Latest Snowblower Fun

techman · Jan 4, 2003

Well the continuously changing forecast here in NE PA finally left us with 5" of snow over about 3/4" of ice. The BX22/Kubota Front blower did a quick job of getting rid of the snow. I then tackled the ice.

Instead of setting the blower lift control to Float, I gave it enough down push to angle the lead edge of the blower into the ice. This provided enough force to get the cutting edge at the lower lip of the blower under the ice and pull it up. Biggest problem was that the front wheels end up off the ground and direction of travel is by grade and luck only. It ended up taking quite a bit of seat time to cover the entire drive since it consisted of a whole bunch of random direction cuts. I wish the BX22 had dual differential brakes, it would have made life easier. The Kubota blower handled the ice like a dream, chopping and blowing it well away.

Two other observations. When snowblowing, you consume nearly full HP and the fuel consumpation really goes up. Mowing and backhoeing seem to use about 0.5 gal/hr, and the snowblowing is running 2+ gal/hr. Also the bar tires with 4WD go anywhere, ice, snow, up banks in the snow, etc. I bought a set of 4 link chains from tirechains.com, but I'm beginning to think that they will end up rusting away in the bag. I've found no need yet to put them on. I think the bars were a good choice. Great traction, and little to no impact on the lawn when cutting with them.

paul

powershop · Jan 4, 2003

Hi Techman:
Any chance of some pictures of the sub-frame and hyd lift cyl of your front blower. I have a BX 2200 with FEL and just bought a used 6 ft snowblade.
Now i can't decide to frame mount it or rig it to my load arms. Pictures would help me if i decide to mount it to the frame, since the blower, blade and broom mount the same. Thanks

techman · Jan 4, 2003

Powershop:

I will get a pix in the next few days. I have a Kubota snowblower and the mount is the Kubota mating unit. It is also the mount for the blade and sweeper as you mentioned. It attaches to the holes/slots that the front mmm bracket hooks into. Then there is a pair of squeeze clamps that grab the front flat frame member that hold the grill guard. It is a pretty fancy assembly that has a retracting hook to hold the implement, the lift cylinder assembly and the pillow blocks, etc for the PTO extension to the front (pto is an additional option to the mount).

If you bought a Kubota blade, it would be quite a project to reproduce the mount. Unfortunately the Kubota unit is not very cheap.

paul

frank_f15 · Jan 4, 2003

sounds like u had fun today/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif agree with u have not noticed the need for chains and i move a lot of snow.

JJT · Jan 5, 2003

I'm surprised that you are using 2+ gallons of fuel / hr with the bx22. I'm under 1G/hr with an L3710 and an 80" blower. Is the hour meter on the bx22 a true hour meter, measuring time against PTO speed? or simply a clock measuring time? If I run at 75% PTO, it will take me 80 minutes to clock an hour on my hr meter.

techman · Jan 5, 2003

As far as I can tell, it's just plain engine run time.

paul

Anonymous Poster · Jan 15, 2003

It's an electric hourmeter runs when the key is on!

cchoate · Jan 15, 2003

The hour meter on my 7500 runs only when the engine does, not when the key is turned. I'd suspect the BX is the same.

cnoel · Jan 16, 2003

Actually, the BX runs when the key is on, as do Kubota's lawn and garden tractors. Everything from the B7500 up runs only when the engine does and is based on one tach hour per hour of engine running at rated speed(usually 2600RPM or so).