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

I was talking to a guy the other day who's a friend of owner of the local Toro/Ariens dealership. Long story short, this fellow said that the dealership owner told him that Suzuki was supplying engines for Ariens snow throwers. Has anyone out there heard of this or is someone getting smoke blown up their a$$? Another thing he told me was that he bought an Ariens with the 305cc 9.5 B&S snow engine on it and the dealership owner told him that the engine was really putting out closer to 11 h.p than 9.5. If that's true, it would appear that my suspicions of the power ratings for the 305cc engine are pretty much substantiated and the different power labels were for marketing purposes only.

On Ariens' website you can see that they offer Subaru engines on some of their models-- though the Subie's have substantially less displacement than the standard B&S engines.  Our local OPE doesn't stock the Subaru-powered blowers; probably one could special order them.  Still, the B&S snow engines seem smooth and powerful... not sure why you'd want to go with Subie. 

Maybe they have all wheel drive?  Wait a minute, there are just two wheels on my blower!

amazer98 wrote:
All I know is that I have an Ariens commercial rated lawnmower that came with a 6 HP Robins-Subaru engine and it is hands down the best engine I've ever owned (and that includes the Honda GX engine).  It is a chain driven OHC design, oil filter, extremely quiet, counter balanced engine.  I wish every outdoor power equipment I own came with this engine.

The thing is though...Subaru probably makes several grades of engines.  The one I have says Robins on the engine's name plate and Robin-Subaru on the owners manual.  I don't know if Ariens is currently offering the same grade of Subaru engine on their equipment as they did a few years ago when I bought my mower.

I'd suspect that the guy was confusing Subaru with Suzuki. That makes sense.

amazer98 wrote:  
2x2 is all wheel drive!!!

Even if you have a unicycle, it's still all wheel drive.

Paul7 wrote:
Not too stray too far from the original topic of this thread, a while ago, I looked into a Subaru EX21 engine.  What a nice engine.  There's also an EX21 EFI. 

If you want to see this engine in person, check out your Home Depot store for this power washer.

http://www.homedepot.com/Outdoors-Outdoor-Power-Equipment-Pressure-Washers/h_d1/N-5yc1vZ1xr5Zarmw/R-100663197/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

OK.  Now back to our program.  Someone was talking about Suzuki engine?

Not thread hi jacking but......... Real happy so far with the B&S that came on my new Ariens Platinum 30: Lots of power: the envy of all who drive by when i'm blowing (altho they probably think I'm using a Husky since the're both orange).