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New toys and how they worked

2K views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  BRL 
#1 ·
OK,, got to play with a whole mess of new toys yesterday and today. 4" of dry powder, plowed easily and came down slow enough that it was all manageable. Here's the toy list and how they all worked out.

Sno-Way "Lobo" Vee plow. This one is only new to us, it's a year old plow that we bought this summer. First time any of us have used a Vee, takes a while to learn the ropes with one. I like the versatility. Productivity is definitely better than a straight blade and will get better as we gain experience. On the down side, it lowers slower than the Sno-Way straight blades and the relief valves on the wings seem to be set a little light.

Sno-Way "Spreadator" vee box. Second time using this one. Starts right off, takes a little time to warm up before you can throttle it down. And you have to throttle it WAY down to keep the spread width down. I'm running with the door closed as far as it can be and you still have to be moving right along to keep from wasting material. It would work great with sand mix as you could open the door and throttle up and really cover a wide pass. But since I use virtually no mix that's rather irrelevant to me. Once I learn to set the deflectors I'm sure it will work better, right now the learning curve is pretty steep. This spreads much wider than the Tarco we used last winter.

Honda 520 snowblower. A true jewel! A bit heavy for real ease in loading/unloading. Nice directional control on the spout. Started in a max of two pulls, usually one and it was running. 4" gone as fast as I wanted to walk with it. Definitely a keeper!

And finally, Urethane cutting edge. I'm a dealer, but I haven't pushed them yet. I wanted first hand knowledge before I tried to sell them. I'll be trying to sell them now! Several hours of wear now and it's worn in maybe 60% of the thickness of the edge. Virtually all that was in the first couple hours, wear slowed down dramatically as the amount of material touching the ground increased. Not scraping as clean as a steel edge now, but I think that once it wears in and the front of the edge is on the ground I think that will change. I'm amazed at how quiet it is, the sound is about like rushing water, more of a soft "whoosh" than a clatter. Clocked a couple of protruding manholes that have always caused violent trips in the past, all they did was leave a little scuff mark on the urethane and a slight bump as the plow passed over. One thing they do funny stuff on is coarse crushed gravel, "plant mix" as it's called here, biggest stone is about 1 1/2", down to fines. One area we do is that stuff and there is quite a bit of the bigger stones sticking up. After the first pass, when part of the blade was now carrying snow, the edge would catch a protruding stone, apparently flexing back and then launching the stone into the next county. Some of these came out like a bullet and went at least a hundred feet. Funny as hell to watch them go, luckily nothing ahead but air, they would do a number on windows.
 
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