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

   Picked up a Deere 826 yesterday.  The thing crapped out during the last storm with a brunt belt and the guy hurt is back shoveling so it got the boot. 

   Nice old buzzard rig but I can't find anything on it at the Deere site.  Anyone know where I can an exploded view?  I tried the usual places that have them and nothing on this one.   It's ID plate has P826J, 127489.  If I google P826J I get new models.  Nothing on the other number.

   The thing works fine after a belt replacement but it only tosses 3 - 8 feet with lots of low splatter.  I tried a few different belt sizes and tensions, and even over tight to insure no slip.  I can't see any slip with the cover off.  It has good grab, no crud in the V's, no obstruction in the housing.  It does have quite a distance from the arms to the lining, 1/2 inch.  The impleller is a 4 blade 12 inch and it should toss fairly well, 15-25. 

   Does anyone have this model and could tell me what it tosses like?  I can't see any problems so guess it's a design problem but at 3-8 feet hard to imagine they could make something that bad. 

   The motor certainly is not the problem, a Briggs Intek Snow 11hp a couple of years old.  I can drive into any condition snow and toss the same distance without engine sag.  Very impressive.  Anyone have a URL to an exploded view on the engine?  I can find one so I assume it a special for some maker.  It's got a 3/4 shaft.  3BSXS 3422HT 275387.  I can't get anything found at the Briggs site.  Googling I get 275385 which is a 10hp but nothing for 275487.  There are lots of hits for 3BXSX 3422HT but no motor like this.

Blackdog, welcome to the forum. 

 

The link you provided shows an 826 that looks like mine from the parts list.  It has the same auger drive pulley and fan dimensions of 11.5 inches with 4 blades.  It’s a looser like mine.

 

>>>I am curious did anyone try the auger kit and what where your results?  How about the pulley change did the increased RPMs and help?

 

I don’t think your poor performance is due to bushings or bearings.  I think it’s a crummy design.  I did not install a “kit” but did put on a 3 inch pulley with the results posted above, lousy.  The impeller speed is still to low to do much.  The machine has a half inch space between the end of the impeller arms and the side wall of the fan housing.  That also has to be taken care of to get good distance. 

 

I stopped working on mine as making mods to that thing is not going to lead to a great machine.  At best the result would be a barely passable machine in average conditions and dog in tough conditions.  It can muscle through snow but it’s a very poor tosser as you know.  It would probably be passable with a 3.5 inch drive pulley.  Once you get the feet per second up high enough you’ll be at it’s max capable RPM on the impeller and augers and only have a barely adequate machine.  It could work though and clear your area but if you are in an area that gets a lot of snow then it would not be a great machine.   

 

There are better machines to spend time on and at least for me that machine was not worth adjusting.  If you started with a better machine and did the same work you would end up with a much better machine.

 

You could try to locate a better blower housing to mount to the base.  The base is very nice.  The tractor section seems very nice with robust components.  The auger engagement clutch is nice and leaves your hand free to work the chute.  For me that engagement is better than the newer designs with drive and auger clutch locking.  On a new machine, if you want to feather the drive clutch in tough going the auger clutch kicks out so you have to hold it.  With the Deere you don’t. 

If you got a full 12 inch or 14 inch impeller and a 3 or 3.5 inch pulley (depends on the pulley size that came with the housing) you would have a viable machine.

 

All in all a 3.5 inch pulley just may be enough to put some life into that thing but it would be at the low end of acceptable.

I have a John Deere 826 that I bought new in 1982.  Model P826H, S/N  101665.  Looks a lot like yours except it Has the H80 Snowking engine.   It doesn't blow snow as far as the new Honda, but goes a lot farther than 8 feet.  I did have problems twice with lack of throwing distance and here is how I fixed them:  (1) about  4 years ago I found that the bearing bushing hole that the impeller shaft rides in had worn into an oval shape so that  when activating the auger drive control (this just tightens the belt) the auger shaft moved up in the bearing and never could get proper tension on it.  Replaced the bushing (and all the others while I was at it) and all was good.   And then (2)  Earlier this winter the throwing distance dropped to what you are seeing - snow just dribbling outa the chute.   Had put a new belt on it last year and looks like it has stretched.  Easy fix this time - just tightened up the ball linkage a few truns to the specs in the repair manual and this fixed the problem.  Took a few tries to get it just right and this appears to be a sensitive adjustment:  too loose and the impeller still turns but it won't throw snow, too tight and you'll get a sore wrist forcing the drive control up and probably be replacing bushings again sometime soon.  All told, this has been a good blower for me.  Not as good as the new Honda tracker, but certainly better than the new JD 1330SE that I tried earlier this year.  I still use it when conditions don't require the Honda.

