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Why is a Front Snow Blower so Expensive

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Trac4me
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2003-09-09          63462

I have been shopping for a Small compact for a while and am still puzzled about the price of a Front Snowblower.

It seems that the front blower is around $4000 for the Kubota B7500. But I think that is if I don't get a loader. With a loader it would be less I guess, is that right.

If the tractor already has a loader how much extra would a front blower cost for a Kubota B7500??

Anyone have one? is it hard to put on???

Thanks for any and all insights


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Art White
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2003-09-10          63478

You are right as to the approximate cost of the snow blower. There is a lot of difference between a generic three point cheapie blower and a front blower. It is about double the cost of a good three point but after useing a three point and the front mounts it's easier to make the choice of the front mount. ....

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TomG
Join Date: Feb 2002
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2003-09-10          63485

They're more expensive because most of them have their own frame and hydraulics. Other than the fact that I don't have a mid-pto to run a front blower, I wouldn't want one even at the same price as a 3ph mount type. I need both a blower and a loader to the work I've got to do. If I had much longer runs, I might think a front blower and rear blade would be better. ....

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DRankin
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2003-09-10          63496

My brother lives in heavy snow country. After several years he switched his front blower to a rear mount for exactly the reasons Tom stated.

Plus, he said it was a pain in the #$$ to mount and dismount when it was on the front end, and much easier on the rear. ....

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DennisCTB
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2003-09-10          63503

Mark,

Does he clear large areas over 700 feet in length or is it short but alot of depth? Where stacking becomes an issue.

Here in the midatlantic states, a compact would not run into stacking problems, but a garden tractor would.

Dennis ....

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Ducati996
Join Date: Jul 2003
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2003-09-10          63511

The price of a front mount blower deterred me from even thinking about it for my JD4100. It was economically more feasible to get a front mount for my Cub 3204 (garden tractor). I think blowers are ideal for most conditions,
it snows a lot around here as well. It enables me to handle driveways very quickly. Besides mine, I have two immediate neighbors, and 2 relatives nearby. I can never see myself doing that many driveways with a FEL, or a blade. Blowers work real well in almost any condition, including gravel driveways providing the correct height is used. Most CUTs have some form of quick attach method, so if someone got a front mount blower setup time shouldnt be too difficult at all. If the price wasnt such a problem, I bet the majority would use a front blower over a rear 3 pt or FEL. This may raise some feathers here for some with that statement. But if realistically if they used a Front mount on their CUT, and price was not an issue, would they go back to a rear 3 pt or FEL after using the front blower? I say they would not... ....

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DRankin
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2003-09-10          63514

Dennis, the area my brother clears is not overly large or long, but it has to be cleared frequently due to high winds and drifting snow.

His biggest complaint is it takes over an hour to get the FEL off and the blower/driveshaft on and the hydraulic lines re-routed. And once it configured with a front blower, it cannot be used for much else without another couple hours of labor to switch things back around.

He lives in a high mountain valley at he boundary of the Chugach National Forest outside Anchorage. He has a Kubota 2150(?) with a Kubota front blower that he has now converted to a 3 point attachment. ....

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Trac4me
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2003-09-10          63517

I have a WH garden tractor now with a front blower that cost me about $800 new. If the tractor could have handled a two stage, which it cannot, and hand four wheel drive, which it don't, it would be great, which it ain't, it just gets me by with a struggle.

Putting it on takes about 25 minutes. If putting one on a B7500 would take more than that I would be pretty unhappy.

Mark, how would your brother rate that blower, how deep a snow can it handle or is he out there battling it 8" at a time???
....

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Ducati996
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2003-09-10          63519

Trac4me,

I guess not every tractor (lawn or garden) is made for snow throwing. The ideal setup consists of a machine that can handle it(weight)along with the chains & weight setup.
When they are setup right, they work great. Single or 2 stage it dosent have to be a 4wd tractor.
As for setup i think people are being unrealistic if they expect to switch attachments that quickly and be off and running. Seasonal setup takes time regardless of attachment.
I guess the older the machine the longer the setup. My older Cub 125 takes me an hour. My JD 4100 took me under 15 minutes to remove FEL first time ( I didnt want to remove it at all because I wasnt sure how difficult it would be), same thing with my new Cub 3204 and its deck. Simple and quick. Same with the blower, I was really surprised how quick. If it took me longer i wouldnt care either way.
I'm not sure why someone would need a FEL as well as a blower capability at the same time. I'm not disbuting the need, just not sure why a front thrower wouldnt just clear it far and away. I dont anticipate using my JD 4100's FEL in the winter at all. I know the blower will handle it just perfectly. Its not like I get more snow than anyone one else or anyless than a typical Northern winter. Just curious as to why both would be needed at the same time...

Ducati996 ....

