Older Ariens snow blower?

[sciphi]

I recently purchased a house, with attendant 40'x20' driveway. Having a real two-car driveway is nice, except when it snows. For some reason, the plow can turn 6" of snow into a 14-15" high (or higher) pile at the end of the driveway. It takes forever with a shovel, so I'm looking at snow blowers on Craigslist.

I'm seeing a lot of older Ariens snowblowers being listed. I've heard that those older machines were beasts. This would likely be purchased once the snow melts and chucked into the shed for use next winter, so a slight fixer-upper isn't out of the question. What should I look out for when purchasing one?

 

[Rand]

my single stage toro 2450 does fine even with the crusty snow at the end. Although the one day It refroze and was 2ft high took abit of work.

is there any slope to the driveway(any direction)
and what is the driveway material?

 

[sciphi]

Originally Posted By: Rand
my single stage toro 2450 does fine even with the crusty snow at the end. Although the one day It refroze and was 2ft high took abit of work.

is there any slope to the driveway(any direction)
and what is the driveway material?


The driveway is a fairly flat sealed asphalt surface. No slope to worry about, except the slight slope at the end connecting the driveway to the street.

I might be able to get a single-stage Craftsman snowblower that's been sitting in a good friend's outbuilding unused for the past 10 years. It was fairly new back when they got it, but it turned out to be a poor match for their gravel driveway.

 

[AandPDan]

Older Ariens should have a Tecumseh Snow King engine. They are tough but if the oil level ever gets even slightly low it can damage the rod. Start it up and listen for a knock.

Carb problems are common in a snowblower. They can be rebuilt or you can get an aftermarket carb.

Most parts are still available.

The friction disc (drive assembly) can wear out. It's not expensive and fairly easy to replace.

The EXPENSIVE repair, after the engine that is, can be the auger drive. If it's run dry the gears can strip and in some cases damage the gear case. Make sure the auger moves under load.

Good luck.

 

[eljefino]

I have one like this. Not visible is the awful gear shifter. One has to hold down a spring loaded catch to shift into reverse. The belt engages at a thing down by the right tire and if it's engaged, the auger is on, and the drive becomes available. One can't drive it up the finished driveway and into the garage with the auger off-- so small bits of snow are flying around inside the garage when parking it. Also a safety issue.

This has the notoriously awesome HF chonda motor on it. You are likely to find a wheezy tecumseh.

This blower nicely splits in half with the removal of two bolts and loosening of two more. Like a "saucer separation" in Star Trek TNG. Makes it easy to get at the belt and such.

The one pictured is missing its shoes. In desperation I welded some scrap metal on. Works perfect.

I have three snowblowers and this is my least favorite. I also have a montgomery wards/ MTD and a Toro 724. The Monkey Wards one actually flings the best. Wife likes the drive interface of the toro the best, it's easy to grab its spring loaded shifter into "R2" and yank it backwards when back-and-forthing.

Blowers have come a long way in interface design, which you start noticing after owning a couple.

When shopping blowers, look for honest-to-god bearings on the drive axle and the auger axle. Note the big-ish one bolted in on my auger. Cheaper blowers use bushings.

 

[sciphi]

A few Ariens 524's are popping up in the $150ish range. Okay price for that machine, assuming it runs okay?

 

[jeepman3071]

That seems to be a good price if it runs. Those old Ariens are beasts. I just restored one last summer for a friend. The engine was worn out, but we swapped a newer used engine on it and gave it a paint job. It works like new now, and it has a cast iron gear box. It is from the 1960s and throws snow farther than his dad's newer machine. I'll take an older snowblower over the newer cheap stuff any day. Some of the sheet metal on the newer blowers is so thin you can bend it with one hand, and they rust out quicker. Ariens machines are also easy to get both new and used parts for.

 

[threeputtpar]

Are you set on Ariens, or are you open to other brands?

I prefer Toro, especially anything older than 2000. I picked up a Toro 824 Powershift this winter for $75 and have put another $75 in it to get it back in good shape. The best feature of this era Toros is the drum on the auger.



The regular 824s are almost as good, but the exit chute is just too short for my liking. Also, the Powershift doesn't have a friction disk but actual gears and a transmission. No parts to wear out, but it makes the machine heavier.

A Toro 824 XL is the best combo of features. It has the friction disk so it's lighter, but it also has the taller chute of the powershift. It also has the larger auger bucket of the powershift. They are hard to find, though.

 

[gsnod]

As someone who looks for these older units and rebuilds/sells them, I can tell you that I prefer the older machines. Someone mentioned earlier that many of the older units don't have the safety features, such as the auger always turning if the auger lever is active.

Personally I think a 5/24 is too small of an engine for that size bucket. A 5 HP engine with a 21 inch bucket is fine.... an 8 HP for a 24 inch bucket is much better.

I just picked up a 1988 Toro 824 with a blown engine for $20. Got a used Tecumseh 8 HP today with electric start for $75. So, for $95, I can have a sturdy machine that I'll then have to find a new home for....my plan is to give it to a friends brother who is in the military. He'll get it for my cost, as I don't need to make a profit off of his back!

 

[sciphi]

I'm not set on Ariens. A good used Toro would also fit the bill well.

Whatever machine I get will be "Clarence modded" to deal with the often-heavy snow we get, and the giant piles that the plow leaves at the end of the driveway.

 

[dave123]

I am more of a buy high end new and take care of it kind of guy and you should get 20+ years out of it easy.

 

[Smokescreen]

I have a 1984 Honda HS55 that will never die. I won't have to get a new one.

 

[threeputtpar]

Originally Posted By: sciphi
I'm not set on Ariens. A good used Toro would also fit the bill well.

Whatever machine I get will be "Clarence modded" to deal with the often-heavy snow we get, and the giant piles that the plow leaves at the end of the driveway.


If you're worried about excessive clearance in the impeller, then definitely get a 1990s or early 2000 toro with at least an 8hp. Mine would chuck the heavy wet stuff at the EOD a good 30' when the chute was adjusted just right, without any modifications to the impeller. The clearance in there was less than 1/8".

 

[99Saturn]

This thread makes me want to junk the "newish" used one I picked up off CL when we first moved into our place a few years ago.

Driveway is an L with two 20X40 sections - the lowly 5hp 24 inch one I picked up on the cheap gets the job done, but I dread the end of the driveway.

 

[jeepman3071]

Originally Posted By: threeputtpar
Originally Posted By: sciphi
I'm not set on Ariens. A good used Toro would also fit the bill well.

Whatever machine I get will be "Clarence modded" to deal with the often-heavy snow we get, and the giant piles that the plow leaves at the end of the driveway.


If you're worried about excessive clearance in the impeller, then definitely get a 1990s or early 2000 toro with at least an 8hp. Mine would chuck the heavy wet stuff at the EOD a good 30' when the chute was adjusted just right, without any modifications to the impeller. The clearance in there was less than 1/8".


+1

My 1978 Toro 826 throws the snow just fine, even the heavy stuff, and it is well used. I added the impeller kit and that made it throw even further.

 

[sciphi]

Update: A neighbor was selling an older Ariens HS-40. I got it for $50. It looked to be in pretty good shape given the age. The Snow King engine started in 3 pulls, and I didn't hear any funny noises from the engine or auger when it was engaged. The carb is a little messed up, since it doesn't like to stay running for more than a minute or so. I'm guessing it needs a new fuel line as a wild guess, and likely the linkage needs some work.

 

[sciphi]

I got a chance to play around with the new-to-me machine today. After some researching the engine serial number and chute model/serial, it's a 1971 model 922003 4 hp 20" machine.

The engine started up and ran well for about 2-3 minutes, then suddenly died. It would re-start after about 30 seconds or so. Any swinging around of the machine would make it run then die quickly. The gas tank didn't have much in it, so that may be it. I haven't re-fueled yet, although I likely should to mix stabilized gas with whatever is in there. Likely I'll add a splash of Techron to the gas to free up the carb while it sits, and go through it with the grease gun and gear lube to get it ready for the winter. Then drain the gas tank and back into storage it goes.

 

[andyd]

Solved my hard starting/ running problems for 120 bucks out the door of Harbor Freight with a Chonda. I started it with one easy pull to move it into summer storage. I have a spare bucket that I plan to add the wipers to. Now that I don't have to worry about the engine, I can rebuild the tractor part of the Ariens.

 

[sciphi]

I played around with it more today. First was adding fresh gas dosed with Stabil and a splash of Techron. Once it got the new gas into its system, it ran noticeably better. It runs at full throttle just fine for a few minutes at a time now. That's without load.

The problem it has right now is that it wants to die after 30 seconds or so with the drive engaged, but without the auger engaged. It'll move about 40-50 feet chugging along just fine, then die. I'm able to recover it sometimes by releasing the drive lever and throttling back. It doesn't always want to re-start. I need to wait a few minutes before trying again to start it.

 

[jeepman3071]

Yeah sounds like you need to take the carb apart and see how it looks. The good thing about those Tecumsehs is that a new carb is pretty cheap. I had a friend's Ariens with a 5hp Tecumseh that wouldn't run right even after cleaning the carb twice. A new carb was $25 on ebay, and it runs like brand new now.