Dave Eng, what is your continued beef with Kubota/Rad snowblowers? You keep going from thread to thread telling people not to buy these snowblowers, but have said you have never used or owned one. Granted, there is some parts that could be designed differently, but it kind of sounds like you have a financial interest in a different brand. Shear bolts are meant to break when something gets caught in them. Chain drive has its advantages until the chain and wearing sprockets start wearing, then it can be a nightmare keeping the chain from breaking and on the sprockets.
I am 70 and don't have a financial interest in anything. What might yours be?
Because of my background in the technical world, friends and neighbors in the ag community where my farm is located started to turn to me with problems.
A telhandler whose brakes would glow red when driven on the road, a milking machine for a small local farmer which was buzzing when it should have been humming and did not milk the cows. Some diodes from a GM alternator and he was good to go. A multi million $ dairy barn, built on a well driller's assurance that the well he drilled produced 25 gpm. Once they moved hundreds of cows in they ran out of water. They needed a short term i.e. immediate fix and then a long term one. You cannot just leave dairy cows and say see you on Monday because no one will come on the weekend.
A dealer of Belarus tractors turned to me when his mechanics could not understand the Russian electrical systems. An owner of a Zetor tractor which was not charging and no one knew how to fix it. I did and for free.
I am free to all and there is no waiting. What I do and what you are objecting to, is to read voraciously of other peoples problems with machinery. I remember their stories and when a pattern of problems emerges, I get involved. First step is to caution potential buyers of that type of equipment to avoid what other owners of said equipment are experiencing. That is a club they do not need to join at least until a cause and solution is found.
Between this forum and the other large forum, people I never met nor heard of are coming seeking help that in this case is shear bolt failures, their dealers are not resolving. If their dealers resolved their problem, we would not see them on the forums. These are people who, when you look at their posting history have had little to no previous involvement. I do not seek them out, they come to these two forums as a last resort.
Perhaps you are a fountain of wisdom to owners with problems. I have not read your profile. If you are an expert show me and I will back off and you can tell these desperate owners of RAD blowers what to do.
Some of these owners have acquired various tidbits of information which, when assembled, start to paint a picture. RAD who has been building this style of front blower for Kubota and others, agreed to talk to an owner directly.
He learned there was an upgrade for the product he was experiencing shear bolt failures on that involved the latest style of shear bolt assembly, BUT, it needed an upgraded gear box as well. This manufacturer's upgraded product parts could be acquired through Kubota but the cost was very high.
I mentioned in another post a neighbor dentist who is not restricted in what he can do by $ unlike most of the rest of us. He told his dealer fix it at all cost as he did not want any more shear bolt failures blowing snow on his paved driveway. He got what he wanted for $1,500.
I don't think people who bought a Kubota tractor because of its reputation for durability and reliability, ever thought the front mounted blower their Kubota dealer recommended and installed was going to be unreliable in the paved driveway world it was going to be asked to perform in.
I await your offer to "be the shear bolt expert," on both forums.
Dave M7040