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Art White
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2003-09-10          63528

I'm reading here of some long times to switch to the snowblowers and I hate to say it but I think you are counting your whole time to get the unit out of storage and to switch. Not to affend but a typical 125 cadet, mower off 5 minutes or less. Blower on in ten minutes. Oil change and point adjustment or change 15 miuntes. B-2150 Kubota approximately (depending on the attachments on the tractor) 15 to twenty minutes for one person. There are things that often are forgotten after a year or two of ownership. Read the manuals again and set a pattern. ....

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Ducati996
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2003-09-10          63532

Art,

No fair !! you are like the equivelent of the NASCAR pit crew, and its all about speed. You can service these machines in your sleep!!. I'm slow no doubt about it, but it takes me longer with my older 125, compared to the newer 3204. The newer models are more tool-less designs.

Ducati996 ....

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TomG
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2003-09-11          63562

Like Art says, you establish patterns for getting the work done. I'll add that I probably tend to think of those patterns as requirements. I probably could figure how to get the work done with having a loader one end and a blower the other. I just don't want to. I'll comment on what I do and maybe somebody will get some ideas for patterns that prove useful.

In fairly short narrow parking areas I tend to blow going one direction and plow with the loader the other. It saves a bunch of maneuvering time. Part of one area is between buildings so I'd have to blow straight away from me. That's blowing snow on top of snow and I couldn't go far enough in heavy snows before the blower couldn't clear the accumulation. Also, I'd be putting more snow around buildings that lack good back grading and there'd be water in them during runoff. So, I use the loader for half of the clearing and stack it away from buildings. I pile it up 7' or higher so I need a loader. I 3ph blade wouldn't get enough height. If I didn't stack it that high, I'd have to plow far into the yard or I'd run out of space be spring.

I also clear two highway entrances and I really want to avoid maneuvering a tractor on a winter highway that has a bunch of transport traffic. I blow down the drives and then swing out onto the highway shoulder for some distance. Then I plow with the loader the other direction across the drive and along the shoulder on the other side of the drive. Finally, I do have to go on the highway to push mounds left where I stop by both the blower and loader into the ditch. I could use a 3ph blade here because I don't have to stack it very high. I do use the loader before runoff to chop down the mounds either side of the drive at the ditch to provide drainage. I don't want water to accumulate in the entrance and then freeze. ....

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Paul_in_NS
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2003-09-16          64068

I have been clearing snow here in Nova Scotia with a front-mount blower and a rear blade on a JD855. It works great about 85% of the time. My neck still aches when I remember using a 3ph blower many years ago. The blade is good for hauling it out from the edges and scraping down the hardpack that I buildup over the gravel. The problem 15% comes with the snow-turns-to-rain kind of storm we get on the east coast. If the snow is too soggy the blower won't move it at all. Then I have to switch to the FEL, still with the rear blade. Change over is 30-40 minutes total, not counting dig-out time for the FEL. Driveway takes 1.5 hours with blower and 6.5 with FEL (3100' total).

Paul ....

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Art White
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2003-09-16          64088

You'll get a kick out of this but in high school Dad used to send me out to change the blowers to mowers and vise-virsa. I did a lot of those model 125 I had nearly 10 of that model alone. With a oil change and general lube greasing and going over tractor setting the points or replacing, plug was about 45 minutes to an hour on site. Can't do it any more as I don't think I could remember which tools for where but there are a few tricks to do it. ....

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ilovecatd2
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2003-10-06          65673

I have a JD 955 with a loader with a snow blade mounted to it on the front, and a rear blade on the back. I am buying a rear blower, so you can have the best of both worlds. Use the bucket/blade to push the light snow around. Then stack it at the end of the driveway. Then spin around and use the blower to move it about 50 feet off the driveway. My plowing customers love this, there is no stack of snow at the end of the drive way and its faster. But if you got deep snow then the blower will just eat right throught it. I don't back down from any snow. ....

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Murf
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2003-10-06          65676

As a kid one of my 'chores' was snow removal, it was one of my favourites, both because it was not hard labour and because I could make a TON of money doing everybody else's place.

We had a dedicated unit, styled after the big Sicard blowers used on airports, etc., it was an old cabover 3 ton truck chopped down to a really short wheelbase. There was a small V8 engine and tranny mounted in a steel box over the back axle. This then drove, via 4 heavy roller chains in an oil bath, a drive shaft running under the truck to a 8' double auger blower mounted out front on a hydraulic lift mechanism like a plow mount.

That thing would chew through snowbanks like there was no tomorrow, I can recall going through drifts so tall the snow would go over the top if you didn't go slow enough. I don't think I ever bogged it out, light snows could be handled at about 15 mph, heavy stuff was done in first gear, probably about 3-5 mph.

Of course the gas consumption alone probably would make it a pretty expensive propostion today.

