DIY Electric chute rotator

[PILOON]

Wow that is interesting, have any idea where to look for these items? Wayne

Garage sales and scrap yards!

I was lucky as a client asked (well payed) me to remouve his old dish so I sold off the steel and kept the actuator.
That is why I can say for sure that it works on 12 volts.

Some trailers and mobile homes also use 12 volt electric actuators to pop out the 'expandable rooms'.
Also they make 12 volt trailer tongue lifts (to replace the crank versions)

You just need to visit recycle/scrap yards more often. LOL!

An example is once with the wife doing garage sales I came upon (nice, new bagged with Deere PN, no less) a window wiper assembly foe a mere $20.
That was a 'kit' with adjustable arm, blade and instructions sheet.
Hate to price that new at the dealer!

 

[WayneB]

I do a bit of yard sale searching, and we have several electronic surplus places around, but it is tough finding actuators at any of them and when you do they are looking for big bucks. Most of the trunk auto closing devices use a linear actuator and also car power door locks and power seats use either linear actuartors or rotary actuators all can be configured to do neat things and are all 12 VDC!

One persons junk is another persons gold, So I have been told. Heck for a good period of time when I would go to the dump (now transfer station) I would bring more stuff home than I was taking.

Have a good one.

Wayne

 

[Al 2]

Hello everyone.
Just mounted a new $40.00 winch on the blower and it works fine. I took the spool off the winch and mounted a 8" sprocket to it and used # 40 chain attached to the chute. It was trial and error and took a few days to get it right. I would suggest using a cable instead of a sprocket and chain as a cable is a lot easier and more forgiving to work with. My set up got a bit more involved than I planned. Since I have done mine , I have seen another winch set up that would take at most , 2 hs to install. The winch was bolted to the bar (in this case) that the crank handle is attached to and the guy drilled another hole in the spool and attached the cable in the same way as on the crank and then to the chute. No picture. About the only time I didn't take one.
Al

 

[Wyld Bill]

I do a bit of yard sale searching, and we have several electronic surplus places around, but it is tough finding actuators at any of them and when you do they are looking for big bucks. Most of the trunk auto closing devices use a linear actuator and also car power door locks and power seats use either linear actuartors or rotary actuators all can be configured to do neat things and are all 12 VDC!

One persons junk is another persons gold, So I have been told. Heck for a good period of time when I would go to the dump (now transfer station) I would bring more stuff home than I was taking.

Have a good one.

Wayne

LOL! must be a N.E. thing. I have fond memories of going to the dump with my Dad & spendng an hour or so looking around grabbing stuff.
We'd get home & my Mom would say "I thought you guys went to the dump??"

 

[WayneB]

LOL! must be a N.E. thing. I have fond memories of going to the dump with my Dad & spendng an hour or so looking around grabbing stuff.
We'd get home & my Mom would say "I thought you guys went to the dump??"

Yes it is a NE thing! But, just got back from the transfer station and there is nothing to put in the bed of the truck.........must be hard times and everyone is beating me to the good junk!

 

[moeh1]

I managed to get a couple pics of my setup, hope it helps illustrate what I did. I timed the rotation, with the sprockets I had it is about 15 sec to rotate 180 degrees.

 

[Wyld Bill]

Gonna keep this going. Today in Mal*Wart I saw a ATV winch for $70. It was rated at 1500# & I think it had a slower speed than most of the other ones on Ebay & such.
Ok I think I was thinking today. I'm gonna totally pimp out my snowblower.
I'm going to go all electric.
Here is my master plan:
Install a plastic PVC electrical box on the snowblower. In the box mount my relays, fuses, & wiring connection points.
Put a camper/trailer round towing plug in on the back of my tractor.
This will feed +12V power (and ground) to the blower, +12V common back to a switch box in the cab, switched circuits back TO the blower for rotation, deflection, hight adjustment, & safety flashers.
Put a electrical 5 or 6 conductor plug with cord on blower.
Mount & wire in on the blower:
linear actuator to control chute deflector
chute rotator
two linear actuators on feet to adjust blower hight off from ground
two oval amber LED lights on the two corner wired though flashers.

All said & done if I shop around & get stuff at my work I can probably do everything for less than $600 total. It won't hurt too much or alarm the wife because I'll pick stuff up here & there over time.

 

[Wyld Bill]

I managed to get a couple pics of my setup, hope it helps illustrate what I did. I timed the rotation, with the sprockets I had it is about 15 sec to rotate 180 degrees.

Sweet thanks!
Nice set up. I can see why it takes so long now thoguh. It is the type of rotator you have It like a worm gear. It takes a lot of revolution of the crank handle to rotate the chute very far.

 

[PILOON]

Your 'snow shield' is clever. Need to add that on my 'to do list'

I also use chain/sprockets on my set up and find that ice occasionaly clogs the chain enough to load the motor and blow fuses. (on mine the drive sprocket is horozontal with the chain wrapped around the shute base)
My routine has been to squirt oil liberally before laying up the blower after a storm.

One other thing that I did was to fab a large custom washer from PVC sheets I had that is below the snow shute where it sits on the main frame.
This way the shoot rotates on PVC rather than metal on metal- helps a lot!

I also find (on mine) that the cheap joggled press steel guides that loosly guide/clamp the shoot to the deck are a bad design in that they tend to jamb rather than guide the shute while rotating.
I have seriously been thinking of replacing them with sealed bearings and body washers.
(On my to do list-too cold right now)

Nice work, and satisfying to boot, isn't it!

 

[moeh1]

Yeah I worried about snow building up on the chain too. The plexi shield was a scrap piece that I heated up with a heat gun (slowly from both sides) and bent sandwiched between wood blocks. It is held on with a couple wing nuts for quick removal. Knock wood, snow build up hasn't been an issue since I got it going. Used it for 2 hours yesterday cleaning up.
Havahappy