I can't answer your question Gary but if you occasionally seal your driveway, the chains will scratch it up pretty good. This, from prior experience, is one reason I bought a 4wd tractor.

+1 on protecting the sealed blacktop. I am in the process of fabricating a rubber cutting edge for my rear blade to avoid scraping the fresh sealcoat and crack sealant back off. Also, we had some abnormal snow (8"+) and ice (1"+) storms last winter here in the Cincy area and the CS2410 had zero problems in the snow, and I have a crazy steep 1/2 mile long driveway. It performed flawlessly without chains. When I was still in the SCUT buying process I was thinking I'd need them. Now, I have no intentions of purchasing them.

OK, my CS is ready for snow. R6, my dealer agrees with you, chains wont be necessary. He knows my driveway (1,800' with slopes) and said that even without the BH installed I shouldn't have any trouble - with it installed it should be unstoppable. He said if I am committed to installing chains to just install them on the front wheels.

As I mentioned in my first post, I added some lights to the ROPS of the CS. I used a 20" Cree LED light bar that is a spot light in the center 1/2, and flood lights on the outer quarters. It has 42 3w LED's and consumes 126 watts (a little over 9 amps). This unit is available on Amazon and eBay and cost about $82 including a wiring harness, switch and relay. I didn't like the switch that was included and chose to replace the switch. Photos follow below.

The first step was to create mounting brackets. I saw a post during the summer on TBN and bookmarked it knowing I wanted to use similar brackets. Here's the link to the original post:--> http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/projects/114640-worklight-brackets.html

I used 2x3 square brackets and a 3x3 L bracket. I also used nyloc nuts and some black foam rubber on the brackets. Here are some photos of my interpretation/version of the brackets:







Here is a photo of a bracket attached to the top of the ROPS



Here is a photo of the relay attached to the relay mount that is located next to the fuse box. There was an open spot located conveniently next to the fuse box. Since I don't have the Cruise Control I used that circuit for the lights. I wanted to wire it into the box from behind but couldn't quite figure out how to crimp it into place. I also tried a Fuse Tap, but it was too bulky and the fuse cover wouldn't fit. In the end I simply used a male spade connector in the fuse spot. This is 100% safe because the wiring harness has it's own 20A fuse.



As I mentioned, I didn't like the switch that came with the harness. Here's a photo:



I like that it has an LED indicator. I replaced it with a Carling type rocker switch that has an LED indicator.



If you look at the control column on the left fender you'll see there is a cut-out for this type of switch. So I cut off the original switch and adapted the harness for the replacement switch:



Here it is installed (and lit-up):



Here is the final installation of the brackets and light bar:



And here it is with power:



I'll take some photos at night looking down the driveway to show how it lights the driveway.

Nice light bar. If you have a steep hill and tends to get icy I'd say chains are a must even with all the weight you mention. But if relatively flat then you should be find as dealer mentioned.
Oh nice install too on the switch and mounts etc.:thThumbsU

MU

The output from this light bar is impressive. It creates daylight.

The photos just don't do it justice. I took two sets of three photos; the first photo in each set is just the headlights, the second photo is with the head lights and the light bar and the third photo is with just the light bar. There is so much reflection from the headlights hitting the snowblower shoot that there is way too much glare in the photos. It's almost best to compare the output of the headlights alone to just the light bar alone.

Headlights only



Headlights and Light Bar



Light Bar only



Again, Headlights only



Headlights and Light Bar



Light Bar only

That is a powerful light bar. It even lit up the sky. :ROF
Nice job on the mounting and switch.

Nice looking rig and lights!! :fing32:

As far as chains, your driveway looks level so you may not need chains.

Weight is not everything,
the PO of this tractor sold it to me after he slid down his paved driveway, it scared him to death!! :hide:



It weighs right at 10K with the loader.

Weight is meaningless when the conditions are icy,,,,,,

If it is icy, my tractor stays in the shed, no chains,,,,,,,,

I have a set of chains off a road grader that I could put on the front tires,
but, it has never been that bad of weather,,,,,yet,,,,,,,

Yeah, that is the level part. The slope is behind me, it didn't make for a good photo. I think I'm gonna pick up chains for the front tires. I'd rather have 'em and not need 'em then need them and not have them.

My driveway is 1,800' long and mostly paved, but there is a section about 400' long that is 3/8" gravel. Because of this I like to keep the scrape bar about 3/8" of an inch off the ground. I like to float the snowblower so it doesn't dig-in and scoop up rocks.