There are a number of companies who now make self-contained units which get carried in/by the bucket of really big payloaders too.

Best of luck. ....

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bradvl
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2003-12-11          70832

Does anyone have any experience with the JD 955 with the front mounted snow blower and excessive vibration of the drive shaft from the mid PTO to the connecting shaft mounted on the front frame? This machine is fairly new (< 120 hours) and the U joints are tight. ....

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Murf
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2003-12-11          70834

It sounds like something is out of balance, likely a bent shaft, or it is the blower itself.

We run basically the same setup except for the Orange paint, it is absolutely smooth, better than the 3pth even.

Best of luck. ....

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Art White
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2003-12-11          70835

Murf, never enough power, I've loved the opurtunities I've had growing up where I have. ....

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Murf
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2003-12-11          70839

Yup, I agree, look at all the things city kids miss out on, cow tipping, dynamiting outhouses, icing up wood piles ... poor, poor, deprived children.

I just hope my father never reads that.... LOL.


Best of luck. ....

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kubotaguy
Join Date: Nov 2003
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2003-12-11          70843

I have a picture of my backyard with deer in it hanging in my cube at work. I work in Washington D.C. and some of my co-workers who live in DC ask me how much land I own. When I tell them that it is 6.5 acres, they ask me where do I keep the cows on my farm!!!!! Can you imagine a 6.5 acre farm? I think the poor farmer would starve!!! I guess it's a matter of perspective like in DC where if you do have a lot, it is measured in square feet instead of acres. ....

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Art White
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2003-12-11          70845

Murf, don't let them fool ya! He'd probably tell you he wondered why that's all you did do! You might be amazed with his list! My grandfather sure did give me the low down, even on things at the turn of the century. The good thing about years ago we never hurt people when we went out and had some fun. The people we were havin our little practical jokes on were our freinds not strangers and they normally knew it was us or they expected it to be! ....

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Murf
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2003-12-11          70847

Art, you soooooo right.

My comment about dynamiting an outhouse was a bit of a family joke. We had a very elderly neighbour who the nicest sweetest old man the world could ask for. His wife had died MANY years before him and the entire community pitched in and helped him out, it was not charity, just helping out. It was all this assistance that probably allowd him to stay on his own so long.

That and he was as stubborn as gravity itself.

His house had no indoor plumbing, there was a "wee' hoose" (he was Scottish and had an accent so thick it was nearly another language) out the back, and a dug well with a hnd pump on top.

He also had quite a sense of humour and LOVED practical jokes.

While he was away visiting his newest grand-daughter several of us had a work bee and built a small covered porch on the back of his house, under it was a holding tank for the newly installed toilet, powered by a small submersible pump in the well.

As he pulled up the driveway on his return his old 'facilites' went up in a cloud of smoke and debris.

He went across the yard at a full on run and 'caught' us culprits, when he asked "And just what am I supossed to do now when I have to go?" we just giggled pointed to the new addition and the crowd of friends there to welcome him home.

Years later I went to visit him in the hospital, my last visit, when I went into the washroom to 'return a rented coffee' he blew a paper bag up and on my opening the door to come out he popped it with a mighty bang.

Between his laughter he managed to say "Now we're even!"

God I miss him. ....

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Art White
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2003-12-11          70895

I love it!!! I know I have some good livin to do yet to keep up my gramps died at 94 and I only hope that I can enjoy life as much as he did! God bless ya Murf! ....

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Art White
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2003-12-11          70897

I'm ging to turn some questions around here. Do you think that if someone was going to build a drive system to add a snowblower to the front of a tractor that could be used at it's maximum efficency, do you think they would build it weak? Do you think they would start out with a blower that on the three point hitch would sell for 1299? Now lets add the hydraulic lift system. Thats where you an get to three thousand dollars quickly. The blower units normally used are of the 2000 dollar retail plus if it was three point hitch. ....

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Murf
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2003-12-12          70930

You're right on the money as usual Art.

The retail cost of any product is the result of simple mathematics, cost of production plus some profit, add the cost of distribution (physical shipping and distributor's profit margin), add to that the dealer's profit and you have retail price.

There used to be quite a few 'custom' front-mounted blowers around here. They were conventional 3pth models mounted on a long tongue which plugged into the drawbar socket and was lifted by a cable system. The cable went from the tongue up over the front harness, back down to the tongue and to the rear where it went through a pulley and up to the 3pth. When the 3pth was raised it pulled the cable and the blower went up. Drive was a pipe shaft which ran in carrier bearings mounted on the tongue and was chain driven from the pto.

A lot of farmers made their own based on this concept.

There were also quite a few which were hydraulically powered from a pump hanging off the pto shaft, these were usually a little weak in performance but were less fuss to fabricate.

Best of luck. ....

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