WSmart
December 4th, 2011, 06:43 PM
In the spirit of ubuntu and by the grace of the Ubuntu Community and the forum here, I'd like to post some information on snow blower jams.
I got my first snow blower last fall, and I had my first snow blower jam yesterday. I was in a hurry and didn't do my normal early morning routine which includes getting the newspaper..... Part way through clearing I heard a noise. I thought the shear pin had snapped or was thinking shear pin, so I engaged the blower again and realized what I was hearing was the belt squealing -the blower was jammed.
I picked and poked at the newspaper stuck in the impeller. I was very concerned as I've heard vague warning about people losing fingers while trying to clear jams. But nothing I did came close to moving that newspaper. I got on-line and saw, among a million mindless troll posts, somebody who suggested using a saws-all or powered saw, and somebody else suggesting a flexible blade hand saw. We have an aggressive flexible blade hand saw that saws through a two inch branch like nothing, and I was able to remove the newspaper jam in maybe five minutes. What a relief to see that paper fall out. The saw I used is called called a Tajima PUL-265R Rapid Pull, 10 point crosscut, pull stroke saw. But any aggressive saw for cutting branches is likely going to work. The saws-all is a bit large to get into the blower housing past the auger, I would think, but of course that should be able to do the same.
And I have couple more helpful points to make on this. You can lever the collection housing up on the wheels which makes it easier to work on this. I was working on the ground at first and it killed my back. Gas can potentially spill out of the carburetor or gas tank lid when you tilt a snow blower, so watch that.
Probably would help sawing if you got the newspaper wet and soap or alkaline might soften it up, but I would recommend getting a good saw which works without the added effort and also works on other materials like rubber which might jam the blower.
And on the issue of lost fingers, I wonder if most of the lost fingers are from using single stage blowers because I've read the auger is the thing that will load up and recoil like a spring -the single stage has a very fast moving auger as that's what throws the snow while a two stage has a relatively slow moving auger since the impeller is what throws the snow with the two stage auger turning like once for every ten times the impeller turns. My jam was in the impeller on a two stage and the paper sort of expanded as a I sawed on it, but the auger and impeller didn't move at all when the paper fell out, not that I could see.
I'm sort of making the all in one post for anybody that has the same issue I had here. It took me a long time to find the information on this because there were a ton of small minded troll posts and not that many posts from somebody that actually had solve the problem with any success.
Thanks Ubuntu community.
A contribution share ratio gives context to the contribution and credits the contributer.
Be real, be sober.
WSmart
I got my first snow blower last fall, and I had my first snow blower jam yesterday. I was in a hurry and didn't do my normal early morning routine which includes getting the newspaper..... Part way through clearing I heard a noise. I thought the shear pin had snapped or was thinking shear pin, so I engaged the blower again and realized what I was hearing was the belt squealing -the blower was jammed.
I picked and poked at the newspaper stuck in the impeller. I was very concerned as I've heard vague warning about people losing fingers while trying to clear jams. But nothing I did came close to moving that newspaper. I got on-line and saw, among a million mindless troll posts, somebody who suggested using a saws-all or powered saw, and somebody else suggesting a flexible blade hand saw. We have an aggressive flexible blade hand saw that saws through a two inch branch like nothing, and I was able to remove the newspaper jam in maybe five minutes. What a relief to see that paper fall out. The saw I used is called called a Tajima PUL-265R Rapid Pull, 10 point crosscut, pull stroke saw. But any aggressive saw for cutting branches is likely going to work. The saws-all is a bit large to get into the blower housing past the auger, I would think, but of course that should be able to do the same.
And I have couple more helpful points to make on this. You can lever the collection housing up on the wheels which makes it easier to work on this. I was working on the ground at first and it killed my back. Gas can potentially spill out of the carburetor or gas tank lid when you tilt a snow blower, so watch that.
Probably would help sawing if you got the newspaper wet and soap or alkaline might soften it up, but I would recommend getting a good saw which works without the added effort and also works on other materials like rubber which might jam the blower.
And on the issue of lost fingers, I wonder if most of the lost fingers are from using single stage blowers because I've read the auger is the thing that will load up and recoil like a spring -the single stage has a very fast moving auger as that's what throws the snow while a two stage has a relatively slow moving auger since the impeller is what throws the snow with the two stage auger turning like once for every ten times the impeller turns. My jam was in the impeller on a two stage and the paper sort of expanded as a I sawed on it, but the auger and impeller didn't move at all when the paper fell out, not that I could see.
I'm sort of making the all in one post for anybody that has the same issue I had here. It took me a long time to find the information on this because there were a ton of small minded troll posts and not that many posts from somebody that actually had solve the problem with any success.
Thanks Ubuntu community.
A contribution share ratio gives context to the contribution and credits the contributer.
Be real, be sober.
WSmart