Snow Blowers

Using roof snow blowers is not a good idea for the average consumer. We wanted to say that upfront to make sure that readers understand that it can be very dangerous to the person using the snow blower. There is also the possibility of actual damage to the roof. If not completed carefully and in a safe manner, people have fallen from the roof due to unsafe conditions.

They have also damaged the roof causing water damage and major leaks to the interior of their homes and businesses. If you must clear snow from your roof there are a couple of safe ways to arrange for the job to be completed. We will cover these issues in this post. We are very interested in your safety and prefer that no one is hurt in any way.

Roof Snow Blowers – Use a Snow Rake Instead

For those of you who may not be aware, a snow rake is actually a blade that is attached to a long pole. This allows the operator to stand on the ground. The business end of the rake is placed on the roof. The operator pulls the snow towards the edge of the roof onto the ground. Sure you have to work a little harder. You may have to shovel the snow that falls onto your driveway or steps, but it is far safer than getting on the roof.

If you must get on the roof, devices like the one shown in this picture are sometimes used. It is light, easy to hold, and runs on electricity. It can be used on the roof without placing a lot of weight on cold brittle shingles. They could break under your own weight.

We have seen pictures of full-sized snow blowers on a roof. We are not sure if they were photoshopped or not, but this is clearly a very unsafe thing to consider.

The chart at the left provides consumers with recommendations regarding what oil to use in snow blower engines at various temperatures. Most consumers will end up using 5 W 30 since it is good for temperatures from -22F to 32F. It is cheaper than synthetic oil which has a wider range.A snow blower engine is not needed during warm temperatures. Therefore the wider range of synthetic oil is not really needed. You save money as well since it is more expensive. Always review the owners manual. Use whatever is recommended for your snow blower engine. The intent of this post is to provide consumers with a guideline to follow.

What Oil to use in Snow Blower Engines – Fresh Oil

We also recommend that the oil should be changed at the beginning of the season in the late fall period. Run the engine for a few minutes to warm it up and ensure that the oil is hot enough to cleanly drain out of your snow blowers engine. Shut it off, drain the oil and replace the oil with whatever oil you decide to use. Check the oil level, restart the engine and let it run for a few minutes and then shut it off again. Let it sit for a minute before checking the oil one more time. This is to make sure there is the right amount of oil in the engine.

Depending on how much your snow blower is used, you may need to change the oil one more time during the winter season. Otherwise you can change it again at the beginning of the next season. Maintaining fresh oil in your snow blowers engine is one of the best ways to maintain your engine and keep it running for a long time. Don’t forget to put gasoline preservative in the gas tank, which you can obtain from most auto stores. Clean the spark plug and re-gap the plug when you change the oil as well.

Signs of bad spark plug on snow blower engines can be confused with several other issues all of which have similar symptoms. For example if your snow blower engine will not start it could be because there is no gasoline in the tank (don’t smirk this happens a lot). Also bad gas that has clogged the filters and / or carb. A bad spark plug or no spark at all getting to the spark plug. The easiest way to trouble shoot these problems is to check the easy things first.

Eliminate them and move onto the more difficult areas. For example, always check that you have gas in the gas tank and if there is a shut off cock for the gasoline, that it is open! Many people shut this off in the spring and then forget that they did that when it comes to firing the snow blower up in the fall.

Bad Spark Plug on Snow Blower – Check the Plugs

The next easiest thing to check is the spark plug. Remove the wire connected to the plug and hold the metal end of the wire within 1/16th of an inch to the end of the spark plug. Have some one slowly pull the starter chord. You should see a spark. Be careful not to touch anything metal connected to the machine to avoid receiving a shock. It will not hurt you but it will give you a bit of a surprise.

Next remove the plug, clean it and re gap it to the specification in your manual. If the spark plug is badly corroded or cannot be cleaned properly, replace it with a new one. Make sure you also set the gap on this plug as well. If your engine is still running rough or not at all you will have to search for other solutions.

At this point you know you have gas in the tank. The shuttle cock is open so gas can get to the carb. You know there is spark getting to the spark plug and you have either cleaned the plug or replaced it. What’s next? Turn the engine over a few times, remove the spark plug and check for gasoline on the plug. If the plug is wet, and you can smell gasoline, then gas is getting into the engine. You will need to recheck that it is gaped properly and that the spark plug is actually receiving a jolt of electricity. If it is dry then gas is not getting into the engine and you will need to recheck and / or clean the carb and gas tank.

