Borat: “How is the impeller/housing for wear? Are the clearance tolerances sufficiently close to throw snow as well as your Honda(s)?”
The housing is solid. The crummy looks white crud is actually grey metal or white leftover Navel Jell leaves when it’s done working. That white film can last up to 6 months if not removed which is tough to do at times. I usually leave it on my own machines as it’s great protection. NASA also came to the same conclusion in a paper I found. They use Navel Jell as a rust remover but also for it’s lasting protection over other removers they tried. The use was on their super sonic wind tunnel.
The clearances are close and the YSxxx machines from the late 80’s and early 90’s are super tossers. The engines are generally set from 3850 to 4000 and auger and impellers higher than US machines. All the YS parts are on roller bearings.
I did over a YS624 this year, rebuilt the engine and had to sleeve the impeller area. On that one I was going to have the local dealer weld on extension tips to the impeller arms. It turned out the distance gain in feet per second was so slight I did not have it done. So a Clarances mod on these machines would not do much.
I did over a Honda 828 the year before. It was a great tosser. It’s the one I used in the side by side tests last year. A few days after a big storm last year I watched the cemetery guy next doot clearing a road with their HS828. The distance was phenomenal and seemed like mine would not do that. A few days later they were still clearing (they do a few miles with theirs) and the machine crapped out. He brought it over to fix so I got to try it out after the repair with mine side by side in the back yard. Their machine out did mine. After chewing on that for a while I believe the reason for the difference is the sleeve insert in mine along with the impeller area being slightly out of round especially in the leg just before the chute exit was the reason for the under performance. My engine is excellent.
Because of the above I picked up another Honda bucket which I’m in the middle of swapping over. The clearance on a healthy Honda is about ¼ inch and the same for the YS828. Not much room for improvement.
FrankMA: “trouts: Was that one listed on CL in Watertown for $400.00?”
No, the pictures are dark but it looks pretty good. Too pricey for me. The most I’ve ever paid for a YS was $150 but they usually have problems and the owners wanting to dump them.
Jrtrebor: You've got all kinds of blower for sale up where you live.
Yep, around the Boston area there are lots of machines with problems people are looking to dump. Two years ago I picked up a Snapper 1030 commercial for $30 and a Snapper 8260 for $30. I put a few hundred into the 1030 and a fair portion of that was putting in new parts which were not essential. They were put in just because I was doing it over (paint) and had everything apart. The 8260 was covered in rust and looked horrible but the tractor internals still had all it’s glossy red paint and looked new. The 8260 had its original very old Briggs engine but had lots of compression. All the mechanics were fine and the only fixup on that one was a carb cleaning. On fireup it sounded like an old farm tractor but tossed as well as can be expected for an older design. I sold it and expect the guy can get 10 years out of it.
Around here if you bring a machine in for non-starting your looking at $150 to $200 with $60 for pickup and deliver.
This message was modified Nov 20, 2011 by trouts2
