Snow Blower Sizing - Opinions Wanted

[5030]

So mature, thanks for your input.

Glad you can appreciate the humor...

 

[hayden]

I have a bunch more experience on my 84" front mount snow blower now. Previously I was running a 74" rear PTO, rear facing blower. Tractor is a Kubota L5740 with 50HP at the PTO.

Don't underestimate the power required to blow deeper, heavier snow. Said another way, I think you are underestimating the power needed to blow deeper, heavier snow.

I lost some power switching to a hydraulically powered front blower vs the direct drive rear blower, but the difference in power requirements between 74" and 84" is profound. I could really bog down the engine with the 74", and with the 84" I need to move really slowly. HST or a creaper gear is essential. I run in low range, turtle mode, which for those unfamiliar with Kubotas HST drives, that's the lowest range out of 6 ranges, and then I modulate speed with the HST peddle. When I am clearing snow, the engine is at 100% power the entire time, and I control speed to keep the RPMs us enough to throw the snow far enough. The 84" blower really needs 70-90hp to perform well. It works with 50hp, and I REALLY like having the blower in front vs behind, but it's slow.

In light snow, even deep light snow, it's much less of a problem, but wet snow makes a huge difference. And teh first pass is the slowest because that's when you are taking the full width in one bite. Subsequent passes you can take smaller bites and move faster. For deeper snow falls, you really need to get out and do an intermediate pass before accumulations gets too deep.

So to answer your question, I would lean towards the smaller unit, or be sure you have a really low creeper gear.

I also still struggle with the pull behind blowers. Let's say you successfully drive through 10-12" of snow pulling the blower (I hope you have good chains) and the blower actually cleans down to the road surface. Now it's time for the next, overlapping pass. You have one set of wheels up high going through 10-12" of snow, and the other set of wheels on teh previously cleared surface, so the tractor is tipping to one side. I don't know about you, but my 3PH level follows the tractor's level, so the blower woudl be tilted and I don't think clear down to the road surface across the full width. So how does this work with deeper snow, especially snow that packs hard?

 

[shooterdon]

Weinie tractor aside, anything over 18-20" I use my loader to push a trail in and then blow the snow. With that, not having a loader and a pull type blower isn't going to work out very well with large dumps of snow.

I thought about that when I got my pull blower. I figured if there is more than 18" of snow in the forecast, I would go out and blow every 8-9 inches. Not a big deal for me as I am retired and having to blow out twice is no big deal.

If for some reason I had to deal with 18"+ of snow on the ground, I would put the blower 8-9 inches into the snow and come back for a second pass to get to the ground.

That is much better for me than trying to push a large dump of snow somewhere.

The most snow in 24 hours has been about 12" where I live. I suppose people can plan for a 100 year event or buy something that covers 99% of their needs.

 

[Citydude]

I thought about that when I got my pull blower. I figured if there is more than 18" of snow in the forecast, I would go out and blow every 8-9 inches. Not a big deal for me as I am retired and having to blow out twice is no big deal.

If for some reason I had to deal with 18"+ of snow on the ground, I would put the blower 8-9 inches into the snow and come back for a second pass to get to the ground.

That is much better for me than trying to push a large dump of snow somewhere.

The most snow in 24 hours has been about 12" where I live. I suppose people can plan for a 100 year event or buy something that covers 99% of their needs.

I tried keeping the blower up about a foot off the ground with the loader up until I seen the snow pushing up towards the radiator. Lol

 

[Woodstock Walt]

So his tractor is on the heavy side of a
kubota M 7060 not exactly a "weinie"
I will concede the 7060 has quite a bit more power at the PTO

Tractorbynet is mainly geared to CUTs and IIANM started as a predominately Kubota site

There is Always a Bigger tractor out there.

For whatever reason WIFO placed a 40 HP minimum on the blower in question. Maybe it is just a very efficient design due to auger and Fan size.?
All I can say is my 55HP tractor runs this blower just fine.
With 4-6 inches of fresh snow I can run in 4th gear no problem, and the tractor only has 6 gears.
The OP has a 12 speed gear box.

