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

Hello,

This is my first post here.

I recently got a used old Honda HS35 snowblower for $80.

It starts and runs with choke 'closed'. The choke knob is loose, moves around with the vibration.And when I put the choke on 'open' position it most of the time surges (up and down). I added some seafoam and noticed that it helped it stabilize on that day. I started it again today and it still surges when the choke is 'open' during the first few minutes, then stabilizes. Is this normal?  To start the machine the choke needs to be 'closed' or it won't start.

 This is my first snowblower, I have not worked on a snowblower before.

Auger's rubber parts are not new, the previous owner said he replaced them 3 years ago.It looks like rubber parts are worn by about half an inch maybe.Because I can see where the tip of the rubber was at one point by looking at the very thin end of the rubber.

Scraper bar is not rubber, it looks like it is made from harder plastic and the edges have 3-5 indents froms scraping. Do I have to replace these this year or will they work for now?

Is the price I paid fair for the machine I described above? Is it too much?

Thanks.

blumonster,

You are a proud owner of 30 year old state-of-the-art snowblower.  I can vision myself sinking a ton of money on this machine so I quit before I lost more.  I thought about dropping GX160 but the height (base to shaft) was just too tall.

I have a concrete driveway, which is part of my development area code, so the rubbers would have wore out quickly and I have no desire to put those rubbers on again.  Look at the bright side, at least you have HS621 which is still being made today.

I have the early version HS35 (purchased 1982) snow blower that uses the discontinued 06761-730-000 Scraper kit or the 76215-730-000 "rubber shield", both of which are discontinued and very difficult if near impossible to find.  My rubber shield had cracked allowing snow to kick back (more or less at your feet).  Since the part is discontinued I decided to make my own part.  I ordered from a company named Zoro (www.zoro.com) product number G0805043.  This will get you a 3/16 inch thick piece of rubber (durometer 90 meaning hardness) that measures 6 x 36 inches for about $15.  My original piece measured 2-1/2 inches wide x 19-9/16 long.  You can get two pieces out of the replacement piece of rubber even if you do as I did and made the replacement 2-5/8 inch wide to allow for some wear.  Use a 3/8 drill to drill the needed (4) holes and make sure you insert the metal spacers into the holes.  They should be snug.

This worked like a charm.  Hopefully I can get a few more years old of the snow blower which runs beautifully in spite of it being 33 years old!

I guess it's a good thing that scraper is only a flat piece of rubber with holes.  Even though it is obsoleted, a duplicate one can be made easily.  If it was extruded or molded plastic, that would be a lot more difficult to duplicate the profile.

MN_Runner wrote:
Sorry to hijack this thread, but since there isn't much activity in this forum, I don't think anybody would get their panties twisted up.  :)

So I had a chance to replace the rubber paddles on both the HS520 and the Toro 421QE this winter.  So here's my assessment of what I experienced.

The Honda HS520 rubber paddles and plastic scraper replacement was fairly easy.  I bought the authentic Honda parts that included new shoulder bolts that matched up exactly with the holes on the rubber.  There was 19 fasteners to remove and install.  Everything was accessible with either a socket or box wrench  The rubber was fairly flexible and easily to align into the mounting holes on the auger.  Just take your time and make sure left paddles goes on the left side, right paddles on the right side.  An extra minute to organize the parts made the job goes smoothly  It took me about an hour to replace the paddles and scraper bar.  I had the machine in a heated basement so everything was warm and comfortable.  I would not have as much fun in a cold garage.

On the Toro 421QE, I decided to try the new Kage Polyurethane paddles.  These are the hefty commercial grade paddles and they look and feel tough.  It is very thick and stiffer than the stock paddles.  Here's the link if you want to find out more.  http://www.kageinnovation.com/en/snow-removal-products/rotor/  .  They are expensive, about 2x the price of Toro OEM paddles.  That's $39 a piece. 

I thought replacing the paddles on the Toro would be easier the Honda HS520, but that wasn't the case.  The single piece paddles means that I have to align all 6 fasteners into the holes.  That made it a little more difficult because the Toro bolts were slightly short when used with a thicker paddle.  Getting the threads to start was often difficult.  The paddles were stiff and didn't not bend as easily.  The 4 inner fasteners are relatively easy.  The two outer ones by the bucket sides were a pain.  I ended up taking the whole metal rotor assembly out of the bucket to install the auger.  That made the job 100% easier, even though it requires removing the drive belt, pulley, and bearing housing.  So if you get these thick Kage paddles. take the rotor off the snowblower and install the paddles.

