Tractors, Mowers, Chippers, Trailers, Chainsaws, Generators, Boat Engines, & Flood Control.

Yes sir, he sure will

 

Saw a guy in one of those small tractors with the tag along standin’ trailers cuttin’ a mean swath by the golf course. That two stage blower flings snow right far for such a ‘lil unit. Darn impressive even.

 

@Bushed how you making out buddy!! Still digging out? Just doing some checking ins

 

Not gonna drive 2hours North to pick up my tractor attachments today, dang weather is crazy, 40mph wind gusts and sleeting North of SA. The lightning is intense as well.

Future cast.

 

It's supposed to start raining here at lunch, I'm headed to my buddies to get those two blades here in a few before the rain starts. Hopefully the bossman doesn't mind

 

Hey! Good morning. Not much going on here. Locked in a deep freeze. Been waking up to -29-ish F for the last week or so. No plowable snow in the last couple of weeks. Went out Monday morning after it had warmed up to -24F, I took the snowblower out to clear a drift that was forming at the top of the hill just up from the house. Open field with cold north winds, and my driveway is on the south side of that field. Perfect conditions for creating driveway choking snow drifts. I'll leave the tractor hibernating till the cold breaks. Layer up and stay warm.

I did capture a couple of city graders on their way back to the yard...3:30...quitin time. They're getting rid of the windrows that narrow the streets. No shots of that action, but one pulls the bank away from the curb. The other pushes it back towards the edge of the road. Then the big snowblower that I didn't get a picture of, loads up the dump trucks.

The guy operating the Volvo came to a stop as he passed me. Thought I was going to get an earful about taking pictures, but turned out he was just dropping the moldboard and wing to clean up the hill on the way back to city garage.

 

That is crazy to me! Never seen a grader with a wing. How much snow do you average there a year?

 

We don’t receive a lot of snow here. Being just beyond the edge of the prairies, the usual west to east weather patterns don’t have much moisture to draw on. Our heavier snowfalls are usually associated with Colorado lows. This winter seems below average to me. Don’t know what the record books will say, and we aren’t anywhere close to the end of the cold season. Looking at the last few winters though, the average seems to be 70-80 inches.

Wing blades are pretty a pretty common attachment. I don’t see them used a lot here for normal storm clean up. You don’t have the down pressure that the mouldboard does for scraping the asphalt clean. You see the wing used on wider roads, or for benching or shelving, no sure which, if either is correct, along highways or rural roads. A lot of the snowplowing is done now by front end loaders with a blade. It was all motor graders when I was a kid. Out in farm country, you see the road graders running a big Vee plow or one way on the front to deal with huge drifts that form on those long, straight roads where there’s not much to break the wind to keep down the blowing snow.

I always loved watching the grader clear snow when I was a kid. I’d bounce from window to window, or bundle up and follow it around the neighborhood. I was either going to be a grader driver, or a pilot when I grew up. Not 100% sure I made the right decision. I’m still pretty fascinated by those big, complicated, versatile machines.

 

Must be a northern thing... the toy graders i had growing up even had wings....

 

My dad made a wing blade for my Tonka grader. Very similar to that. I had a road system all through our, and our neighbours yard. Would spend every day of March break building and maintaining those roads.

 

Pretty cool when it turns into Tag Team formation.

 

Here you go @six5crèéd. Six and a half minutes of snow wing action set to the music of a Cummins powered (11 litre I believe on this model) Champion 740A. Use to be built in Goderich Ontario, before being bought by Volvo, who then phased out the grader line completely.

https://youtu.be/DpSHabp3UGQ

 

Thanks, that's neat!

My brother used to work for a grading company and they would use the graders around here if it snowed, he ran a Champion but I think it had a V8 Detroit in it.

 

Yeah, the 471 and 671 2 stroke Detroit's were pretty widely used in Champions from the 60's through to the late 70's. Maybe even into the early 80's.

 

Formin’ Up for another pass.

 

Is this Portage and Main? Kind of looks like the view overlooking Portage Ave from the Fairmont.