If a person were to get 30 inches of snow and then have it rained on to bring it down to say 24 inches then yes it would be slow going.

SKU	ELL-WIF-WBPT84
Weight	1220.0000
Horsepower Recommended	40 HP Minimum (29.8 KW)
Width - Overall	84" (7 Feet; 213 cm)
Width - Working	84" (7 Feet; 213 cm)

That's very interesting. I just found the same statistics as well. So, it appears that the manufacturer's minimum HP rating is actually 40 HP. The dealer that I am using has it listed at 60 HP minimum and that is the statistic that I has based much of this thread upon.

With that being said, sd455dan has convinced me to go with the 84" blower, and I am going pick up the 84" pusher as well. I do realize that the blower may not perform optimally in deep, heavy snow conditions, but I have enough alternative options for snow removal that I'm not worried about it.

I guess a few more details are in order, my road cuts across the side of a mountain for it's entire length, with an uphill slope on one side and a downhill slope on the other. I don't wing snow towards the uphill side as it would eventually build up into the road and I'd have no place to put it besides bucketing it out and over the bank on the downhill side. This means I have to wing all of the snow towards the downhill side of the road, which creates a large heavy bank since it's quite a lot of snow.

The drop off the downhill side is very steep, so I don't get near enough with my 8' FEL plow to wing all of the snow over the bank. This leaves the large heavy bank. If I don't get the snow over the edge, the bank just crowds back into the road with each storm. Consequently, my current procedure is to wing everything to the downhill side with the FEL plow, then pretty much every other storm I swap the bucket on and work diagonally across the road using the bucket to push the banks over the edge. 1 mile of that takes half the day.

If using a snow blower allows me to blow snow over the edge of the downhill side, the process will eliminate my need to push the banks back every other storm, even if it takes longer to initially clear the road compared to plowing. That's the goal that I'm trying to achieve by using a snow blower. If we get a storm too big for the blower to handle, I can go back to doing it the old way without much hassle. Just looking for a more efficient way to handle our typical weekly storm of +/-6". Based on what I've read here, I think the 84" would fit this niche well enough.

 

[Woodstock Walt]

So to answer your question, I would lean towards the smaller unit, or be sure you have a really low creeper gear.

I also still struggle with the pull behind blowers. Let's say you successfully drive through 10-12" of snow pulling the blower (I hope you have good chains) and the blower actually cleans down to the road surface. Now it's time for the next, overlapping pass. You have one set of wheels up high going through 10-12" of snow, and the other set of wheels on teh previously cleared surface, so the tractor is tipping to one side. I don't know about you, but my 3PH level follows the tractor's level, so the blower woudl be tilted and I don't think clear down to the road surface across the full width. So how does this work with deeper snow, especially snow that packs hard?

I believe that my gearing is pretty low, but I'm not sure how it compares with other models. Per the chart in my owners manual, L1 (lowest gear) would be .99 MPH at rated engine speed (2300 RPM).

You make a good point with the out-of-level situation while making overlapping passes. I had wondered if that would be a factor. One thing that I actually really like about my tractor is that the 3PH actually does not follow the tractor's level. The lift arms raise under power simultaneously, but when lowered they float independently, allowing the implement to follow the contour of the ground. It's worked well with my box blade, york rake, ect. I think it'd be the same with a blower, allowing it to clear snow level with the road even if the tractor is out of level from riding up on uncleared snow.

 

[Rustyiron]

Walt have you ever thought about a large (84") snow bucket instead of a pusher?
Not sure of the availability or cost comparison. Pushers are amazing for clearing small areas with shapes that don't windrow well, but I assume that your thinking about using a new pusher for handling the banks. A bucket would do the same and be useful in a situation where you needed to carry it a little bit and (my motivation) use it for lighter materials all year long. Mulch, brush/trash, firewood, etc.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

72" snow blower on a 50 hp 40 PTO hp HST New holland tackling hard snow drifts. It hadn't snowed for over two weeks and the weather had warmed to the mid 30s for four days before it started freezing again. Then on the 20th of December the wind started blowing 30-40 mph all night long and was still blowing 20 mph when I was clearing it. There were times when I had to slow down and let the blower clear, but it got through it all.

