I bought this blower back in the fall before winter started, and live in southwest Wisconsin. I wanted to give this machine a few good snowfalls before writing a review. My review is based on what I have to clean, I clean 3 driveways, and a few sidewalks, as well as making a path to my shed in the back yard. The driveways are all asphalt and for the most part pretty level with one having a pretty steep incline. I also have mine attached to a Cub Cadent XT1 Enduro. There are some goods, some bads, and one ugly that I encountered.
The ugly I found:
The ugly thing is there is a bolt under the cap over the shaft of the center auger. There is also a small gap between the auger and the worm box. I managed to find a neighbors dog cable and it got sucked into the auger, the pin sheared as it should, but that gap allowed the object to get sucked in and caused the front auger to separate and push the auger forward completely stripping the bolt head off. I am still able to use it without the bolt since the shear pins keep it in place. I have to get the remnants of the old bolt out so I can get another one in. This happened on my first use of all times for something to happen!
The Bads:
This thing is very hard to get mounted by yourself. You have to become quite inventive with some of the things. It is manageable, but be ready to be working on it for a few hours. I took about 5 hours to assemble and mount by myself. I did have to get some new lights for the tractor because the headlights on my tractor get covered and it makes it a bit harder to blow snow in the dark (it gets dark around 5-5:30pm and sun up is around 6:45 am) So I either have to clean snow before or after work, I recently ordered some lights to install on the tractor to make cleaning a little easier. Also the chute control is in a precarious place making gassing up a bit awkward, I just bough a funnel and the problem was solved.
The Good:
This thing is a beast! I have went through 10 inches of fine powdered snow and it threw it a really good distance. Last night we had another 8" of heavy wet snow and this thing cut through it like a hot knife through butter and still threw it far. The engine on the tractor does not bog down at all. The key to success is to learn the limits of both the machine and your tractor. The belts are nice and tight, the adjustments are easy. I love the chute controls, I was thinking that the manual lift lever was going to be miserable and a fight, my 4 year old daughter can pick it up and lower it with absolute ease. It takes the snow completely off the surface of the driveways, when I go onto the grass it still cuts like it was on pavement. After last nights snow the plow came by and put a good 2 foot berm at the end of the driveway, good and solid and very heavy. This snow blower cut through it like it didn't even exist. It is also very heavy, so it does a really good job at keeping itself on the ground and not riding up on the packed snow. The other reviews about being bad in heavy snow got debunked fast when I figured out my speeds and intake and output rates. Last thing on this part is the assembly is made so fool proof its unreal, all of the steps of assembly came packaged individually. It was AMAZING looking at the instructions and seeing the bag of hardware listed with the corresponding step. Simply amazing!
Recommendations to buyers:
-Buy extra shear pins
-Get a decent set of chains
-Get the weight kit! I am 150 pounds and I can tell when I forgot to put the weights on. I cannot get up the incline on my neighbors driveway. once the weights are on I have no issues.
-Look into some extra lights if you are primarily working in the dark. Plus having a little extra light keeps you visible and helps from getting struck by a motorist.
-Learn the capabilities of your tractor and machine!
Overall I am very happy with the purchase and would recommend!