
There are many videos on you tube that show rtv's with front mounted snow blowers and also tractors with front mounted and rear mounted snow blowers.
You have to decide how much money you can afford to spend and be sure to purchase a mule with at least 15-30 horsepower more to use if it is a hydrostatic mule or a good used JD 3020 or 4020 with the slice shift transmission and a wide snow blower in either a single stage or a two stage snow snow clearer.
A four foot single stage rear mount Reist snow caster with no bells or whistles will cost you $4,000.00 canadian dollars and they are a bargain with the exchange rate as good as it is in our favor you can order then in a five foot wide version as well. you can always add a hydraulic chute rotation later as it comes with a manual rotation hand crank for the one piece spout.
You have to plan and plan and plan as you may have years where you have little snow and years like last year.
If you are familiar with decision trees you need to do that and make an upside down decision tree to make a full examination of the issue as there are may ways for you to do this. The other thing is needed simplicity, the simpler and dumber any machinery is the better, that is why I love single stage snow throwers as they are not complicated with a 3 or 4 blade fan to cast the snow away.
The other issue is the open augers used on these 2 stage snow blowers as they do not chew up the snow to break it into smaller pieces to make it easier to get rid of and will always push the snow forward into the snow pack as you are trying to clear it with a smaller snow caster. and that issue is only solved with more power and a two auger snow caster which is much more expensive than a single stage Riest snow thrower.
I am not trying to impede you progress nor spend your money just leave your wallet and check book home when you start looking after you build your decision trees please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The only exception to this is the Pronovost TRC two stage snow casters with a rotating impeller drum that bypasses the chute and spout entirely to reduce any chance of plugging by simply casting the snow left or right and the packed snow will not be an issue as it will not pile up in front of the snow caster as you move into the snow pack as the impeller works more effectively by just creating a fire hose stream of snow being pushed through it.
The same holds true for the Reist single stage units and in either case you need to have at least 10 more horsepower in the mule to work well with zero strain on the drive train as you will be in four wheel drive using chains and loaded tires to make the work easier to manage as you will be traveling from zero to 88 to 176 feet per minute depending on the snow depth to clear it away.
I guess I would see how difficult it would be to install snow fence as a first option to make your life easier as you know where the drifts start and end now.
I wish I could be of more help but you have to decide what you can afford to spend and what the payments will be before you even walk into a showroom as they are not there to help you.
