The Ongoing Super Mega Weather Thread v3

[Locke]

Originally Posted by RW99

Maybe a dumb question, but can you buy a snow blower that you can reduce the throwing distance? I only have one side of the driveway to blow on and I share about 6 feet of grass with the neighbor before their driveway starts. Just buy the cheapest, lowest powerful one?

Well, I dont know about all snowblowers as I have knowledge and experience with a grand total of 1, but you can usually control direction and elevation.

So I can swing the outlet nozzle and direct the snow to any side and up and away or almost straight down.

I have the same issue, one side of my driveway is only separated from my neighbour by about 3 feet, so I direct it straight down onto that patch of ground.

[Paulie Walnuts]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

Was using my old corded snow blower to clear my walkway, wasn't paying enough attention and caught the cord. I spent about 10 minutes trying to untangle the broken cord out of the auger before saying "fata this" and went to Home Depot. I'm now a proud owner of a Ryobi cordless snow blower, and it ####s all over the old one. Really wish I had just bought the bullet last year when it was $200 cheaper

I have a gas one, but it's too loud and I just don't like the smell of gas.

Have the Ryobi mower and weed whacker. I have been on the Home Depot website looking at the Snow Blower and the Shovel thinking what would be best. It also shows everything out of stock where did you find?

[Nufy]

I have a 23 year old son who treats snow shovelling like a work out...

Saved a ton of money today...LOL

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

I have a gas one, but it's too loud and I just don't like the smell of gas.

Have the Ryobi mower and weed whacker. I have been on the Home Depot website looking at the Snow Blower and the Shovel thinking what would be best. It also shows everything out of stock where did you find?

I bought this one, though it came with a charger and a battery for $750 total

https://www.homedepot.ca/product/ryo...ly-/1001649792

It was on display but there were no boxes near it. I asked a clerk and they found 4 of them deeper in the store, Country Hills Home Depot

[RW99]

Originally Posted by Nufy

I have a 23 year old son who treats snow shovelling like a work out...

Saved a ton of money today...LOL

Nephew! Come over and visit with your uncle RW99.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by RW99

Nephew! Come over and visit with your uncle RW99.

Lol!

"Wanna help me shovel the driveway? Heres a shovel, I'm just going to go get my boots and another shovel to help out. I'll be right there....super swearsies..."

Honestly, I shouldnt complain about snow removal because my snowblower makes it so easy, but the real PITA is the timing.

Both of trying to remove it before work and the length of time it actually takes to do the whole job.

Its not like I'm pouring tons of sweat equity into it or anything, its just a job that takes a bunch of time at an inopportune moment.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

I bought this one, though it came with a charger and a battery for $750 total

https://www.homedepot.ca/product/ryo...ly-/1001649792

It was on display but there were no boxes near it. I asked a clerk and they found 4 of them deeper in the store, Country Hills Home Depot

Home Depot just updated their site, this is the one I bought

https://www.homedepot.ca/product/ryo...1457?rrec=true

2 left in stock at Country Hills

[Minnie]

Thank you to those with snowblowers who help their neighbors out, without making things more difficult for the rest of the neighborhood.

We have a guy just around the corner by 2 houses, who gets out with his snowblower & cleans his place up, then comes across & does my neighbor's house. Lovely.

Except he blows the main sidewalk up to our property & blows all my neighbor's snow on to our driveway/sidewalk. The driveway & sidewalk that is currently drifted 3 ft high with dense, heavy snow. Does the same thing on his side of the street with his snow - onto the neighbor's property on either side & into the street, narrowing it immensely because several other people push their snow on to the street & the city almost never plows here, so now we have this tiny little route through, enough for a single vehicle & everyone gets stuck in these idiots' snowpiles (or smashed into the ice piles) they've tossed onto the road - we've been here 8.5 years & they've plowed our street 3 times. That old coot makes me very cranky on snow days.

I mean, if he was going to help anyone out, why not the elderly lady on the other side of us who is dying of cancer & whose kids don't come out to shovel her out? But no, he uses his snowblower on the other neighbor's place, the 1 who has a big strapping son who is well capable of doing the job (in his early 40s, 6'5, etc). Instead, it's us & the young guy 2 doors down who dig out our dying neighbor's place every snowfall, making sure there's ice melt down, etc.

I don't care that you don't help us, I just don't need everyone else's snow added to my 3 foot high driftpiles, thanks.

I might be a tidgey bit cranky.

[TrentCrimmIndependent]

Originally Posted by Minnie

Thank you to those with snowblowers who help their neighbors out, without making things more difficult for the rest of the neighborhood.

