Snowblower Snowblower Question - How fast can I go?

etgjr · Jan 6, 2006

I live in the U.P. of Michigan where we get lots of lake effect snow. I have a Kubota 4330hst and am thinking about getting a snowblower to keep the 1/2 mile road open to my camp.
Here is my question; with a 6 foot blower, how fast (miles/hour) can I blow snow under the following conditions:
6" of no moisture fluffy snow?
12" of no moisture fluffy snow?
18" of no moisture fluffy snow?
6" of moderate moisture snow?
12" of moderate moisture snow?
18" of moderate moisture snow?
6" of heavy wet snow?
12" of heavy wet snow?

Thanks in advance, Ed

trlong · Jan 6, 2006

etgjr,

Would love to give you an easy answer but, that's a lot of what-if's. What 6' blower may be significant (especially when dealing with the deep/wet snow), front or rear mount, short or tall discharge chute, impeller clearance ... If rear mount/rear facing, I don't think you'd want to be backing up very fast. If rear mount/front facing, your front end traction, clearance, tires, and steering would dictate a lot. If front mount (my preference) you can probably go the fastest but, only within the abilities of the blower and your safe steering.

In any event, I don't think you want to try high range for any type of work, other than simple transport from one place to another. Keep it in low range, feed the blower enough snow to keep it blowing but, with wet snow, don't push it so as to clog the impeller/chute. If any one has the same tractor with a 6' blower (similar to whatever it is you're looking at) they'll probably have more info but, a lot has to do with trial and error as the snow is not snow, is not snow...(how many words for snow do the Inuit's have?).

Good luck,

Tom

Dutch445 · Jan 6, 2006

( I live in the U.P. of Michigan where we get lots of lake effect snow. I have a Kubota 4330hst and am thinking about getting a snowblower to keep the 1/2 mile road open to my camp.
Here is my question; with a 6 foot blower, how fast (miles/hour) can I blow snow under the following conditions:
6" of no moisture fluffy snow? FASTEST 
12" of no moisture fluffy snow?
18" of no moisture fluffy snow?
6" of moderate moisture snow? SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE 
12" of moderate moisture snow?
18" of moderate moisture snow?
6" of heavy wet snow?
12" of heavy wet snow? SLOWEST

Thanks in advance, Ed

)

Could be anywhere from 1-2 miles per hour,, up to 7 or 8,, depends on conditions, and all of those other variables mentioned above.

a snowblade, that can broadcast at an angle, would probably be the fastest overall, until the snowbanks got so big that you couldn't keep the drive as wide as needed.
/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif

bncsauve · Jan 6, 2006

I can tell you about my experience. I have a 5' JRW rear mounted mower (back up style) on my 25 hp Kioti. About 20pto hp. I only have 2 speeds in reverse. At pto speed on the engine, no matter how much snow was on the ground, I would not be able to blow snow in high gear. It would be too difficult to back up at that speed and I'm pretty sure the blower would not be able to keep up. In low gear, you only really have one choice and that is how ever fast your tractor goes in reverse at pto speed. (doesn't matter how deep the snow is.) For me that's about walking speed. I have never had snow that I couldn't move in low gear at pto speed. I have used the blower so far from 3" up to about 6" of very heavy wet snow and up to about 18" of moderately dry snow. I will also add that if I want to go slower, I use the 1000 rpm setting on the pto at a lower throttle speed unless I start bogging down the engine. Hope this helps.

44trxfun · Jan 6, 2006

I agree with all the advice you've gotten thus far. I would just add to listen to your tractor and blower. Between performance and the sound, I think you'll be able to adjust to conditions for optimal speed. Have fun!

George2615 · Jan 6, 2006

Ed,
I also agree with the others. It's a slow go no matter how you look at it. If you go too fast in heavy wet snow, you'll probably overload the blower and bust a shear pin. That's how you know your going too fast. I've plowed over 40 years but the snowblowing I did was always slow going. That's how I found out how fast to go, I sheared several pins then figured I better slow down and let the blower chew its way through.Usually the low moisture fluffy stuff can be blown away pretty brisk speed.

George

Deerlope · Jan 6, 2006

Ok thats an easy question. Just watch you RPM's and when drops below what you got it set at you are going too fast. RPM's tell a lot of what your attachment is doing.

etgjr · Jan 6, 2006

Thanks everyone for your input.

What I'm trying to get a sense of is how long it's going to take me to run a decent 6' blower 2 miles in various conditions. Thats 4 runs on my 1/2 mile road.

Sounds like I'm looking at around an hour maybe a little more for a "decent" snowfall. Could be more with a whole lot of wet stuff. Will probably be less with 6" of "fluffy" stuff.

