Snowblower Snowblowers, opinions, good ones and bad ones.

[MadReferee]

I don't consider the Puma a "Value" blower. It is really a "Premium" blower. Their next series up is the "Heavy Duty" series. There are plenty of "Value" blowers out there that are lightweight and with fewer standard features and with inferior designs for certain aspect of the blower.

I will stack my 64" Puma up against any other brand that is similarly priced and it will be slightly heavier and much better built and designed. Just my opinion.

A picture of my Puma in action can be found a few posts before this one.

 

[450EXC]

I'm looking for one also, maybe we can get together and get a volume discount. The best I've seen is a 6' puma for $ 1950.

What do you think ?
Larry

 

[5030]

There are a couple of things to consider about snow blowers:
1. The throat size of the blower directly relates to how much PTO power it will consume
2. Whether you are man enough to withstand the blowing snow that will cover you, your face and any other exposed parts of your body which will immediately begin to get very,very cold.

On one, I have a Lucknow 84" 2 stage that I had on my 5030 which will go behind the M9 this year. I thought the 84" would be fine behind the 5030 and it was so long as the snow was powdery and not heavy. Heavy wet snow had to be approached with care and high drifts had to be taken in at least 2 swipes by lifting the 3 point up and then lowering. I don't expect that problem this year as I about doubled my PTO power. My Lucknow has an exposed chain for the auger drive and I have had the blower for 3 seasons and I have never had a rust problem with either the drive chain or the finish on the blower itself. I lube my drive chain with Bel-Ray Chain wax, the same thing I use on my motorcycle chain. The Lucknow don't come with skid shoes so I fabricated some mounts, welded them on and used round adjustable shoes from a Western Snowplow. They are obtainable on the web and are cheap. I have a gravel drive and that necessitated the skid shoes. Without them, the blower, if you weren't careful, would turn into a machine gun and gravel can break windows and puncture siding right now.

If you have an open station tractor, I'd advise against a blower. Get a blade. The blower will cover you and the tractor, especially if you are throwing the snow a long way and it's powdery. A snowmobile suit is mandatory or Carhartts and a full face mask and good warm gloves, and of course, a cup of hot cocoa waiting for you inside. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[ttowne66]

Larry

Thanks for the thought on the volume buy. I believe we would need a few more people though. Don't believe 2 would be enough.

Tom

 

[robison]

I have a 72 inch Puma. A few other posts have mentioned Puma, which is the lighter weight product from Pronovost. They are very high quality.

Here is the Puma web site http://www.pronovost.qc.ca/puma.html

Here is Pronovost, the parent, with bigger blowers - some of which require several hundred horsepower
http://www.pronovost.qc.ca/snowblowers.html

When I bought mine I looked at Meteors and some no-name models. The Puma is much better built, and the bigger Pronovosts are just more than I need where I live.

 

[450EXC]

Tom

I though Jwease might jump in also. Maybe 3 of us would drop it enough to make it worth it. No big deal though.

Larry

 

[ttowne66]

Larry

What dealer did you get your Quote from? Thanks.

 

[jwease]

What brand are we talking about? I called McQueens and what do you know, they never heard of Blizzard either. The salesman was trying to push Agro-Trend but I said I had already looked at them and wanted to look at the Blizzard. He replied, "whats the difference?" I got annoyed and said thank you for your time. The only other brands that seem to be an option for me right now are Puma & Allied. But that led me to another concern as seen in this post earlier. The clearance of the impeller tips inside the drum. How big of deal is this? With a gravel driveway does this allow stones to get caught in there? The Allied looked to have at least a .25" gap between the impeller tips and the drum. I didn't look at that on the Puma. Otherwise the Allied looks OK.

 

[MadReferee]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( The clearance of the impeller tips inside the drum. How big of deal is this? With a gravel driveway does this allow stones to get caught in there? The Allied looked to have at least a .25" gap between the impeller tips and the drum. I didn't look at that on the Puma. )</font>

The clearance on the Puma is real, real close, less than 1/8" on mine after two seasons of use. I have a gravel driveway and have never had a stone get caught. This, in my opinion, is one of the advantages of the Puma, in that everything gets expelled out the chute.

 

[HobbleCreek]

Makes me sad I'm so far away from you guys. I'd think seriously about thowing in to get the volume discount.

-- Grant