We have a guy just around the corner by 2 houses, who gets out with his snowblower & cleans his place up, then comes across & does my neighbor's house. Lovely.

Except he blows the main sidewalk up to our property & blows all my neighbor's snow on to our driveway/sidewalk. The driveway & sidewalk that is currently drifted 3 ft high with dense, heavy snow. Does the same thing on his side of the street with his snow - onto the neighbor's property on either side & into the street, narrowing it immensely because several other people push their snow on to the street & the city almost never plows here, so now we have this tiny little route through, enough for a single vehicle & everyone gets stuck in these idiots' snowpiles (or smashed into the ice piles) they've tossed onto the road - we've been here 8.5 years & they've plowed our street 3 times. That old coot makes me very cranky on snow days.

I mean, if he was going to help anyone out, why not the elderly lady on the other side of us who is dying of cancer & whose kids don't come out to shovel her out? But no, he uses his snowblower on the other neighbor's place, the 1 who has a big strapping son who is well capable of doing the job (in his early 40s, 6'5, etc). Instead, it's us & the young guy 2 doors down who dig out our dying neighbor's place every snowfall, making sure there's ice melt down, etc.

I don't care that you don't help us, I just don't need everyone else's snow added to my 3 foot high driftpiles, thanks.

I might be a tidgey bit cranky.

yeah maybe

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Minnie

Thank you to those with snowblowers who help their neighbors out, without making things more difficult for the rest of the neighborhood.

We have a guy just around the corner by 2 houses, who gets out with his snowblower & cleans his place up, then comes across & does my neighbor's house. Lovely.

Except he blows the main sidewalk up to our property & blows all my neighbor's snow on to our driveway/sidewalk. The driveway & sidewalk that is currently drifted 3 ft high with dense, heavy snow. Does the same thing on his side of the street with his snow - onto the neighbor's property on either side & into the street, narrowing it immensely because several other people push their snow on to the street & the city almost never plows here, so now we have this tiny little route through, enough for a single vehicle & everyone gets stuck in these idiots' snowpiles (or smashed into the ice piles) they've tossed onto the road - we've been here 8.5 years & they've plowed our street 3 times. That old coot makes me very cranky on snow days.

I mean, if he was going to help anyone out, why not the elderly lady on the other side of us who is dying of cancer & whose kids don't come out to shovel her out? But no, he uses his snowblower on the other neighbor's place, the 1 who has a big strapping son who is well capable of doing the job (in his early 40s, 6'5, etc). Instead, it's us & the young guy 2 doors down who dig out our dying neighbor's place every snowfall, making sure there's ice melt down, etc.

I don't care that you don't help us, I just don't need everyone else's snow added to my 3 foot high driftpiles, thanks.

I might be a tidgey bit cranky.

You know, is it possible that he doesnt know any of that?

I know my direct neighbours, but thats about it. Oh, and the crazy lady 4 doors down that walks her cat outside and hides around corners smoking hoping that nobody can see her.

I told her once that she's a grown woman, she can smoke if she wants to. Its not a crime or anything but then she panicked and ran away.

[calgarygeologist]

That was a tough shovel job this afternoon. The worst was that the bottom layer of snow was really wet and sticky so it was tough to move but it was also constantly sticking to the shovel blade. Hopefully we don't see snow like that again. I like the soft, light, fluffy stuff.

[WhiteTiger]

Well, that was a fun walk in to work today. Glad for my Sorels.

Also, for the curious, there have been 362 accidents in the last 24 hours...

[GGG]

Originally Posted by WhiteTiger

Well, that was a fun walk in to work today. Glad for my Sorels.

Also, for the curious, there have been 362 accidents in the last 24 hours...

How does that rank?

Seems low to me for a winter storm. I thought the big ones were 5-600.

[chemgear]

Originally Posted by GGG

How does that rank?

Seems low to me for a winter storm. I thought the big ones were 5-600.

The really dumb MFers are using scooters instead.

[WhiteTiger]

Originally Posted by GGG

How does that rank?

Seems low to me for a winter storm. I thought the big ones were 5-600.

IMO, it's up there. It'll likely be one of the largest of this winter. I have seen bigger daily totals, but not very often. From my experience, anything over 150 is a "respectably bad" day, traffic-wise.

IIRC, Calgary will usually get between 20-35/day.

[DoubleF]

Originally Posted by Minnie

Thank you to those with snowblowers who help their neighbors out, without making things more difficult for the rest of the neighborhood.

We have a guy just around the corner by 2 houses, who gets out with his snowblower & cleans his place up, then comes across & does my neighbor's house. Lovely.

