 Mornin' Guys, Finally, I hit a deal (I think)! Last spring, my old riding lawn mower wouldn't run so true to my short-temper disposition, I got mad and went to town and bought another. A few weeks ago, I dig that old one out of the weeds, bring it in the shop and get it running by cleaning the carb. It runs like a new one now. Fine, now I have two big riding mowers, which makes no sense at all. So, I get to thinking that if I could find a good used snow blower, I could take off the mower deck and mount the snow blower on this old guy and just leave it there permanently. It is a 16-horse tractor; no use letting it just go to waste. I stumble across this snow blower for sale on ebay (hope the link works). It is exactly what I need but something is wrong. Nobody is bidding on it and it has run multiple times. No takers; nobody wants it. Smells like dead fish. The guy won't ship it the 800 miles and this deal just seems a bit rank. Something is wrong here. This ebay deal has red flags all over it. I have a subcontractor who lives in his town and I ask her what she knows about the seller. She says to stay away from him, as he is crooked as a dog's hind leg. She says not to buy anything from him--ever. Well, for a $100 bill, I threw caution to the wind, jumped on it anyway and hired a trucking outfit to haul it up here for another $133. So, now I have $233 in an unknown machine that probably won't run and more than likely is a pile of junk. As I expected, when it gets here, the damned thing is locked up tight. Won't move; it just will not turn. However, it is otherwise in very good shape, all the mounts, belts, controls and levers are there. Gearboxes are not cracked; bearings are all good as new. If it would just turn! An already too long of a story short: Someone had tried to run a tree thru the thing, 'cause I found this 3" x 1" piece of wood jammed between the upper impeller blade and the housing on the second stage. After some struggling to get the thing out, I finally removed it by force and now the snow blower runs smooth as a new one. Whew!! Still shaking over this deal. Allan
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