The Kioti snowblower doesn't come with skids; they're an option. A $125 option no less. Ouch! I really didn't want to spend that much on a pair of skids. So I did some research and came across ARMORskids. The owner (Bob) manufactures skids for just about every snow blower known to man; walk behind or mounted. Oddly enough, he'd never heard of Kioti (ok...not so odd) but his website has excellent information so I could spec the right skids for the KS50-160FM (former SB50) snowblower.

The mounts for the KS50 are drilled for 3/8" bolts and the spacing is 2-7/8" center-to-center. There are two sets that fit this requirement; ACS1545-C and ACS9545-B. The ACS1545-C are 4" high and 12" long, and the ACS9545-B are extra long and tall at 5" high and 16-1/2" long. Since I only need to raise the scrape bar 3/8" off the ground I went with the standard duty ACS1545's. The price with shipping was $41.74. That's a lot better then $125.

What's also better is the quality of the skids. The bottom plate is made from 1/4" steel and is over an inch wide. They are nicely powder coated black (orange is available...I asked) and look like they will last for many many years. One difference between the Kioti skids and these aftermarket ones is that the Kioti skids are mounted inside the shroud while these are mounted outside the shroud. This is necessary so the angle at the rear of the skid clears the backside of the shroud. This will not present any operational issues.

You can buy ARMORskids direct from the manufacturer at www.snowblowerskids.com. Here are some photos...



Here's a photo with a 3/8" piece of wood under the scrape bar as a spacer



Final fitment

My first outing with the snowblower was less then spectacular.

Last Wednesday we got about 4-5 inches of heavy snow...mostly slush. I know from experience that this type of snow is hard to move with a snowblower, but I gave it a go anyway. I have found with slush that there is a certain forward speed where you can get a snowblower to work; too fast and you clog the chute with ice and too slow there isn't enough material for the auger to move to the impeller. Within a few minutes I had it figured out and I was on my way.

I made it down the driveway and was about 1/2 way back when I started to notice a vibration. I figured that the chute was getting impacted so I disengaged the PTO and cleared the chute (I keep a miniature plastic spade shovel with me just for this purpose). I got back on the machine and engaged the PTO and the vibration was still there. I moved maybe another 25 feet and the vibration turned violent. I went to disengage the PTO and before I could do so the vibration stopped. I got off the tractor to inspect what was going on and found the front of the PTO shaft on the ground. The rear (with the locking ring) was still attached to the PTO drive.

I thought to myself "this isn't good".

I reattached the PTO shaft and ensured that it was locked into place. Upon reengaging the PTO there was still vibration. I powered up and began making my way back to the garage. 50' further up the driveway the violent vibration was back - and then the PTO shaft flew back off the snowblower drive. I was done for the night.

I inspected the tractor on Friday and found the shroud in the area of the impeller badly scored across the entire surface. I had my son sit on the machine so I could visually inspect the PTO drive shaft in action. I only ran the engine at 2000 rpm but I couldn't believe the amount of wobble/movement in the PTO shaft. I shut down the tractor and called the dealer. This is obviously a manufacturing defect or installation issue.

The dealer picked up the machine yesterday, so I should know something today or tomorrow. In the mean time I'm going to pick up a 60" or 72" 3-point angle plow from Tractor Supply. This would be good to have for slush storms and as a back-up in the event that the blower fails.

UPDATE:

The dealer got right on it this morning. It appears that the spline-shaft bearing was put in backwards. This only allowed about 1/2" of engagement between the PTO shaft coupler and the spline shaft. Raising and lowering the snowblower allowed the shaft to move forward enough that the shaft came off the spline. When they dropped off the machine I did about 100 up/down movements at 3000 rpm just to make sure.

The feeling about the missing paint on the shroud is that it's from rocks. It could be as 500' of my driveway is stone. I got about 3' into the stone part of the driveway and decided not to clear that part. In that span I must have picked up rocks as there is paint missing on the inside of the deflector. I was given a can of Kioti orange spray paint if I want to touch it up at the end of the season.

I was glad that Kollmer Equipment got on this as fast as they did and I'm pleased with their response. Like everyone always says, the dealer is just as important as the machine.

