OP
jimgerken
Veteran Member
Welcome Kyle!
The blower was a bigger project than I had imagined before starting. Tolerances and balance became very important issues and so added to the workload. In my case, I had an old 3 foot snow thrower setting in my shop, used to run it on a Honda tractor, and I used it for a base idea. From there I made improvements and upgrades to material thicknesses, etc. The most difficult fabrication was the auger itself, because the commercially-available flighting is some very stiff and ornery stuff, and didnt want to conform to the center pipe. And then it neede to stay balanced and ended up a bit bent, needed to be straightend with welding, etc., You read all that above in earlier posts.
Good luck, it is an ambitious project. Not including my time , the project cost less than $800, which I find to be a good deal since the John Deere attachment is $2600 or so, is only 47 inch (mines 59), and mines built much heavier where it counts to resist wear-out. If you can't save at least half of new cost, you should just buy new, I always say. Kyle, if you build a blower (or some other cool stuff) be sure to keep us posted with pictures. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
The blower was a bigger project than I had imagined before starting. Tolerances and balance became very important issues and so added to the workload. In my case, I had an old 3 foot snow thrower setting in my shop, used to run it on a Honda tractor, and I used it for a base idea. From there I made improvements and upgrades to material thicknesses, etc. The most difficult fabrication was the auger itself, because the commercially-available flighting is some very stiff and ornery stuff, and didnt want to conform to the center pipe. And then it neede to stay balanced and ended up a bit bent, needed to be straightend with welding, etc., You read all that above in earlier posts.
Good luck, it is an ambitious project. Not including my time , the project cost less than $800, which I find to be a good deal since the John Deere attachment is $2600 or so, is only 47 inch (mines 59), and mines built much heavier where it counts to resist wear-out. If you can't save at least half of new cost, you should just buy new, I always say. Kyle, if you build a blower (or some other cool stuff) be sure to keep us posted with pictures. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