Using a snow blower on your roof is probably not the best thing to do, given the danger of slipping. Also potentially damaging the shingles on your roof. However, we know people are going to disregard these suggestions and do things that may compromise their own safety. The best snow blower for roofs is actually a snow rake. You stand on the ground and pull the snow off the roof rather than lift a snow blower onto the roof. Although a snow rake takes more work, it is by far the safest approach to take. If you are going to use a snow blower on the roof, use one that is meant to be portable. One that you can lift with one hand and that you can handle easily while maintaining your balance on a slippery roof.

Best Snow Blowers for Roofs – Portable Snow Blower

Most snow blowers are far too heavy to lift onto the roof and they will definitely damage your roof as well. Use a portable snow blower like the one in the picture. It is an electric blower so no need to worry about spilling gasoline on your roof. It is light enough that it will do less damage to your roof.

The handheld model will handle most snow conditions. However, if there is ice or hard-packed snow it may have more difficulty removing the icy chunks. You probably also blow the snow onto adjacent sidewalks or even your driveway and will have to clear it later on. This is to be expected. If there are shrubs just below your roof, try to avoid dumping too much snow onto the shrubs. The weight of the snow will usually break the branches and flatten them to the ground.

If there is any doubt about your safety, hire someone to do the work on your behalf or use a snow rake to remove the snow.

Many readers are looking for snow blower for roof solutions which we have to say can be very dangerous. We have seen numerous pictures of people using hoists and cranes to lift full-size snow blowers onto a sloped roof. Not only will you damage your shingles you can slip off the roof and have serious injuries as a result.

We strongly encourage readers to never lift a snowblower of any kind onto a roof. There are two possible solutions which are much safer. The electric snowblower shown in this picture would work. This is provided that the snow is not hard-packed or has an icy crust on it. Anyone attempting to use this solution needs to be very careful to avoid falling off the roof. But at least it is a light machine and can be controlled much more easily than a full-blown powerful snowblower.

Snow Blower for Roof – Use a snow Rake

This solution is far better, although it involves much more work. Although it is probably a lot harder, it is much safer than getting onto the roof. The snow rake has several long poles which are connected together. The user can stand on the ground to pull the snow off the roof. Consumers must be careful to not work too hard especially if you have been a couch potato for many years. With this kind of work, often people who are not fit. They suffer heart attacks when they do this type of work.

If you fall into this latter category, hire someone to do the work for you who is younger and fit. While it will cost you some money, it is much better than falling off the roof or suffering a heart attack. Electric snow blowers and roof snow rakes are the best options for clearing snow off of sloped roofs. Even those that are flat.

Using a leaf blower for snow on roof clearing looks to this writer as an incredibly dangerous activity. These guys on the roof of this house are really taking a chance walking on a slippery icy roof. They are attempting to clear a light amount of snow from the roof. It appears that they are using a rope in an attempt at safety. However, the second individual has nothing to grab onto if the first should slip and fall. Both are going to go tumbling off the roof and land on whatever is at the bottom. This also looks like a home under construction so there are likely some sharp ragged things on the ground. This could hurt them a lot when they do land on the ground. Never try this sort of thing without a lot more security than what these guys currently have.

Leaf Blower for Snow on Roof – Does it work?

Aside from the safety issue, we are wondering if using a leaf blower to clear the snow from the roof would actually work or not. Light, non-compacted snow could possibly be blown off the roof, however, most snow goes through a compaction cycle of the sun warming the snow slightly during the day so that it melts a bit. At night when the air is colder, the snow forms a crust on top of snow. Once the crust has formed it takes much more than a leaf blower to remove any snow on a roof.

As the snow gets deeper on the roof, the snow becomes heavier as well and so really using a leaf blower to clear snow from the roof is a nonstarter. As we mentioned earlier it is also very dangerous to be on the roof anyway due to the slippery slopes. If you must clear the snow from the roof,  use a snow rake with a long pole to remove the snow. Consumers can remove the snow in this manner while remaining on the ground! Remember stay safe!

The questions in not how to get a snowblower on a roof. But why would you do this or take the chance of an accident and damaging your roof? We hope this picture is photoshopped and not something that really happened. Snow loads on a roof are an important issue. As a result, the snow needs to be removed to avoid damage to the roof. Most people will get on the roof to shovel the snow off. They can also use a snow rake while standing on the ground to remove the snow. Of course, raising a heavy snow blower onto the roof is difficult to do and also dangerous. How do you get the snow blower up there? A crane could do the job if you had one handy. I guess you could lift it up there but most people cannot afford to hire a crane.

How to get a Snowblower on a Roof – Damage to Roof

More importantly, is the potential damage you can cause to the shingles as you move the snowblower along the roof. The tires are going to dig in and dislodge shingles. The scraper on the snow blower is going to catch shingles and tear them off. As a result, a lot of damage will be done to the roof. This can cause leaks later on when the snow begins to melt.

