Snow Blower Maintenance

A couple of weeks ago we had a ton of snow fall over a couple of days. While I was using the snow blower on the driveway one side of the auger broke and wouldn't spin. I found out there was a bolt through the driveshaft on that side fixing it to the auger and that bolt had sheared off due to how heavy the snow was. I did a temporary fix of sticking a piece of roundbar through the hole and bending it to stay there which allowed me to finish the driveway, but I needed to do a proper fix.

Once it warmed up a little I took a closer look and found that there is a bolt connecting the auger to the driveshaft of both sides. I was under the impression this was a bad fix done by the previous owner, but I guess that's just how this blower was setup.

I ended up stealing a couple 2"x1/4" bolts from work guessing they were the right size. They were! Hopefully this will hold up more than the piece of roundbar.

I also took this opportunity to grease everything. There are 5 or 6 zerk connectors all over the business end of the blower and I put as much grease in as I could. In the Spring I'm going to change the oil and look closer at everything before I put it away for the rest of the year.