Except he blows the main sidewalk up to our property & blows all my neighbor's snow on to our driveway/sidewalk. The driveway & sidewalk that is currently drifted 3 ft high with dense, heavy snow. Does the same thing on his side of the street with his snow - onto the neighbor's property on either side & into the street, narrowing it immensely because several other people push their snow on to the street & the city almost never plows here, so now we have this tiny little route through, enough for a single vehicle & everyone gets stuck in these idiots' snowpiles (or smashed into the ice piles) they've tossed onto the road - we've been here 8.5 years & they've plowed our street 3 times. That old coot makes me very cranky on snow days.

I mean, if he was going to help anyone out, why not the elderly lady on the other side of us who is dying of cancer & whose kids don't come out to shovel her out? But no, he uses his snowblower on the other neighbor's place, the 1 who has a big strapping son who is well capable of doing the job (in his early 40s, 6'5, etc). Instead, it's us & the young guy 2 doors down who dig out our dying neighbor's place every snowfall, making sure there's ice melt down, etc.

I don't care that you don't help us, I just don't need everyone else's snow added to my 3 foot high driftpiles, thanks.

I might be a tidgey bit cranky.

I thought it's not allowed to blow snow onto the road, so I point it at the lawns. Letting the snow add to someone's driveway or sidewalk to increase their difficulty for removal is a bad and careless move though, I agree. I will say that I occasionally blast it on the road though... but this is more to
potentially avoid shooting gravel and snow at someone's vehicle in a lazy manner. If I notice the wind blowing the snow onto someone's driveway, I'll go over and at least shovel a path to their sidewalk or do their sidewalk to try and balance out the extra effort I had inadvertently added to them.

I also do the road in front of my house on occasion with the thrower. Two reasons, altruistically, it helps the neighborhood out so that they have a lower snow section to get momentum if needed. Hedonistically, I won't get embarrassingly stuck in front of my own home and I won't have to run out of the house to help the Xth person who is stuck directly in front of my place.

My parents used to live in a bad snow drift location. My brother and I would be pushing out 1-6 vehicles on bad snow days and it'd take like 10-30 minutes each time. We realized we were mainly digging out the snow under the vehicle most of the times anyways, so it was just easier to do it without a vehicle on top of it. I kept up the habit once I moved out.

I'm also seemingly lucky. On super bad days, it seems like there's a dude or two who use vehicles to plow several streets around them and some guy with a vehicle with a plow attachment and he just does the sidewalks around the streets. On those days, I'll grab my shovel and use the time I'd regularly still be out and go help someone outside with their driveway or sidewalk or whatnot. Honestly though, I don't really know my neighbors other than a handful of names.

Snow piles wise, when the temps get good and the driveway gets dry, I'll use a spreader shovel and chip off bits of the snow piles and spread it on my driveway to melt or I whack it 3-4 feet further onto the lawn. I'm sure I get weird looks. But it's basically a solar powered snow melter. When the next snow comes, I don't have to start at 2-5 feet snow pile if using a shovel. It'll be closer to 1.5.

[DoubleF]

Originally Posted by Paulie Walnuts

I have a gas one, but it's too loud and I just don't like the smell of gas.

Have the Ryobi mower and weed whacker. I have been on the Home Depot website looking at the Snow Blower and the Shovel thinking what would be best. It also shows everything out of stock where did you find?

If you sell it, you're probably pretty close to funding a huge portion of it. If you have a battery powered lawnmower as well, the same brand could mean you could just share the batteries and save more or have extra on hand for a bad day.

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

That was a tough shovel job this afternoon. The worst was that the bottom layer of snow was really wet and sticky so it was tough to move but it was also constantly sticking to the shovel blade. Hopefully we don't see snow like that again. I like the soft, light, fluffy stuff.

I've often read that one trick for snow throwers is to use spray oil on the auger and chute to avoid clogs. This storm is an odd ball, but if this winter is a bunch of weird high precip with low temps then perhaps a quick coating of WD40 on the shovel might help?

[Erick Estrada]

Good lord the forecast for the next 7 days is absolutely abysmal. Can someone tell mother nature it's beginning of November and not middle of January?

[Fuzz]

Looking forward to more snow, should be a good base to get XC skiing up and running. The cold can back off a little though.

[The Fisher Account]

Originally Posted by Hemi-Cuda

I bought this one, though it came with a charger and a battery for $750 total

https://www.homedepot.ca/product/ryo...ly-/1001649792

It was on display but there were no boxes near it. I asked a clerk and they found 4 of them deeper in the store, Country Hills Home Depot

Thanks - just picked one up!