Jan 01 2008
Snow Thrower Throwdown
My first official act of 2008 was to trudge outside to clear the driveway of the snow that had come down hard all night. The snow proved too difficult for my single-stage Craftsman snow thrower, however. It has plenty of power, a 5 HP Briggs and Stratton engine, but the green plastic body wasn’t up to the task. The ice scraper on the bottom of the auger cowling snapped right off. Without the ice scraper, snow was being shot out behind the snowblower, and it left a half-inch deep layer of snow in its wake.
I thought that it was pretty sad that I had to shovel even after snowblowing, but it was only half an inch deep (preferable to two feet). That covered my exercise for the day. Three years ago, we chose a 5 HP Craftsman single-stage snowblower when we moved into our house because we hadn’t gotten more than a foot and a half of snowfall in the previous few years. After all, we only needed to clear the driveway and sidewalk, and both of them were paved flat. This year, however, we’ve already had two snowfalls of over two feet. The single stage was a good choice at the time, but now it was time to upgrade.
Chrissy looked up snow thrower reviews on the Consumer Reports web site while I was outside shoveling. Consumer Reports voted the Craftsman 9 HP snowblower into second place for two-stage gas snow throwers. After the plastic tore free from our smaller model, we decided to try the two-stage with a steel body instead. It’s a huge monster, probably more machine than we need, but it was on sale for only $100 more than the smallest two-stage model. I nearly threw my back out getting it into and out of the CR-V. It didn’t help that it turned out to be broken when we got it home. We exchanged it with no problem, but I had to lift it four more times before the end of the day. I’m hoping for better luck this time.
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Chrissy, CR-V, Craftsman, snow, snow throwers, snowblowing
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You lifted it all by yourself? You should have called your father-in-law to help you!
I may have had a little help.
I don’t miss the snow AT ALL! But luckily M had a plow so all I had to do was say, “Go outside and push something.”