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

I was at a local Honda dealer yesterday and I was stunned by the prices on their snowblowers. In Canadian dollars, they were: 928 wheels: $3000 928 track: $3400 724 track: $3400 1132 track: $3500 I know they have tracks, hydro tranny, honda engines, etc. but they're at least $1000-1500 more than equivalent toro and ariens models. Is it gold, they re making?

starwarrior wrote:

That's a tough one. I do enjoy clearing snow so I'm not sure if I'd pay someone else to do it. Although the thought of having perfectly manicured long winding driveway using only hand shovels by a large labor group is quite appealing. Nice perfectly shaped windrows on the sides.

FrankMA wrote:

There isn't one tool perfect for all jobs. Unless all you have on the property is a large parking lot. I would not give up any walkbehind equipment for home use. But having a tractor set up is fun, some times you want to blow snow, some times you want to plow.

I thoroughly enjoy blowing snow by myself so the laborer option is out.... a tractor mount sounds appealing though.

snowmachine wrote:
Snowmachine,

Looking at your sig, I see you have two electric snow shovel/blower.  What's your views on these two products?

I picked these up during the summer off of Craigslist. Each was only $30/each and had never been used. The picture is actually of the MTD branded version... mine is a Yard machine branded version with the only difference being the color of the controllable chute vanes. In my case they are black instead of red. I think the MTD might be fine for a few inches in a driveway but the less expensive Toro Power Shovel blows it away for performance. It can really shoot the snow out there. I think the Toro is also better suited for deck clearing over the MTD. At first glance you would think the controllable vanes on the MTD product would be a nice feature to have but they seem to cut down throwing distance by about 1/4 of what you get straight on. Save yourself the $50 premium on the MTD and get the Toro if you buy one of these new. I haven't had a chance to use them in really wet snow yet but will report back when I do.

My gas engine Toro Power shove excels in throwing wet snow.  It's much better throwing it than trying to shovel it off of the deck.

starwarrior wrote:

Yes, but try to get them there after a storm. Its like my neighbor said to me this past winter when we had a 3' snow "this is too much snow! we need to hire somebody!" I asked him "Who do you think will show up with 3 feet of snow on the ground? Do you have a name picked out? Or were you just going to start calling around" He was very silent. And so I proceeded to use my 26" MTD with track drive over the next 4 hours to plow out our private road. Only one neighbor helped with his single stage toro. God bless him, he stayed up all night and went out once an hour for 12 hours to do the best he could. I finished it off and did EOD. I'd rather be the guy getting unstuck than the one calling around to see if someone could plow us out over the next two weeks or so.

tkrotchko wrote:

Now you are really talking a different language here Bud. You can buy 5 brand new MTD 26" Track Drive units for the price of one of the Honda models they are talking about.

I had a MTD26 Trackster for the last 14 years. A truely Great Machine. The trigger mechanisms would allow you to turn the thing on a dime.

I recently sold it simply because after 14 years of service I couldn't trust the reliability and was forced to hunt for compatable parts since I no longer was able to find certain OEM parts for my specific model number.

There is nothing worse than a machine breaking down in the middle of a storm. It's the shovel we are talking about here and with the amount of snow you guys are getting hammered with you are absolutely right, I'll bet even the reliable laborers are  heading south this winter.

My new unit is an Ariens 26PRO... I don't expect the same manuverability but do expect better performance. 

I hope to have as much luck with the Ariens as I did with the MTD 

Good luck, it will be over soon and I'll bet that next year you'll load for bear like I did... But seriously, if it is taking 4 hours to plow out your private road you may want to think about a bigger machine. Say something in the 32-36 inch range. If it were me, I would be thinking more along the lines of a 7' Meyers Power Angle in front of an F-250

starwarrior wrote:

I already upgraded because I kept my MTD spotless and perfectly maintained, but stuff was starting to break all the time. Nothing major, but enough to have me in the garage repairing things after 3 hours of use. I already upgraded to a Honda, and I can see that it is not as maneuverable as the MTD (we'll see if that was a mistake). But looking at the Honda, in terms of materials and construction its clearly a step above the MTD (although that was a fine machine). Incidentally, I sold the MTD for 2/3's of what I paid for it after 14 winters. It sold in 3 hours on craigslist on the 4th of July! I put it up the day before, the guy called me an hour later, he came over early 4th of july, tried it and drove away with it before lunch,

tkrotchko wrote:

Wow Throtchko, your story sounds almost exactly the same as mine. (with the exception ot the 66% return)

You did great. I could have held out for more but settled for 30%. (woulda shoulda coulda ???) But man the bucket and drive parts on mine were in serious need of renuvation. 

The biggest problem with mine since the cog wheels that are made of plastic was the drive wheels started to get stress cracks right around the hub and one disintegrated without warning.

Lucky me did not have much more to do and finished up with a shovel. I was able to find a drive wheel last year and this year I noticed the same stress cracks on the other one. I should have bought both drive wheels when I had the chance but not figuring on the other going bad I went the cheap route. Actually I thought a rock had gotten caught between the tread and the cog and the wheel just broke. Well as luck will have it the same part that I found so easily last year was discontinued by the OEM this year. Man the only way I was going to get a replacement was to order the part from a different machine that had a different part number and hope it was the same. I even went so far as to call MTD and when they found out the age of the machine simply responded with the perverbial "Oh Well".

Well I had to make a decision and since a different part number usually means there is going to be something different about the part and really not wanting to end up in the middle of my driveway with a yard ornament, I sold it.

Sometimes it is not worth pulling your hair out trying to salvage a clunker. Well it was out with the old and in with the New so not unlike yourself, I am now charting new territory.

The other dilema since this is a seasonal issue (thank goodness) was last year when I ended up grounded in the middle of February started to scope out the newbees, I would have had to settle for what was left in stock rather than what I wanted, which was either the top priced models or the dogs.

Starwarrior