So it took me about 1.5 hours to do the Toro with these Kage paddles.  if I had to do it again, it would taken me about 1 hour to do it I just remove the rotor in the first place. 

I haven't had snow to try out these new Kage paddles.  The fit is tight against the snowblower bucket.  I did run it dry and the extra heft of the paddles means that there will be more vibration and noise.  That is something to consider when upgrading to these.  But I suspect these paddles will attack the EOD piles more aggressively.  The tight fit means that it should be very effectively against slush.  I'll update when I have actual snow to test.

Thanks for posting this AA335. I will be taking my 221 in for service this offseason and after reading about these new auger paddles I was most definitely

going to request these. A liitle more noise and vibration won't bother me as it's already obnoxious to begin with! I look foward to your review after trying them

out in the snow. Thanks again.

ralphfr,

Just to clarify, these Kage polyurethane paddles for the Toro 221 / 421 / 721 models are aftermarket parts.  I highly doubt that your Toro dealers will have them or will install them.  That would compromise the warranty from Toro.

Toro does have the commercial grade thicker rubber paddles that goes on the 721RC.  Dealers are stocking these and are offering them as upgrades, if you so desire.

aa335 wrote:

Appreciate your clarification. I did assume these were the paddles that Toro was using on the 721 R-C. Did a little googling and found that the Toro parts manual for this model lists the part number as 125-1128 for the extended life paddles and they are about $40 each. The kit is part# 38205 and it cost about $90 which includes 2 paddles and the hardware. Cannot seem to find any info on what material Toro uses to manufacture these paddles. Definitely going for them. It would be nice if they fit as close to the housing as you say the Kage paddles are. If not then I might have to consider doing it myself and going with the Kage paddles next time around. Again great info. Thanks again.

If anyone else is interested here's the link to the Toro 721 R-C Parts Catalog: www.toro.com/en-us/professional-contractor/snow-removal/single-stage/Pages/Model.aspx?pid=power-clear-commercial-721r-c-38751

You're welcome.  I'm posting information about alternative replacement paddles  just in case people may interested in trying them out for themselves.  Replacing the paddles isn't hard, sometimes you just have to find the easier way to do it.  I do like doing these things myself as I get to know the machine better and appreciate the engineering thought that goes into it.  The more I know about the machine, the more I like to keep it in top shape.

I don't like the initial tight fit of the Kage paddles.  It's a little bit too tight.  It creates some drag and robs power from the engine.  I have sprayed Fluid Film on the bucket housing to minimize any wear to the blower housing during initial break in.  As the paddles wears in, the performance should improve.  Vibration and noise should improve as well.  Kinda like having high performance summer tires that need to be broken in after a few hundred miles.

The Toro dealers around here have a display of both Toro regular and extended life paddles.  From what I can see and feel, both are made of the same rubber compound and cords.  The only difference is the extended life version has about 1/8" more rubber.  Other than that, the number of fiber cords and the construction are exactly the same.  I don't see a huge difference, that's why I went with Kage version.

I don't think there will be a great performance gain.  I think Toro offers the extend life version to stay competitive with Ariens, which has a fairly thick and stiff auger.  The extended life paddles may potentially extend the life of the scraper bar.  Just a speculation on my part.  I do like Toro's implementation of the pivoting scraper bar.  The scraper bar is always in contact with the paddles as it wears down.  It works well and easy to replace.

My problem is I redid all the cement on my property a while ago and it has accelerated the wear on the paddles for sure. Considering that Toro's extended life paddles

are still made from the same materilas as the OEM paddles those Kage paddles seem like a bargain.  I'll definitely try the new Toro's and hopefully they'll provide

longer life. It also seems that the more the paddles wear the more blowback I get fron under the scaper bar. I just replaced it before this winter and it didn't seem

to make much difference. Hopefully I installed it correctly. It seemed pretty straightfoward. Again thanks for the information aa335.

I used the Kage paddles today on varying amount of snow, from 2 inch all the way up to 10 inches.  The throwing performance is no better or worse than the stock Toro paddles.  I did notice more vibrations and bumps especially on uneven pavement.  The polyurethane is definitely stiffer and does not absorb bumps as well as the rubber material.  There is noticeably less forward bite.  A couple of times, I lifted the handles to tip the machine forward and got snow blow back under the scraper bar.  Hopefully, this will improve as the paddles wear in more.