I have been clearing snow on my 80' x 20' driveway with a shovel for the past 15 years. This year, I decided to take the plunge and invest in a snowblower so that I can clear my driveway quicker than I could with the shovel. This snow blower is one of the cheapest blowers on the market with good reviews. I decided to take a risk and get it to see what others were raving about.
The blower came well-packaged. The instruction booklet is quite detailed (and there are separate booklets in English, Spanish and French, so you can throw away one of two of them and be left with one light booklet instead of hanging on to a heavy booklet that has instructions in all three languages), and putting the blower together was a snap. All you have to do is straighten out the handle and tighten the bolts. Took all of about 10 minutes. The tough part was waiting for the first real snowfall I could use it on!
Before I used the snowblower for the first time, I applied silicone lubricant to the parts of it that would come in contact with the snow. This included the inside of the chute. This is to prevent snow from sticking to these surfaces. I had good luck with liquid wrench silicone lubricant.
Fianlly, almost 3 weeks after I bought the machine, we had enough snow for me to consider using the snowblower. Yesterday night, I took it out to the driveway for the first time. I must say I am very impressed with how it did. There were about 3 to 4 inches of light powdery snow on top of a frozen-over crust. This snowblower easily took care of the snow on top. It was quite powerful and threw the snow in a steady stream. I would say the throwing distance was easily 20 to 30 feet. I had to be careful taking care of the snow right next to the garage because the stream of snow flying out of the chute seemed capable of denting garage doors and breaking glass if I was not careful!
The hard crust stuck to the driveway was a little more difficult to deal with. Because the blower is quite light, it relies on the operator to press down it so that the lip can break up the crust and blow it away. That takes quite a bit of effort, and I decided it was not worth it. If you use this machine regularly so that the hard crust never forms in the first place (this crust was left over from the last time I had cleared the snow of my driveway with my shovel, before I bought this snowblower), you should not have any problems getting a totally clean driveway with this blower.
The blower also handled the wet mushy heavy stuff at the end of the driveway left there by the street plows. Usually, it takes me a while to shovel this stuff off my driveway because it is mostly ice and water, and is very heavy. But the snowjoe had no problem sending the stuff flying without any prepwork on my part. Based on what it did to the snow, I would say that this blower can easily handle up to 8 or 10 inches of snow, and probably not get stressed out even if the stuff is somewhat wetter and heavier than the snow I took care of yesterday. With the heavier, wetter stuff, the throwing distance might be more modest, but it should still be enough to clear the driveway edges easily.
The machine is practically no-maintenance. You might have to oil the crank for the chute occasionally and apply silicone lubricant to the blades and inside of the chute every now and then to keep them from clogging with sticky snow. But otherwise, I don't have to worry about gas, oil, spark plugs and all the other things that owners of gas-powered snowblowers have to worry about. And I don't have to wrench my shoulder out of its socket pulling on a cord trying to get this thing to start when it is 10 below zero either! It took me longer to untangle my 100 foot cord before I started throwing snow and then wind the cord back up on its spool when I was done, than it took to actually clear my driveway of snow!
Things to keep in mind if you do get this machine: oil the part where the chute connects with the body so that you can turn the chute easily with the handle. Apply a water-repellent coating to the parts of the snowblower likely to come in contact with snow, including the insides of the chute (a good silicone-based lubricant does the job perfectly). Get a 12-gauge extension cord (you can use 14-gauge if you use only a 50' extension cord, but given the length of my driveway, I needed a 100' cord, and only a 12-gauge can be used with this snowblower because it needs 13.5 amps), preferably one designed for low temperatures.
When using the machine, make sure you push down on it so that it clears snow all the way to the ground. Because the machine is light, if you don't push down, the lip tends to ride up on the snow and leave a layer of snow next to the ground untouched. Keep track of the chute direction and be prepared to crank on the handle to have it pointing in the direction you want. After blowing through some heavy stuff, the chute tends to turn from either side and ends up pointing straight ahead.
Make sure you follow a pattern of snowthrowing that will keep the cord out of the way of the blower. I did passes up and down the length of the driveway, starting from the side of the driveway closest to the electrical outlet and ending up at the opposite side when I was all done. Others have good luck clearing from side to side starting from the garage and moving gradually towards the street. I used a low-temperature cord that was easy to manipulate since such cords tend to remain flexible in sub-freezing temperatures instead of becoming stiff and hard.
The main problems I see with the machine are that except for the four blades (and hopefully, the motor windings!), pretty much the entire machine is made of plastic. Even the pulleys over which the belt passes to transfer power from the motor to the blades are made of plastic. So, make sure you don't abuse the machine or use it on snow mixed with rocks and other hard debris that can damage the blade housing of the snowblower. The use of plastic also makes the machine very light (less than 40 lbs fully assembled), which can make it tricky to clear snow down to the ground. Also the wheels are tiny, so maneuvering this machine can be tricky.
Overall, this is an excellent snowblower for light to moderate amounts of snow. If you have the right cord for it so that you can supply the power the machine requires for optimal operation, you should have no problems with this machine. My only concern is the longevity of this machine given the use of plastic everywhere. But plastic can be quite strong while being flexible at the same time, so I will reserve judgment on that aspect of it until I have had a chance to use it more extensively. If you have any questions, go ahead and shoot. I will monitor the review for comments and try to answer any questions as best as I can.
Update as of 02/02/2011
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This snowblower was a lifesaver in helping me dig out of the huge midwestern snow storm that dumped about 20 inches of snow where I live. The drifts in some places were well over 3 feet high. The blower had no problem with the snow. The high drifts required multiple passes, and I used only half the normal cut-width of 18 inches because of the height of the snow, but after all was said and done, both the snowblower and I survived without undue cause for concern. The motor never overheated, the belt never slipped, the auger never slowed down, even when going through the highest, hardest-packed snow and ice at the end of the driveway. I was worried that I was subjecting a cheap, light-duty snowblower to extreme stress and it might give up any moment, but the blower never did, and could have probably kept going long after I was done!
The only problem was that one of the plastic washers that holds the axle in place broke off at some point during the exertions of yesterday and today. So, the right end of the axle has popped out of the holding bracket and that wheel is just dragging along on the ground instead of holding up the blower on that side. This was not a problem since the wheels are tiny anyways and the blower moves about as well with or without the wheels on the ground! I have sent a message to Snowjoe on their website asking them what I should do about this problem and will report back when they respond (they have promised to respond within the next day or two).
Review by
Balaji Ramanathan "balajithegreat"
Just bought this in Nov 2010 and have used it 4 times in December already. It worked great on the driveway and the 100 foot cord (I have a long driveway) wasn't a hassle like I thought it might be... but you have to organize how you are going to clear the driveway so the cord won't be in the way. It's not as loud as the gas powered ones. DO NOT use it when snow is more than 6 inches so you may have to do it a couple of times before it stops snowing if you are going to get a lot of snow. Also, it doesn't do well with "heavy wet" or slushy snow (2+ inches) - it didn't shoot it very far but with 1-2 inches or less of heavy wet snow, it still did okay. It was easy to use - right out of the box and the only thing I had to do was hand tighten the handles. I did spray the blades with silicone so snow wouldn't stick (like I do my snow shovels) and that worked well. Sometimes the chute would vibrate and move while I was using it but I need to take a look at that because I bet that I can tighten something to prevent that from happening but I'll do that when it warms up a little! It was on sale ($174) and had free shipping!
