(ET) Snow run, take 1.

[Christopher Zach <cz alembic crystel com>]

Notes:

1) Put a weight box on. Without it the tractor will skip the chains on 
the ground when going up a 40 degree driveway blowing a foot of wet snow.

2) Get the extra battery bank: Two banks of BB600's have trouble at the 
end of climbing said hill and blowing a foot plus of wet snow.

3) I am pulling way more than 200a doing the above :-) The tractor 
actually was dropping out at the top, I think the E20 motor was 
over-loading.

4) The chute only clogged once when I was going too slow at the top of 
the hill. Clearing it was as simple as waiting for the auger to stop and 
pushing the snow out of the chute from the bottom. The POR15 from years 
ago is still as smooth as glass. Snow does not stick to it.

Total run time was about 30 minutes constant use with a steep drop off 
in the last minute as the BB600's ran out. I don't know power usage; the 
E20 is pegging the amp meter. Maybe I'll try hooking the Link-20 to the 
18 volt light power to see how it's going.

But I can see why I had three strings. For the past few years I have 
been blowing 6 inches of light cold fluff. Which is no problem. This 
stuff is *heavy*. Heavy enough to slow down the auger. Heavy enough I 
had to blow in L gear and sometimes LL.

Now the tractor is on hard charge and we have another foot on the way. 
I'll go to the shed and get the weight box and load it down with old 
batteries. For the future though I think I'll build another string of 36 
BB600's; does anyone have a spare weight/tool box around?

Overall though the E20+blower is impressive. If I had to do this by hand 
I would not be happy. And I have to believe with the weight and power 
that this would overwhelm a Craftsman tractor+snow blower or even a good 
10hp gas one.

Chris


Chris