Finally got some real snow today. The snowblower works good...not great...but good. The unit I had on my Cub Cadet 3000 series would blow 1/4" of snow...if it could get it into the auger it was happy to fling it through the chute. The SB50 has a rather large step just above the scrapper bar. There were times when I was pushing snow like a plow because it wasn't getting into the auger. This snow was wet and had a little frozen crust on top, and maybe that what was holding it back. I'll know better on Monday as we are going to get more snow. This is from a clipper system so it should be nice and fluffy.

I also thought that the drive shaft was noisy from time to time, but that could just be me being paranoid from the last episode. I think that the shaft might be slightly bent. The dealer told me they checked it, but I think that the blower should be free any vibration. If someone else has this blower I'd sure like to know if you get occasional noise, especially when unloaded (blower engaged but not throwing snow) and moving the blower up and down.

At least it didn't self destruct.

The light bar looks great. I wish I had that 2 weeks ago when I was repairing another water service line leak (2nd in under a year ) and ran out of daylight. I had to get my wife to come out and hold a flashlight so I could see where to dig with the backhoe. I'm thinking this would be even better if I could fashion a pivoting mount so that I could flip the light bar forward for normal use, and the flip it down and back for using the backhoe.

I'm going to think more about this...

Not necessary. Just remove the two nuts at the back of the light bar and flip it around. The brackets can stay right where they are.

Gary - Times have changed. Your $41.74 skids are now $199.74 (including shipping) from the same site. And they now only come unpainted.

I did find some replacement Kioti skids on Amazon for $75.00, but like the original Kioti skids they are much shorter and smaller than yours.

On a different note - what do you use to lube the PTO shaft on your blower and the PTO spline on the tractor? A particular grease, or maybe Fluid Film spray?

Thanks, Cal

Gary in NJ said:

The Kioti snowblower doesn't come with skids; they're an option. A $125 option no less. Ouch! I really didn't want to spend that much on a pair of skids. So I did some research and came across ARMORskids. The owner (Bob) manufactures skids for just about every snow blower known to man; walk behind or mounted. Oddly enough, he'd never heard of Kioti (ok...not so odd) but his website has excellent information so I could spec the right skids for the KS50-160FM (former SB50) snowblower.

The mounts for the KS50 are drilled for 3/8" bolts and the spacing is 2-7/8" center-to-center. There are two sets that fit this requirement; ACS1545-C and ACS9545-B. The ACS1545-C are 4" high and 12" long, and the ACS9545-B are extra long and tall at 5" high and 16-1/2" long. Since I only need to raise the scrape bar 3/8" off the ground I went with the standard duty ACS1545's. The price with shipping was $41.74. That's a lot better then $125.

Click to expand...

I use the same grease on my tractor as I do my dirt and street motorcycles - synthetic marine-grade grease. I tend not to use the zerk fitting on the shaft, I just put a handful on the shaft and let the excess clear itself.

I like the skids, but $200 is rather pricey.

Cal,

I too hand goop (or... finger goop to be exact) plain old T/S grease onto the Berco splines and into the shaft. I haven't yet re-greased mid winter for the past 2 winters we've used it, and there seems to be plenty left over on/in them for me to have to clean off for install/re-greasing for the next season. So for us, it seems to be one grease up and done - per winter

Renster

Cal,

I rechecked the website for the skis. The new part number for the pair I ordered is PRO1545-C and they are listed at $66.74 shipped. I don't know why his application chart is showing a $200 pair...it's just not necessary. In fact, if you click on the link in the application chart for a CS-2410 (why he has the tractor model number is confusing) you will see he used my photos above as well as my post. You will see that Bob has added a note at the bottom where he says he developed a heavy duty series for "larger" blowers. But after using these skids for 7 seasons I have to say that the 1545-C units works perfectly, and you will keep $133 in your pocket.

So for anyone else looking for skis for their blower, these units are still a great value.

3 Legged Dog said:

Gary - Times have changed. Your $41.74 skids are now $199.74 (including shipping) from the same site. And they now only come unpainted.

Click to expand...

Why did you do that now my wife is gonna want me to put that on her cs

Gary in NJ said:

The output from this light bar is impressive. It creates daylight.

The photos just don't do it justice. I took two sets of three photos; the first photo in each set is just the headlights, the second photo is with the head lights and the light bar and the third photo is with just the light bar. There is so much reflection from the headlights hitting the snowblower shoot that there is way too much glare in the photos. It's almost best to compare the output of the headlights alone to just the light bar alone.

Headlights only

Headlights and Light Bar

Light Bar only

Again, Headlights only

Headlights and Light Bar

Light Bar only

Click to expand...