Outdoor Power Equipment (Lawn Mowers, Snow Blowers, Chain Saws and more) Discussions

I just put in a new auger belt and noticed that the holes for the bolts that hold the front end of the blower to the back end where elongated. I also find that putting the bolts back on after replacing the belt is a real pain. part of the reason is that the nuts that were welded to the inside of the chassis, in line with the holes, fell off two years ago and it take a bit of fiddling to get the regular nuts to not fall into the bottom of the housing.

I've been trying to come up with a modification that will make it easy to open and close the pulley area. I want to make it as easy as possible to change and adjust the belts outside in cold weather with a minimum of tools, preferably while wearing gloves.

One trick that I find helps a lot is to tie one end of a ratchet tie down to the handles and to hook the other end to the top of the auger housing. You can then use the ratchet to pull the two pieces together so that the bolts holes are in line.