# ARIENS PLATINUM 30 SHO



## foranger (Sep 19, 2018)

Can some owners of this model give there reviews of this snowblower?? Positives and negatives? There some old dude on you tube saying its junk and a piece of crap from a few years ago!!!! Seems hard to believe to me ......thanx forum members.....


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## Zavie (Sep 23, 2014)

That goofball video! He eventually got a 46" or a 50" tractor mounted snowblower. He claims his old Ariens, (that one we never get to see though is soooooo much better than his new Ariens. He has videos of everything from home canning to leaf vacuum mods. But somehow his old timey trusted Ariens videos are nowhere to be found. Hocus pocus stuff.


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## Mountain Man (Oct 14, 2018)

I use a Platinum 30 at work, and my neighbor has one. Both have been reliable. The 414cc engine is very powerful. Extra power is great when you deal with wet snow, or rain on top of snow, which we geta lot of in Connecticut. 

I did a overhaul on a Platinum 30 2 years ago. ( story and pictures here, 








Platinum 30 overhaul


This is my employers machine. They have a different blower at each difernet location. So I offered to pre season it. Lol Bought late 2013, and shall we say rode hard and put away wet? Lol. MY 2003 Pro is well used, but not like this. So she got some TLC and asome parts. Lots of pics cor...




www.snowblowerforum.com





About 5-6 years of hard use with little maintenance, needed belts and a friction disc. And this is run HARD, and put away wet. At times its snowblows out a 20 space parking lot. It's still very solid and totally reliable.


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## Town (Jan 31, 2015)

My Platinum 30 SHO does not have the problems that i remember noted in that video. Ariens did have a problem in early 2000's with another model where water was getting on the drive plate causing the friction drive problems. But this was soon fixed by a metal plate on the front of the chassis ahead of the engine to divert water and is on my machine. The Platinum has never had this problem. The engine is amazingly powerful, easy starting usually first time even in very cold weather with the primer. The auger drive uses matched dual belts and never slips and lasts a long time with easy adjustments. The friction drive uses a softer rubber to give unstoppable drive, but is wears faster than the hard rubber ones that have lesser traction. The chute operation is lightning fast compared to electric and manual screw drives and is very rugged and stands up to bumps on railings very well. The stock tires are winter versions with significant tread blocks so the machine has great traction on snow and ice (much more traction than I have with winter boots). Augers are rugged and I have never broken a shear pin, although I change them every few years. Cast iron auger gearbox is very rugged and the gears are all steel so no sacrificial parts to replace. The chassis and bucket are very strong so when you get into an old icy snowbank there is no shaking or distortion of the structure, it just carves its way until both tires spin. Auto-Turn works perfectly with the plastic Ariens skid shoes that last and last. The Auto-Turn keeps both wheels turning in a straight line, but allow easy turning accompanied by clicks as the differential adjusts itself to the smooth turn while maintaining traction. The machine throws snow (wet and dry and water) a good distance with the complicated design and fit of the 14" impeller. The engine heater box works great so no icing problems on very cold and snowy days while my old Tecumseh 11 hp did suffer icing in cold snowy weather. 

The gas tank is ridiculously small, especially since I do 6 driveways for my neighbours so I put on the B&S 6 liter gas tank, that does everything on less than a tank. My engine ran slow at 3,450 rpm from the factory so I changed the governor spring setting to get 3,700 rpm which is in the spec range of 3,600 rpm +/- 100 rpm that livened the engine. It is a higher revving engine than Ariens spec's it. The impeller shaft seal on the auger gearbox has been replaced due to leaking. Also the impeller bearing a couple of times, but I use the machine a lot. Wheel axles need greasing annually due to water washing out the grease and no grease from factory.


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## RIT333 (Feb 6, 2014)

Great testimony on ariens, and rightfully so. They are great machines*.*


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## foranger (Sep 19, 2018)

Mountain Man said:


> I use a Platinum 30 at work, and my neighbor has one. Both have been reliable. The 414cc engine is very powerful. Extra power is great when you deal with wet snow, or rain on top of snow, which we geta lot of in Connecticut.
> 
> I did a overhaul on a Platinum 30 2 years ago. ( story and pictures here,
> 
> ...





Mountain Man said:


> I use a Platinum 30 at work, and my neighbor has one. Both have been reliable. The 414cc engine is very powerful. Extra power is great when you deal with wet snow, or rain on top of snow, which we geta lot of in Connecticut.
> 
> I did a overhaul on a Platinum 30 2 years ago. ( story and pictures here,
> 
> ...





