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

I would appreciate opinions on a crazy idea I have.  My problem is very limited storage/access space which pretty much limits me to a 24" wide machine (with a corresponding smaller diameter auger).
So, In order to get a step up in performance, I am looking at a 10-28 unit that I have, and wondering about the possibility of narrowing it to 24". That would mean remove the rakes, grind off the welds on the outboard support, compress the rakes down by 2" and reweld. Of course I would need to narrow the housing & shorten the shafts too.
My logic is that the larger rakes of the 28" machine (16" dia. vs 12" in the 24" machine) even narrowed, would still have a much bigger throughput. Does that make any sense? They are both 3 blade impellers, the 24" is 11" and the 28" is 12". I haven't calculated the relative impeller/auger speeds for the two machines, but interestingly enough the the smaller machine has a much longer  "hook" at the front of the impeller, which I assume is to move the snow from the auger housing into the impeller chamber. So it seems to take bigger bites of snow?

Cheers

A friend of mine had about the same considerations that you are having and bought an Ariens 1124 a few years ago.  Not sure if anything like that is still available, but he didn't have much room and still wanted the biggest engine he could get in a 24" wide blower.  He loves the thing and is the main reason I got an Ariens when I was looking last year.  Maybe looking for a used 1124 or finding out what Ariens offers in a high horsepower 24" wide blower would be a lot cheaper and easier than modifying a 28" down to 24".

I repowered a 24" machine a couple of years back. I went from a 7hp Tecumseh (making probably 5 hp) to an OHV 11hp Honda with about 4 hours of use on it. Two things I noticed. First is there was no noticeable difference in throwing distance; it's the same unimpressive 20 feet it was before. The second is that I've been unable to "bog" the machine down. It'll clog as usual, burn the belt as usual, snap shear pins as usual. When it's cold, I can run it in 2 feet of snow in top gear and it won't hiccup. It'll push snow ahead of itself.

I am told that the throwing distance is as much a function of engine RPM as anything else. My Honda doesn't spin any faster than the Tecumseh did.

I know that it's not really a direct reply to what you are thinking about, just giving you more to think about!

Just throwing and un-educated opinon out there; What about changing the pully's and belts by a little bit and therefore increasing the RPM of the impeller?

I know that would also, relatively, increase the speed of the auger, but that depends on the gearing on the shaft too. After all, you could put 20 hp on the head but if you cannot get the torque to the "ground" so to speak, what good will it do. Does anyone make different size pully's or different gearing for that end of the shafte. I know that opens a hole different can of worms, but after all, if the RPM is the cuplrit...

I had a siilar thought about my old Ariens before I sold it. Repower and increase strength or just replace...

I found a suitable replacement instead of tinkering...

For a two stage thrower there are two pulleys, sometimes joined together, one powers the auger, the other powers the impeller. They can be removed and replaced with slightly different sized pulleys but there are things to be aware of that have been discussed in other threads.

I did it when I put an 11HP B&S Snow Intek on a 10/28 machine that had a blown 10.5 Tecumseh L-Head. I increased both pulleys by 1/4" and got a bit faster horizontal speed and a noticable but not really useful increase in throwing distance. I have noticed with other machines that when the throwing distance is bad its normally because the impeller belt is not tight enough and is slipping. This is due to the belt being too worn or the idler not being adjusted properly.

If you do this be very careful, belt tensions will be different and components running faster will wear out faster.

Back to the OP. Throwing distance is determined by the diameter of the impeller and its RPM. The amount of snow that can be "pumped" through the unit is also fixed. Most OPE engines run at the same RPM and the gear train doesn't change so throwing distance under normal load won't change appreciably. As you stated, the difference is in how the machine reacts to being used under higher loads. More power means the engine is harder to bog down and hence can throw its maximum snow volume without slowing down. It doesn't really increase that volume nor does it make it go away faster, any excess snow goes out in front of the auger and the unit starts to snow plough.