# Bobcat expert needed



## Kiss4aFrog (Nov 3, 2013)

Is there a chance this is really the OEM auger ?? I've seen a few Bobcats and never remember seeing anything this flimsy for an auger. To me it looks like someone tore a single stage apart and welded them to pipe ??
It just seems like the first thing you hit like a chunk of ice or even some gravel might be enough to bend or break one of those arms off.


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## sscotsman (Dec 8, 2010)

It's original..

photos here:
Its a sad day. My snowblower commited suicide... or did it... - Page 2

show the same basic style of auger blades, but with two supports per side..while the photo above shows only one support per side.

Photo here:
http://www.torkelsonrepair.com/HPIM2907.JPG

and here:
Bob Cat snowthrower! - MyTractorForum.com - The Friendliest Tractor Forum and Best Place for Tractor Information

shows one support per side.
yep, its definitely original! they were built that way.

scot


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## Kiss4aFrog (Nov 3, 2013)

WOW :blush:

Since they are still out there working it must be strong enough but it sure doesn't look it.


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## wdb (Dec 15, 2013)

Mine was a later model, called BearCat, and 28", but yep those look about right. Although there was nothing flimsy about my augers! They were 1/4" steel.


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## Brother Al (Nov 12, 2015)

Most definitely will handle quite a bit without getting damaged... Several years ago, we got hit hard by the "Halloween Nor' Easter of 2011" here in New England. I was without power for 8 days, (and I live in a suburban/light urban city of 45K). The issue wasn't total snowfall (14" my house), but the fact that we had been seeing unusually warm temps well into October. The trees hadn't really dropped any leaves, and many were actually still green, (very odd for that date). What came down was heavy, wet snow and it piled up quickly. Adding to that, winds in excess of 50 mph.... Viola'. Just about every tree lost large limbs, many smaller trees were stripped bare of limbs, lots of very large trees had come down, and there was at least one section of power lines down for every 1/8 mile of roadway across New England, according to the statistics given in the aftermath. I have municipal electric and gas here in Westfield, Mass. They do a great job keeping the power on, during even the worst weather, but they had to kill all of the power to the town because of the widespread, ongoing damage... such was the case everywhere across the Northeast.

Anyway, the previous weekend before the storm, I was a vendor at the Annual Fall Tyrods Swapmeet at Stafford Speedway. I had discovered that one of my '91/92 Firebird Formula nose cones had a bad filler panel, so I swapped it with a good one I had.. This piece is made of 16 gauge stamped steel, about 5 feet long, and attaches/fills the gap between the nose supports & the radiator support, just behind/below the headlights and marker lights... I had tossed this bad one alongside my garage and figured I'd toss it in my scrap metal pile later. 

Well, the storm really caught everyone off guard, so there wasn't much time to prepare and I never even thought about it still being there. As the storm progressed, and more limbs fell, my neighbor and I took to our chainsaws and started cutting up everything that fell. I had a young 35 foot sugar maple in my front yard, by midnight, it had lost all of its limbs and top, it was maybe 20 foot tall the next morning. D*** scary time.. whole Oaks trees in the neighborhood gave way and all you could hear was a constant crashing of limbs and trees all around, all night long. My neighbor and I heard a loud crack across the street, at another neighbors. We watched as a Huge "Y'd" oak tree, gradually split, down the main trunk. They were not home (later found out they were trapped on their way home by trees that had fallen in front of and behind them). Half was leaning over their yard and the other over another neighbors' house. We invited them to stay at our homes but they refused politely. My Neighbor Scott and I advised them to stay out of their living room because it might hit that part of their home... about 20 minutes later, we watched in horror as it fell just parallel to and across the front face of the house. We chopped through it best we could to their front door, which was obliterated. One limb had pierced the bay window, another though the roof, others through the walls and ceiling. Eventually, My old McCulloch 610 ran out of bar oil and the snow was getting deep enough to be hazardous to saw in, so I trudged back up to my shed and dug out the Bob-caT.... 

As I made my initial pass by the side of my garage, I heard the poor old gal chewing into something and remembered what I'd left there... DOH! I backed off a little too late, Wham, Wham, WHAM!, WHAM! I quickly choked her off... What I found amazed me. I thought for sure I'd destroyed her, but instead, the filler panel had gotten by the auger, and was wrapped loosely around and back into it by the action of the impeller bashing the H*** out of it. I had to hacksaw it out. I checked everything on the Bob-cat's auger, impeller and the bearings... not a single thing wrong. She fired right up.


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## Kiss4aFrog (Nov 3, 2013)

Looking into the mouth of wtb's photo I can see it's a lot more substantial than I had thought.


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## wdb (Dec 15, 2013)

Brother Al said:


> Several years ago, we got hit hard by the "Halloween Nor' Easter of 2011" here in New England. I was without power for 8 days, (and I live in a suburban/light urban city of 45K).


Great story about the indestructibility of the machine. 

We got clobbered by that 'Halloween Surprise' storm too, power out for days etc. Neighbors had just moved in about a month earlier; the big old bean tree in their front yard fell across the road and took out the electric lines and pole. Lots and lots of other damage too. It looked like a disaster area.


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