Mountain Man said:


> I use a Platinum 30 at work, and my neighbor has one. Both have been reliable. The 414cc engine is very powerful. Extra power is great when you deal with wet snow, or rain on top of snow, which we geta lot of in Connecticut.
> 
> I did a overhaul on a Platinum 30 2 years ago. ( story and pictures here,
> 
> ...





Mountain Man said:


> I use a Platinum 30 at work, and my neighbor has one. Both have been reliable. The 414cc engine is very powerful. Extra power is great when you deal with wet snow, or rain on top of snow, which we geta lot of in Connecticut.
> 
> I did a overhaul on a Platinum 30 2 years ago. ( story and pictures here,
> 
> ...





Zavie said:


> That goofball video! He eventually got a 46" or a 50" tractor mounted snowblower. He claims his old Ariens, (that one we never get to see though)
> Is soooooo much better. He has videos of everything from home canning to leaf vacuum mods. But somehow his old timey trusted Ariens videos are nowhere to be found. Hocus pocus stuff.


Thanx.....


Mountain Man said:


> I use a Platinum 30 at work, and my neighbor has one. Both have been reliable. The 414cc engine is very powerful. Extra power is great when you deal with wet snow, or rain on top of snow, which we geta lot of in Connecticut.
> 
> I did a overhaul on a Platinum 30 2 years ago. ( story and pictures here,
> 
> ...


Thanx.....


Town said:


> My Platinum 30 SHO does not have the problems that i remember noted in that video. Ariens did have a problem in early 2000's with another model where water was getting on the drive plate causing the friction drive problems. But this was soon fixed by a metal plate on the front of the chassis ahead of the engine to divert water and is on my machine. The Platinum has never had this problem. The engine is amazingly powerful, easy starting usually first time even in very cold weather with the primer. The auger drive uses matched dual belts and never slips and lasts a long time with easy adjustments. The friction drive uses a softer rubber to give unstoppable drive, but is wears faster than the hard rubber ones that have lesser traction. The chute operation is lightning fast compared to electric and manual screw drives and is very rugged and stands up to bumps on railings very well. The stock tires are winter versions with significant tread blocks so the machine has great traction on snow and ice (much more traction than I have with winter boots). Augers are rugged and I have never broken a shear pin, although I change them every few years. Cast iron auger gearbox is very rugged and the gears are all steel so no sacrificial parts to replace. The chassis and bucket are very strong so when you get into an old icy snowbank there is no shaking or distortion of the structure, it just carves its way until both tires spin. Auto-Turn works perfectly with the plastic Ariens skid shoes that last and last. The Auto-Turn keeps both wheels turning in a straight line, but allow easy turning accompanied by clicks as the differential adjusts itself to the smooth turn while maintaining traction. The machine throws snow (wet and dry and water) a good distance with the complicated design and fit of the 14" impeller. The engine heater box works great so no icing problems on very cold and snowy days while my old Tecumseh 11 hp did suffer icing in cold snowy weather.
> 
> The gas tank is ridiculously small, especially since I do 6 driveways for my neighbours so I put on the B&S 6 liter gas tank, that does everything on less than a tank. My engine ran slow at 3,450 rpm from the factory so I changed the governor spring setting to get 3,700 rpm which is in the spec range of 3,600 rpm +/- 100 rpm that livened the engine. It is a higher revving engine than Ariens spec's it. The impeller shaft seal on the auger gearbox has been replaced due to leaking. Also the impeller bearing a couple of times, but I use the machine a lot. Wheel axles need greasing annually due to water washing out the grease and no grease from factory.


Thank you really appreciate the review!!!


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## bisonp (Mar 23, 2018)

Zavie said:


> That goofball video! He eventually got a 46" or a 50" tractor mounted snowblower. He claims his old Ariens, (that one we never get to see though is soooooo much better than his new Ariens. He has videos of everything from home canning to leaf vacuum mods. But somehow his old timey trusted Ariens videos are nowhere to be found. Hocus pocus stuff.


Yeah, that guy was a piece of work. He bought it online and set it up wrong, then got mad at his local dealer for not jumping through hoops for him. Eventually he got mad enough at the commenters pointing these things out that he disabled comments. 

But he wasn't totally off base either. Newer machines do tend to ride up on firm snow a lot more than older ones from the '80s and prior in my experience, and even a perfectly setup AutoTurn isn't going to be as steady in a straight line on a bumpy driveway as a solid axle. So, yeah, for "his conditions" as he says so often in his videos, the Platinum 30 wasn't the right choice. But that doesn't make it a bad machine. You just need to understand what your needs are. A RapidTrak he got as a loaner worked well for him.


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