Yes, I planned on either building up the edge of the impeller with weld and then fitting it to the housing tight.
Or cutting equal size pieces of plate steel and tacking them to be impeller tight with the housing on the leading edge. Then removing the impeller to finish welding them on nice.
Plse let me throw some thoughts out to you before you get started. I have repeated them so many times, I have a file saved to paste.
There have been several times on this forum where owners of blowers they recently acquired complained in the same way you have. To their surprise, it has happened the blower was rotating backwards. It typically happens when a blower, designed for front use or front and rear use, is not installed correctly and reduction chain and sprockets are wrong.
I suggest investing a few dollars($20) in a laser tachometer will immediately show you the fan rpm's and, for future use the accuracy of your pto speed gauge which becomes important if you want to power a pto generator.
Amazon.com: Digital Photo Laser Tachometer Non Contact Tach RPM Meter: Automotive
Can I point out something that may change how you view blower throwing distance.
Imagine standing with a bucket of baseballs. The first test has you throwing them 100' in a fixed amount of time. Now increase the distance by 50% and throw the balls in the same amount of time.
Unless you are a star athlete, you will be much more fatigued throwing the same number of balls a greater distance. There is no free lunch either when it comes to snow blowers. Distance comes at the expense of requiring more power and fuel.
If you really need distance, then buy a blower where the drum rotates and the snow completely bypasses the chute and comes directly off the tip of the fan. This feature adds a lot to the price.
In heavy wet snow, blowing capacity of the RDX-102 is greatly increased as the snow can be discharged directly off the fan paddles versus all the way up through the center chute.
This video make the design function very easy to understand.
Normand N86-282HTR Side Discharging Snow SnowEquipmentDealer.com - YouTube
This photo from the Schulte web site shows how far the snow can be thrown with the side discharge
Schulte Industries Products
Gravely walk behind snow blowers have a feature where the drum and chute rotate so the snow is not being influenced by the chute and the distance the snow is thrown is much further,
Newer blower designs have improved fan performance by partially blocking the opening into the fan as shown in this photo
When choosing a snow blower, owners often forget about the importance of the angle that their pto shaft will have to operate at.
Measure the height of your tractor's pto shaft above ground. Now compare that measurement to the radius of the blower fan. Radius not diameter. Radius is 1/2 of the diameter so a 22" fan diameter would have an 11" radius.
If your pto shaft is say 15" above ground level, the height of the pto shaft at the blower end will be the radius of 11"
This means your pto shaft U joints are gong to be operating at an angle. The degree of the angle depends upon the vertical difference in height between the tractor pto and the center of the blower fan plus how close the blower is to the tractor.
Why this is important has to do with the life expectancy of the pto joints.
This chart shows how quickly the pto joint life decreases as the operating angle increases.
A pto angle of 5 degrees has a life expectancy of 450 hours.
Increase the pto joint angle to 25 degrees and the joint life is a very short 20 hours.
These figures can be disputed by owners who claim to have long life while having large pto joint angles. The designers of these shafts spend many hours testing and rating their products. I think it is wise to be guided by the designers ratings.
In the end, it is your blower and of course plse do what you feel is best considering all the advice you have received.
I have been very fortunate in life to have been educated as a mechanical engineer and have spent 40+ years dealing with issues of performance and power.
There are many members on this forum who are wiser than I am having spent their lives learning by doing and their advice has much weight too.
Dave
M7040