 

[leonz]

Hi all, I'm hoping to get some opinions and input regarding which size of snow blower would be best for my application.

I'll be using my Mahindra 5155 which is rated at 55 horsepower engine/47 horsepower PTO. It's width is 78" at the rear tires. My bucket is 78" wide, but I'm considering purchasing and using an 84" snow pusher on the FEL.

I'm intending to purchase a WIFO Inverted PTO-driven snow blower, and am torn between the 78" model or the 84" model. The 78" model has a minimum required horsepower rating of 50 HP (unsure if this refers to engine or PTO power), and the 84" requires 60 HP.

I maintain about 1 mile of 16'-wide private road. Our storms range from 3" of light powder to 24"+ of wet, heavy, heart attack snow. Thus far, I've been using an 8' snow plow on the FEL and am tired of chasing windrows, fighting the keep the tractor straight with an angled blade, and pushing banks back.

Questions-
-Would 47 PTO horsepower be enough to turn an 84" blower with decent efficiency?
-Being a pull-type blower, am I better off buying one that matches the width of the tractor (78"), or one slightly wider than the tractor (84")?
-Knowing that the blower may be used in combination with a 84" snow pusher, how would that affect your decision on which size blower?

Any thoughts or input would be appreciated!

You need to visit youtube and watch videos of folks using inverted snow blowers and
the pronovost TRC snow blower. The vanderzon folks use a great number of Kubota M100
mules and inverted snow blowers for thier clearing operations.

www.mjsvanderzon.ca

With hydraulic drive snow blower you have a 4 hose bundle plus the small case drain hose that
are attached with your choice of quick disconnects that stay on the hydraulic power pack out of the way.

A larger hydraulic powerpack will let you run a front mount hydraulic drive snow blower with a
rotating impeller drum without bogging down using the engines rated PTO speed.

 

[3 Horse Ranch]

That's very interesting. I just found the same statistics as well. So, it appears that the manufacturer's minimum HP rating is actually 40 HP. The dealer that I am using has it listed at 60 HP minimum and that is the statistic that I has based much of this thread upon.

With that being said, sd455dan has convinced me to go with the 84" blower, and I am going pick up the 84" pusher as well. I do realize that the blower may not perform optimally in deep, heavy snow conditions, but I have enough alternative options for snow removal that I'm not worried about it.

I guess a few more details are in order, my road cuts across the side of a mountain for it's entire length, with an uphill slope on one side and a downhill slope on the other. I don't wing snow towards the uphill side as it would eventually build up into the road and I'd have no place to put it besides bucketing it out and over the bank on the downhill side. This means I have to wing all of the snow towards the downhill side of the road, which creates a large heavy bank since it's quite a lot of snow.

The drop off the downhill side is very steep, so I don't get near enough with my 8' FEL plow to wing all of the snow over the bank. This leaves the large heavy bank. If I don't get the snow over the edge, the bank just crowds back into the road with each storm. Consequently, my current procedure is to wing everything to the downhill side with the FEL plow, then pretty much every other storm I swap the bucket on and work diagonally across the road using the bucket to push the banks over the edge. 1 mile of that takes half the day.

If using a snow blower allows me to blow snow over the edge of the downhill side, the process will eliminate my need to push the banks back every other storm, even if it takes longer to initially clear the road compared to plowing. That's the goal that I'm trying to achieve by using a snow blower. If we get a storm too big for the blower to handle, I can go back to doing it the old way without much hassle. Just looking for a more efficient way to handle our typical weekly storm of +/-6". Based on what I've read here, I think the 84" would fit this niche well enough.

What you plan is with the snow blower is what I had started doing with my snow. Plowing left berms on each side and after a series of above freezing days the berms were hard and pretty much immovable. When the snow is light enough I use my front mounted plow and plow from the edge both directions and I can then blow it all 30 feet away. Ideally, I can face forward and drive by mirror.