Today I put on my new chains that I got from tirechains.com, put on the Woods RB72 rear blade and set out to widen my driveway. The RB worked really well for pushing back the piles I left last weekend from using the FEL. Especially since everything was hard and chunky from all the rain we had earlier in the week – not the light, fluffy stuff from last weekend. It took a little getting used to, going backwards and the blade doesn’t really float, so you have to adjust it on the fly. At least I do, because the sides of the drive are very uneven over its length; can’t just set the blade and forget it. But, I got used to that, too. I even got brave and used both the RB and the FEL to open up the other side of my driveway (it forks at the bottom of a long hill, one drive on either side of the mailbox, one pointing up road and the other down road). /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif All week I’ve had to use the south-facing fork, even though I come home southbound, which meant a hard cut of the wheel, stop, back up, FWD and then rocket up the hill (F-150 w/studded Nokian snows). It took some practice to work both implements and clear the drive without tearing up a) the state asphalt road, b) my hardpack driveway or c), the dirt around the driveway, but patience and small steps made it happen. People were very good about going around my work area on the main road, and I, of course, stopped whenever I saw somebody coming. Courtesy counts. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif I also used my flashers, although I don’t know how visible they are during the day. I’ve kept my hazard triangle on the tractor, since I have to play around down by the road. Does everybody keep theirs on or take it off? It does make it a little harder to see to the rear on the left side.
Then, I tackled all the snow that came off of my metal roof. The main house and the carriage house addition meet to make a valley in which all the snow really stacks up and then crashes down to the ground, piling up against the house and porch. All the rain made it a solid, four-foot high block of ice and hard snow. Again, I took it in small bites, being careful not to whack the house. Some of the blocks I got into the bucket were pretty huge and weighed a couple hundred pounds each, easy. But, slow and careful was my mantra. I'm sure others could do it a lot faster than me, but I am still pretty new at doing this on such a scale, and I had dedicated the whole day to the project, so I wasn't in any hurry.
I have to say that the chains made a BIG difference. I never got bogged down anywhere, and I was out for over four hours. They really enabled me to get into places that I just couldn’t go last week. /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif My front end still slides, if I get the FEL too full and the surface is slick, but I can live with that. The chains from tirechains.com went on very easily and their cam-lock is a cool design, once you figure it out. Used their spring tensioners, too. Never slipped a chain.
Now, I’m ready for the next big snowstorm on Sunday. /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif
