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Snow blower, (And shovel) Spray Products

33K views 53 replies 29 participants last post by  nbwinter 
#1 ·
How about some discussion on the various spray products that are available for use on snow removal equipment.
If you have actual experience with the product, great.
Otherwise, just give us your thoughts on some of the products you have heard or read about.

Some thought on products I have used.

WD40: Cheap and easy, but not great at lubrication or freeing up seized threaded parts. I use it very little.

PAM: Never used it on a snowblower, but I have read that it works pretty good. Seems a little pricey for use on the snow equipment.

Sno-Go: Never used it, but it also has quite a few supporters. Not cheap, either.

Fluid Film: I have only used this as a lubricant so far and it seems to do a good job. Rust and corrosion prevention are supposed to be quite good with it. It has almost a cult following. Bought mine at a John Deere dealer for about $9.

CRC Silicone Spray: I use this a lot and have used it on snow shovels in the past with some success in keeping the snow from sticking. I'm not sure it has a long life as a lubricant.
I have never felt I needed anything in the chute of my snowblower, but I do think I will try it this season. At $3 a can, it is about as inexpensive as I have seen.

This snow season, I plan to use both the Fluid Film and the CRC Silicone and see if I can tell any difference in snow throwing.

Based on what I have read, I definitely think the Fluid Film is the better product for lubrication and corrosion prevention.

Comments????
 
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#39 ·
11.4 oz can Fluid Film on sale now at Lowe's $8.98.

I've never used it but may try it. I don't know what else I'll use it for.
 
#40 ·
Today's snow blowing was about 10 inches of partly wet snow. Temperature was 27 degrees F.

I rubbed and brushed fluid film on the impeller blade faces sides and backs. Also coated various areas with fluid film at the impeller intake which on my Ariens 1032 ices up consistently. It was dry when I put the fluid film on and I brushed it on the blade faces with a harbor freight disposable metal handle paintbrush and everywhere else I put the fluid film it was rubbed on resulting in a thin coating wet to the eye but not heavy like you sprayed it on with the aerosol can. I also fluid filmed various areas where snow accumulated including an inner wheel hub on one side and blower top housing including around the chute. The reason is an attempt to deal with blowback snow which frankly is a pain in my ass every time I snowblow. It flies back in my face, all over me and all over the blower and motor and controls etc just about every time. This could be avoided by not putting the chute outlet at full distance setting but my situation and limited space along with high slope at the outside and house on the inside requires me to pitch it high and away fwiw. Uggg.

On the auger I used water from a Paul Mitchell hairspray squirter. Reason for this is it produces a fine mist just right to cover a surface with tiny droplets but not so much that you get water runs although with this dispenser you can still get water runs if you apply too many squirts. The idea of this was to ice coat the auger. I also tried to ice coat one wheel hub.

Results were mixed. The fluid film did seem to resist ice buildup better than my previous attempt Aldis Canola oil cooking spray. But to be fair, I was much less thorough with the application of the cooking spray two days ago (and) that was more powder snow and I just sprayed the cooking spray down into the chute on the impeller faces. I think I didn't get the areas that do build up enough with that trial because the Ariens 1032 has the six blade impeller with the hooks on the inside hub and that's an area it ices up bad reducing performance as you go. With the canola spray, slightly warmer conditions 29 degrees F but fresh snow still powder I did have some buildup. Today's snow I waited 13 hours as it continued to fall and it had gotten a bit heavy as ground temps aren't frozen underneath fwiw.

The water mist spray was a fail. At 27 degrees F I had difficulty getting it to freeze and even after it was in the cold for 20 minutes or more it didn't seem frozen. Snow stuck to the auger same as usual. It's possible this could work in colder temperatures than I'm experiencing here for the record but a flat fail for me.

The snow stuck on the fluid filmed surfaces on top of the blower housing and inside of the blower housing too. It might be a slight improvement over no fluid film but not much. Not too impressed.

What does impress me is fluid films marketing. I got into fluid film maybe 3 years ago. I read all the literature and was easily convinced I'd found the holy grail of rust prevention. My own experiments on steel and automotive underbody left me far from impressed. Frankly. I think there's a lot of religious fervor around regarding fluid film and I think it's largely in the marketing. Like WD40, I find it expensive and it doesn't meet my expectations. That said, I still have a partial can and thus this experiment.

The problem with these experiments is they're not controlled in terms of temperature and snow type and once you've applied say fluid film, when you then try something else, by necessity, you're going over the fluid film that remains with something else which might easily affect your results observed.

I've got spray furniture polish here from Lowes. I've got vegetable oil.

My Ariens 1032 really doesn't have issues with clogging the chute. Anything that "gets in there" tends to be in a big hurry to get the **** out of there via the chute and as she sits now I think she'd **** near give a Honda snowblower a run for its money!
 
#42 ·
A couple more possibilities:

One person mentioned an auto detailed/restorer product they referred to as T7. Looks like it might be a product made by Granitize about $37 a gallon.

Another person mentions ceramic auto store spraycan paint they said not the 500 degree stuff just regular ceramic " duplicolor" ??

Another says any silicone spray be liberal which who really wants deal with silicone spray it gets on surrounding surfaces to your future misery painting and whatnot keep it out of your shop...

Another says spray on lithium grease

Another PB Blaster Teflon spray


Mine isn't a situation where meguires wax say would work that well due to my modifications but....
 
#43 ·
Today's snow removal was 24 degrees F and approx 9-10 inches what I'd describe as heavy powder but the end the drive was a terrible heavy mess, over a ft deep and soaked with road salt mix. Uhggg.

Today I applied spray can furniture polish from Lowes. Brand was Styles Selections #0399182. The stuff is a version of Pledge type cleaner polishes. I made sure to get a good coat especially on the impeller hub where I get my primary icing issues. Basically a couple hours of straight use and the impellor got pretty iced up... again. Probably worse than with the canola oil cooking spray or fluid film but to be fair that end of driveway mess was about as bad as it could get slushy right to the bottom sticking to everything which it wasn't that bad the prior two sessions with the prior two mentioned coatings and this time the goop was laying to the sides brown on the top the drifts to give you an idea. It's the stuff a 40 ft snowblower (powder snow distance) can only throw 17 ft say or less gunk and it sticks to everything grrr. A shovel full is heavy and it sticks to the shovel but the shovel coated with the furniture polish took a couple minutes scooping for this mix af garbage to start sticking to the face. Not disastrously but there was some stickage. Not the whole shovelfull sticking to the shovel like wet clay but I'm sure it would get that way with use.

I had high hopes for the furniture polish at under $4 for a 17.7 ounce can it looks economical. Certainly feels slick but the metal runners I coated built up thick ice over the 2 hours which shouldn't have been the case if this stuff is the slickness. I had to pound it off it was so hard with a 2X4. I did not get any buildup at the impellor housing intake which is a problem with my 1032. Whereas I did still get buildup there with fluid film and canola spray. In both cases it was less buildup than using nothing for comparison but the polish was the best. And where the furniture polish was applied to the auger the snow did build up but seemed easier to remove, whereas without there'd be more ice stuck to the auger. So this could be a good application at the impellor housing to reduce buildup and performance loss but all three of these failed me over 2+ hours of use in terms of ice buildup on the impellor itself. And maybe that's unavoidable with my machine which has more fins than most on the impellor? I don't have issues with chute clogging even using nothing. It's repowered from HM100 10hp Tecumseh to 13hp overhead cam with smaller pulleys for faster rpms and higher impellor tip speed.

I guess I could try vegetable oil next. I'm starting to think I should just put the plow back on the tractor and plow the mess till February. Probably be faster. Guess I was hoping I could find something that would keep the inside the blower relatively clean so I don't have to thaw it out with heat every time which is a hassle of it's own sort. In that respect, I could use nothing as I did previous years and once thawed you're good for another round of 2 hour snow cleanup. The impellor icing becomes less a problem as temperatures drop and you're dealing with powder snow. I don't recall having the icing problems on the tractor 5 ft 3 point blower impellor but it's also limited in its throw distance (PTO speed 2580rpm) creating issues with that method too for my situation.
 
#45 ·
That's a great idea. Dump trucks have been using an exhaust bypass for years to heat their beds in the winter to prevent sticking especially those that haul snow away from on-site.
 
#46 · (Edited)
Interesting idea for someone with more technical capability and resources than myself! I'm actually wondering I'd just spraying windshield de- icer on that impellor hub when it ices up might be my best option. I tried some CRC White Lithium Grease because a tech research paper on icephobic materials mentioned lithium grease as one of the best easily available icephobic compounds. In the attached link you can find lithium grease in one of the charts...
How a solid coating can reduce the adhesion of ice on a structure | Caroline Laforte - Academia.edu
Not sure how much I can recommend it cause that was a short snow removal session. There wasn't enough to really clear so I shoveled it all across the drive to one side and cleared that pile. There was some ice buildup on the impellor hub (30 minutes use maybe?) but the longer session outcome I can't speculate. I did like the way it sprayed on using a plastic applicator insert. Nice even and good coverage. Not spotty needing excess spray or post spray physical spreading on full surface.
The ice buildup mentioned was easy to remove at the impellor with a gloved fingernail so maybe I should consider just stopping at intervals and doing a quick scrap?
Frankly we're getting hammered here with snow this last week and if it's any indication of the rest of the winter it's gonna be NOT fun. It hurts to watch plows come and plow out neighbors in what seems like a flash even with side by side plow making huge piles in the process. But the get it done quick. I do have a lot more to snow to clear and I do sidewalks too etc... which they don't, but the snow blowing is SLOW! And that end of driveway stuff is much better plowed into a pile than blown. Of course we all know the plowing and resultant ice piles by February all the neighbors are in a bad way nowhere to put the snow.
Hmmmm. To install the plow on the tractor or not? That would at least end the snow. Murphies law spend two hours removing the mower deck and installing that then it would stop snowing...
My plow is 6.5 ft wide for the tractor so that would be faster and easier pushing the end of Drive slush pile onto the lawn. I never wanted to do that because the spring gravel in the grass cleanup hassle but I fight with it all winter with the blowers and careful as I am I still end up with gravel on the lawn. On that note, I don't like plow snow piles either but it would save time and cleanup on plow is minimal compared to the blower.
 
#47 ·
CRC White Lithium Grease

The CRC White Lithium Grease seems to work pretty well for me in cold and single digit temperatures with powder snow. Probably get some warme4 wet snow here in the near future and have to see how it is on that. For the record. Doesn’t seem to be too much interest in this here judging by the minimal response.....
 
#48 ·
This is more physics then chemistry. Any lubricant, even water, will work. But the problem is how long will it last. You have snow, which is more abrasive the water, constantly rubbing against these surfaces. So the key, IMO, is getting something that will stick on the metal surfaces the longest, and resist being worn off. It would seem ski or car wax would meet this criteria, but how difficult is applying a paste wax and buffing it in, when it's hard to reach and too many awkward and rough surfaces. A spray or liquid is the go-to application. I've seen where they contain "polymers" and other ingredients, and if any of these will dry and stick to the metal surfaces longer, than that's the best application.

I had sprayed silicone on my snow blower blades, chute, surfaces and after a snow storm, the second snow storm the snow built up so much on the blades I was "pushing" rather than "eating" snow. So I melted the snow off with heater, until mostly dry, and sprayed down with silicone again, and tried to let it dry, and it worked fine. . for a while. I noticed the blades started to build up again. So I'm guessing the silicone wears off pretty fast. I'm going to try Home Depots Snow Jet Non-Stick Polymer Treatment, and I ordered DuPont Teflon Snow and Ice Repellant, 10-Ounce from Amazon I'll try later when it arrives. It seems the manufacturers need to better address this with the paint they add, and they could also design them better. Someone on youtube has a cool video of how he claims the auger chute blades are not close enough to the sides, which allows build up. He creates a rubber blade to attach that meets the sides and says this prevents build up and improves snow removal. Makes sense, but hard to attach, and they wear out.

Good luck!
 
#49 ·
Sorry about bumping an old thread. I have found tremendous success with turtlewax hybrid solutions ceramic spray coating. They sell one that you can put on wet, or dry. Works great all season. Does not come off easy. I spray my whole machine down after the season, and hit the chute and augers before the first snowfall. Snow just slides off. out $14 on amazon. Good luck!
 
#52 ·
I've been using fluid film for years and it seems to do a pretty good job. I try and buy it on sale in a pail and then just run it through a sprayer. My neighbor uses chainsaw bar oil through a spray gun. He puts it in a bain marie of sorts and then when nice and warm he sprays it on.
 
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