Whatever you are thinking, don’t try this as a solution. If you cannot get up on the roof yourself, hire someone to clear the snow off. Make sure that they do this in a safe manner to avoid any potential injury from falling. Personally, I use a snow rake. It allows me to stand on the ground and pull the snow off the roof. It is hard work, but a whole lot safer. If you are the couch potato type, you may want to hire someone to do this. Many heart attacks are caused by unaccustomed overwork.

Placing a snow blower fuel stabilizer in the gasoline you use in your snow blower or any small engine is one of the best things you can do to keep the engine carburetor and filters from getting fouled.  When this occurs your engine will either run rough or it may not even start. This of course is not something that you want to deal with when there is a foot of snow on the ground. We suggest that you purchase some kind of snow blower stabilizer and regularly add it to your gasoline tank to keep everything clean and working smoothly every year. We do not recommend any particular type of fuel stabilizer, just that you use one recommended for your small engines.

Snow Blower Fuel Stabilizer – Why

If gasoline sits in a tank for any length of time, for example over a season, the components of the gasoline will tend to separate and settle on the sides of the tank as well as on the filter of the tank. As it is drawn into the carburetor, it coats the orifice of the carburetor. It. restricts gasoline from flowing smoothly and at the correct mixture of gasoline and air.

The engine will not start if the carburetor is badly coated. Insufficient gasoline gets into the engine. If it is not too bad the engine will speed up. Then it will almost stall before repeating the same thing all over again. It makes it really difficult to develop enough power to blow snow properly. Especially when you have lots of heavy snow to deal with. A few dollars spent on a fuel stabilizer can prevent all of these issues. It may even save you a trip to the local small engine mechanic as well.

Some people have been known to just go and purchase another snow blower instead of getting theirs fixed. Enterprising collectors will take them free of charge. They will fix them themselves and sell them for a few hundred dollars making a nice little profit.

This is the time to add fuel stabilizer for engines that are going to sit around awhile without being used. Since this is a site that discusses everything about snow blowers and this post is in mid-May, it is time to prepare your snow blowers engine for sitting idle for the next six months. If you have not done so already, add some fuel stabilizer for engines to the gas tank and run the engine for a few minutes to ensure that the gasoline with the fuel stabilizer is properly circulated through everything. We are not recommending any particular stabilizer, but we are recommending that you use some form of stabilizer to ensure that your engine components do not become clogged with the old gas that sits in your gasoline tank.

Fuel Stabilizer for Engines

If you are wondering why you should use a stabilizer, read on. Most mechanics will tell you that when gasoline sits around for longer than several months, it gets stale. Some of the chemicals will separate. They will form a gummy substance that clogs filters and the orifice in the carburetor. Your engine may not run at all or it may run very rough. Only a proper cleaning of all of these parts will bring it back to proper running condition. Spending a few dollars on fuel stabilizers for engines is much less expensive. It is also much less frustrating than having to take your engine in to be repaired.

Most auto parts stores, small engine stores along with big box stores like will sell these kinds of products. Follow the instructions carefully. Add the proper amount to either your gasoline tank on your snow blowers engine. Or into the portable gasoline tank that you fill at the gas station. In fact, if gas is going to sit in this portable tank for any length of time you are better to use up this gasoline rather than have it sit for a long period.

Over the past few weeks we have posted a number of articles about snowblower maintenance. The term snowblower and snow thrower are used interchangeably. We thought we would summarize some of the tips for snow thrower maintenance activities that we have read. Anyone who owns and operates a snowblower should consider.

Safety

Never allow your children or pets to be near an operating snowblower. The Snowblowers can throw rocks, hard ice and the engine sound can lead to deafness. There’s also a danger of slipping into the spinning blades particularly with active dogs. Always read the safety section of the snowblower manual prior to operating your machine for the first time.

Tips for Snow Thrower Maintenance

• Wear hearing protection and safety glasses
• Wear excellent grip footwear to stop you from slipping
• In heavy snow conditions try to clear the store more often or only take a half cut with each pass of your snowblower
• Always wear lots of protective clothing particularly in windy conditions with dry powder snow.
• Always clear your driveway of any rocks and sticks or anything else that could damage the snowblower or be thrown.
• Never point the snowblower chute at windows or vehicles or humans.
• Lower the speed, the forward speed of the snowblower when you’re dealing with deep snow and heavy wet snow.
• Always clear all of the snow from the driveway, since any snow left can freeze and make it difficult to clear the snow next time.
• Always clean the auger and the impeller of snow once you’re finished. Make sure you turn the engine off to avoid any potential accident with the moving auger
• Always use the proper bolts for shear pins to avoid expensive repairs to the transmission and the gear system of the snowblower.