-Ed

robison · Jan 6, 2006

I have 3/4 of a mile to clear where I live, two shared driveways, a 1200 foot cul-de-sac street, and two regular driveways. That takes 1-2 hours. There are stops to adjust the chute, move things, and forward and reverse to work around stuff.

A continuous straight road would be faster but if it has driveways etc it gets shower

cag · Jan 6, 2006

Ed I have a CK30 HST with a 6' snowblower, I can work in High gear in a minimal snow fall but it's not suggested, most will say high range is for travel, I mostly do my work in mid range, one of the roads I maintain is about 3000 feet long, 12 inches of snow takes about an hour, I crank up to full RPM an away I go, when the RPM drops I slow down, this is due because the snowblower is at full capacity of intake and I have to give it a chance, that being said I found the snowblower to be faster then the truck fisher plow combo, HST is the best trany in my view for the snowblower attachment(FASTER) When you do purchase try to get the dealer to throw in a set of skid shoes, I find them to be very valuable for uneven surfaces, I attached a pic of the little beast...cag

scesnick · Jan 6, 2006

I have a 2.5 mile driveawy up a mountain that I snowblow with a 64" Ber Vac. it takes quite a while, no less than 2 hours, once down and once back.
I also have a 72" plow on my Yamaha Rhino. 20 minutes to plow it with the Rhino. But, once i plow it a few times there is no where else to put the snow so i have to break out the blower.
I have found that a combination of both machines works great.
i put my boy in the rhino and he plows it and i then blow it off the sides of the road.

turbo36 · Jan 7, 2006

Hey Dutch, how far are you from Old Forge?

turbo36 · Jan 7, 2006

Are you thinking front or rear mount blower? The front mount is a lot easier on your neck! I don't know where in the UP you are but I would think the blower is the best answer unless your drive is in a wide open field and you can plow 30' wide at the start of the season it won't take long before you can't get the tractor down the drive with a plow.

etgjr · Jan 7, 2006

Hi tubro36,

My camp is near Nisula which is about 35 miles south of Houghton.

I have been leaning to a rear 6' maybe 7'. I like the idea of keeping the loader up front. But part of me says that with the blower I don't need the loader because I won't be making banks to move.

I have thought about a 6' front mount blower running off of the mid PTO. I want a minimum 6' blower to cover the width of the Kubota L4340HST. So far I have not found any that meet this spec. Any ideas?

Thanks all for the great input,

Ed

RayMunising · Jan 7, 2006

I've heard Erskine makes a commercial quality (and expensive) front mount blower that would work for you. It's driven off the rear pto. Info is available here: www.erskineattachments.com

BTW, did you get your Kubota in Marquette? Is the dealer any good?

turbo36 · Jan 7, 2006

Nisula? I had to look that one up. That's a great area, we used to snowmobile out of L'anse quite a bit and always tried to stop at the Northland Cafe in Mass City if we got that way. It's been a few years so I don't know if they are still open but I remember good soups and great bread. /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

PILOON · Jan 7, 2006

I have a MT180D (20 hp) driving a 5' BERVAC but it origionally had a 4' blower which got trashed (don't ask)

The tractor is 48" wide and let me tell you when I installed the 5' blower it became a real pleasure to use.

Be sure you buy a blower that is wider than your overall width otherwise you only compact the 'spilloff snow'.
I'd say 12" wider than the tractor.

In my case with a manual transmission all blowing is in low gear and even at that in deep or dense snow I often have to stop traction to 'unload' the blower.
This year I made a plow blade that mounts under the FEL for speedy ' pushing to one side' the lighter snowfalls in order to save many slow blower passes.
This way I make, say 2 or maybe 3 fast passes followed by one slow 'blowing pass' resulting in no snow banks.

I also have a 6.2 GMC 4x4 fisher equipped for comparison and can say that tractor/plow/blower while about 20% slower overall does a nicer neater operation and by end of Feb I will still have full width driveway as against starting at 16' wide and ending up with barely 6" in Feb.
This is the last year for the truck!

masscity · Jan 8, 2006

Nice to see some people that know the UP of Michigan. Nisula is about 15 miles away from my home town. Northland Cafe is long gone. There's a Kubota dealer in Marquette and one in Wisconsin(can't remember the town). My neighbor up there bought his Kubota from Wisconsin where he got the best deal. Both are about 100 miles from my home town. I grew up in Mass City and will be soon be moving back, retiring. On our farm we have a Ford 9n with a backblade, 8hp John Deere snowblower and my Kubota B7100 16hp gear with a backblade. Anyone know of a quality 4' front snowblower for my Kubota, which has a front and back PTO? I've looked at many, but all are two big. I still have some time, but I want to do some research before I buy. It has to be a front mounted, have a bad back. Thanks much.