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Traction problems 3212H


Wishin2BMowin

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Hello All, I've seen pics of the various things done to our little tractors to get some traction but was wondering, if you put wheel weights on the back and the front won't they just counter each other out? My 3212H with a 42 inch blower has a real problem with backing up even with my 240+ pounds on the seat. Also does not steer very well with the blower down. I only have wheel weights & chains on the back and the rear tires have some kind of stuff in them. I haven't done any checking on that adjustment on the axle for the traction control. Would this help? I've lowered the air pressure on the front tires till they are real soft but that didn't seem to help much. They are 1/2 worn out turf tires so I guess these aren't the best for snow either. Would a weight on the rear lift help? Thanks for any help... Snowing here today, 8 to 10 inches to add to our 24+ inches we got on Sunday. Getting to hate the snow, but it's kind of fun running my tractor...
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I had proublems with traction on my 7016 what i did was put tractor cleat tires on the rear and put 3 rib tires on the front. I dont have any weights on the front wheels, but have weights on the rear wheels. It made my traction a lot better. I can climb up hill a lot better, and it goes in snow a lot better to. I dont have a snow blower on mine but i think it will help you on the traction with a rear weight on the back of your tractor since you all ready have the chains.
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Weight applied directly to the wheels (wheel weights or liquid fill) will not affect the traction on the other wheels since it is applied directly to the tire and not to the chassis. Weights hung on the chassis can affect one or both sets of tires depending on where it is attached. If you hang it way out behind the rear axle it will help the rear but actually reduce the force on the front tires. If hung in the middle of the tractor it will help both. It is a matter of leverage when the weights are on the chassis. The tri-rib tires are just about the best thing you can do for the front tires. I have them on two of my tractors and they make a significant difference. Some people use small bar tread tires and also "snow hawg" tires on the front, that are also much better than turf tires. The 3.50 or 4.00 tires are much better in snow than the 6.50 tires because the bite down into the snow more and don't float on top. On the rear the best thing is chains. Additional weight will always help on the rear also. When I first mounted my blower last year, I had neither chains nor additional weight with turf tires on the rear. Couldn't even get to my driveway. Put on a set of chains and about 150 pounds hung on the rear hitch. Had no problems then. I have not had a steering problem with the tri-ribs, so I really can't compare them to the turfs. I used turfs with a blade several times and could only push snow with the blade straight. Not enough traction to angle the blade, as it just pushed the tractor sideways. If your tractor has the two screws on the hub, then they should be tightened to 20 ft-lb to get max. traction. All on my tractors have the newer style limited-slip diffs. In fact I modified one of the limited-slip to make both wheels nearly always spin together. It will not spin one wheel in snow, but will turn normally on dry ground.
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I had some steering problems with snow blower on GTH-L I can lift blower up evenly to put weight on front wheels . That did not help. So then I added weights on front wheels. They are factory weights feel fairly heavy. in some situations even with blower weight on front wheels tractor will slip sideways. This is with turf tires. Going to put ribs on next. want to find narrow rims or make narrow rims. With wide rims, ribs look like they should go on diet.
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Sounds like the front is the biggest problem, so lets look at that first. You did a very good job at descibing what your problems were and what you've done so far. As for the front, looks like if the tires are about slick anyway, changeing thme to most anything with a more agressive tread would help. If your gonna try to run the same tire in the summer, be careful not to get something too agressive as it will cause a lot of marks in the turf. If this is not a concern, get some Hogs or Tri-ribs and have at. For the back, a combination of traction from chains, ags, or both my be reqiured but the best is combination usually has a little weight added for that extra dig. Finding the right combination may take a little time unless you just go get weights, chains, tires and the like at once. Good luck, as poor traction really bites when your trying to have tractor time and it just won't go.
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I'd recommend narrow wheels and 4.80 x 8 tri-ribs on the front... and a counterbalance weight on the rear, with at least 45-50 lbs on it to help lift the snowblower and get traction. I have the counterbalance weight with one "donut" on it, but am running the wide turf tires on my 3112V and DO NOT like how it steers in snow, even with decent tread on the tires. BTW, I don't have either wheel weights or loaded tires, but am running chains on the 10.50 turf tires. Traction is typically not a problem unless I'm trying to back up with the snowblower lifted... [img]http://simpletractors.com/club2/attach/Kent/3112_blowing_1.jpg[/img] [img]http://simpletractors.com/club2/attach/Kent/3112_blowing_3.jpg[/img]
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Pump up your front tires, even if they are getting bald they will turn better pumped up than running them low. Especially on slippery surfaces you want less surface area touching the ground to put more pressure on the surface that is touching. You do not want your front tires to "float" when snowblowing. Floating on the surface is what you want for mowing. You will notice that many guys take their big monster tires off in the winter because they cannot get traction or steering vs the narrower OEM tires.
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