Rear Inverted Snowblowers 2019

airbiscuit · Jan 20, 2020

Hilbilly said:
Here's a short video of it in action.

Beautiful country and impressive snow banks. Looks like you have that blower working like it should.

Hilbilly · Jan 21, 2020

It' been raining all day and I had to go to town and I start down the driveway only to find out that the snow that got missed during the plowing and blowing events so far, has turned to slop and I am having difficulty making it through the slop in 4WD, on the flats and even on the downhill slope. I would have turned around but I had to pick up my grandsons from the basketball games and had no choice but to go. I feared I would not make it back up the driveway and it was touch and go in a few places but in the end I made it back to the house. I figured I better get the rear blade on the tractor and scrape this stuff off to the side but then I realized that was the old way. Maybe I should try the inverted blower on this stuff. By the time I got the tractor rigged up with the inverted blower the temps had dropped and the slop was starting to freeze.

I dropped the inverted blower and started down the driveway (in 2WD) in Mid range and the blower impressed me. It was blowing freezing snow, that looked more like chunks of ice than snow, at least 30' maybe more and the chunks were bouncing off the crust on the snow at the sides of the driveway. It was an awesome sight in the dark with the cab lights all turned on. I would travel at 6kmh to 11kmh depending on how much snow the blower was engaging. I could hear it load up and then would slow down a bit. On the way back up I used 4WD and ran at around 6kmh to 8kmh. There seemed to be deeper snow on that side. I'm certain an inverted blower is going to make things a lot easier for me and hope this one will hold up. I am not impressed with the build quality of this blower compared to my old one. All the important parts are just a little thinner or not braced as well. I have about 2 hours on the new blower and have had some serious issues with it and now found one of the auger supports has bent. I have probably put 20 hours on my old blower since getting the new one and it is still working flawlessly, with no damage. At some point I may take some side by side pics of the old blower and the new one to show the differences. But for now I will enjoy the fact that I can drive forward and the blower is doing everything I need it too.

shooterdon · Jan 22, 2020

Over the weekend I had two 5-6" snow events, so not much of a workout for the FK. It sure is nice being able to drive forward!

By this time last year, I had large banks of snow. None this year.

I am glad I added the SSQA adapter plate so I could mount the rear blade on the front. The downside of the pull blower is not being able to get close to things to clear snow. I use the blade to back blade about 4-6 feet and then blow the snow out. A bit of a pain to have to turn the tractor around but a minor inconvenience.

I expected using the blower would be slower than the plow truck I used last year and it is. Using the plow truck took about 40-45 minutes when I did not get it stuck. The plow mount was jury rigged when I got it and sat low to the ground. It was easy to get hung up in the snow banks and then needed to shovel it out and pull the truck out. That would happen every second or third time. With the tractor and blower, I have not gotten stuck once. it takes about an hour to clear so a good trade off for an old man. I have loaded and oversize turfs on the tractor and traction has been good. I thought I might need studs on the rears and chains on the front but so far so good.

So far, I have not needed to adjust the angle of the discharge chute. I was going to add a linear actuator but I doubt it is worth the cost and effort.

It is a pain to clean snow that accumulates on it, and clean out the auger before parking it, but that would be the case with any blower.

I am very pleased with the inverted FK. There may be better blowers, but for $4k is serves my needs well and offers advantages over the $7K front blower (no subframe to deal with, and I can use the FEL). I clear about 8000 sq ft of open area and 300 yards of gravel drive. Our snowfall is 120-140" per year. It just works.

Hilbilly · Jan 22, 2020

So far this year I have been bouncing back and forth between using the inverted and the rear facing blowers. I'm getting faster at switching them over. Part of the reason for the constant change over is due to the fact that I didn't get the inverted blower until late in the season and by then I already had high banks on both sides of the driveway. Plus I need to adjust my thought process to allow for the inverted blower. Example being: I used the rear facing blower to knock back the high banks on the sides of the driveway. That is how I've always done it and thought that was my only option. However, later I came up with a better approach (which only works if the snow has not been exposed to rain and become compacted) and that was to use the front plow, with the inverted blower in combination. I took the plow and pulled the banks back onto the driveway and with the blower running behind me, the snow was blown away permanently, in one pass. Next year will be different because I will use the inverted blower for all the driveway clearing.

Hilbilly · Jan 22, 2020

shooterdon,

Does your Farm King blower sound like the this video when it's running? I'm not sure if that is normal for these open gears or not. All my other implements with gear boxes have the oil bath ones.

jcummins · Jan 22, 2020

Why wouldn't they use a closed gearbox for something like this?

airbiscuit · Jan 22, 2020

That looks funky to me. Maybe that's the way open gears are supposed to be, but I've only seen them on ground driven corn planters.

I keep noticing differences between my old meteor and the new inverted. It sits back further on my 3pt which I like because the angle from the PTO is more shallow.

metalbender · Jan 22, 2020

Found out sometime after I bought my Farm King, it also has open gears. Was a bit ticked at first, then read that the gears are much easier to replace in case of trouble. I use constant velocity joint grease on mine. Third year, light use, so far ok.

shooterdon · Jan 22, 2020

Hilbilly said:
shooterdon,

Does your Farm King blower sound like the this video when it's running? I'm not sure if that is normal for these open gears or not. All my other implements with gear boxes have the oil bath ones.

I have not run it at full rpm while standing next to it and I have a cab so am not noticing excessive noise. There seems to a lot of slop in yours and I will need to check mine. I need to pull out the manual. Looks like those gears need greasing an a regular basis.