I just finished installing a Clarence Impeller Kit on my John Deere 826. We are supposed to get snow tomorrow and Weds. so I should have ample opportunity to test it out.

I ran it for a while tonight  just to "break in"  the rubber onto the housing and that went fine.

If you have a 1/2" space between the impeller blade tips and the housing that is the problem, without question.  Increasing the rpm won't really help that much. The impeller and housing section of a
blower is basically a pump. And without a fairly tight clearance it won't pump well. Not only that,  the impeller is always spinning inside a wad of snow that never leaves the housing.  It's functioning more like a blender than a pump.

 I had an air drill once that had worn vanes.  It would spin really fast and sounded like it was working well until.
You put the drill under a load by putting the drill bit on a piece of steel.  It would barely spin then. All the air that was supposed to be pushing on the vanes to spin the chuck was finding an easier way out by going through the space between the vanes and the housing. I know that is kind of the reverse of how a impeller and housing work but it's a similar principle.

I recently posted a comment from a Ariens tech that I read somewhere else.  He stated that "if the clearance is correct in the housing you should be able to put a dime on the bottom of the housing and the impeller should sweep it up and throw it out the chute". "When the Impeller won't do the same with a quarter it's time to rebuild the impeller blades". 

When I lengthened the blades on my impeller to where I now have 1/16 to 1/8" clearance (the housing isn't perfectly round) it made a noticeable difference in the throw distance and the ability of the blower to blow both snow and slush.  So much so that I no longer carry a clean out tool on the blower.  The chute just never clogs and I can throw pure slush. 
I really think that decreasing the gap or clearance between the impeller blades and housing is the single biggest performance booster that can be made on a blower.  You can't believe the difference until you see it for yourself.   I've also noticed that because the blower is now so much more efficient at expelling all the snow that enters the housing.  That I can reduce the engine speed, use a higher gear and still get the job done with snow depths up to about 4 or 5". It's a wonderful thing!

Jrtrebor:>>If you have a 1/2" space between the impeller blade tips and the housing that is the problem, without question.

 

I agree.   The spacing and the very slow impeller rpm make a big problem.

 

   There are now five people I have heard of that have this style of Deere and have the distance problem.  A guy on another forum put CL’s kit in and is using his but he did not give the improvement over the original short distance.  Reading about his made me think about mine more.  I checked the impeller area again and realized I had ½ on one side and an inch on the other at 180 from the ½. 

   The impeller arms are very small to boot.  With a CL kit it would be good to extend past the flat up onto the curved part of the arm.  If mine got a kit I’d still be away from the barrel on 1/3 of the travel of the impeller.  I think mine has it’s impeller shaft hole slightly off from center.

I read it is straight down to 90 degrees out to the side of the chute that matters.  It was said that the rest doesn't matter.

Sorry Shryp, can you repeat that but differently?

Is that the last quarter of rotation before the chute?

Yea, I read somewhere that it is the last quarter of the sweep that really matters.

I got a chance to run my deere 826 today with the kit installed. There was a noticable difference. We had about 5 inches of dry, powdery snow today.

I noticed an improvement of about 25-30% in distance. This is in line with what I have read others are seeing. The real improvement is supposed to happen with the heavy, wet slushy stuff.

Anyway, it has turned the machine from being basically unusable to marginally acceptable. Definately not a good as a modern machine, but OK. My take on it is if you have an old machine that runs good but cannot toss well due to the huge impeller gap, it's worth the money. If you really want to pinch pennies, you could fabricate your own kit.

ahw2698 wrote:

That's great and about what I figured.  It would bring it just into acceptable.  If you put a three inch pulley on that it would get it even better.  I tried on mine but without a kit it did not make any difference.   I think the Deere is nice and like the auger clutch allowing a free hand.  It's like the old Ariens machines which are very easy to use.  The Deere seems very well built and mine is clean without rust.  I hate to just have it languish or get the boot for $50.