I used to want to driver the groomer, but...

[arcticridr]

Its actually an awsome job, although conditions can and do get really nasty, cutting a road out of a mountain when its sidehilled off 40-45 degrees and you have half a track with nothing but air under it can get a little intense to say the least but know what ,,, its all worth it when one person tells you the trails are great!!!!!! And I do it all volunteer as many do , but I am also the coordinator and a State Trainer man if I could just turn it into a fulltime paying job It couldn't get any better!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Here are a couple of short (crappy vids) as I was solo and trying to take vids and run a 12 way blade etc so they are a little rough weather was a bit nasty this night!!!!!!and thanks to the peeps who appreciate the trails!!!!!!!!


http://media.putfile.com/GROOMING-3

http://media.putfile.com/PICT0105

http://media.putfile.com/grooming-vid-2

http://media.putfile.com/grooming-vids

 

[R J]

Building things would be great as those ski hill units can push monster amounts of snow and do it in quick time.

I've been able to do some stuff with them around the midwest but nothing of substance. Since I grew up or should I say got older around the trail stuff that is where my heart is. I'm hoping March will be kind to me, at least give me a storm or two so we can get back out there and make a 200 hour season in the twin cities. That would be unreal. Were at 102 right now.

 

[Wolfrun]

Building things would be great as those ski hill units can push monster amounts of snow and do it in quick time.

I've been able to do some stuff with them around the midwest but nothing of substance. Since I grew up or should I say got older around the trail stuff that is where my heart is. I'm hoping March will be kind to me, at least give me a storm or two so we can get back out there and make a 200 hour season in the twin cities. That would be unreal. Were at 102 right now.

R J, Would you be able to groom trails well if your boss would not let you use your front blade at all when pulling a drag?

 

[Wolfrun]

Its actually an awsome job, although conditions can and do get really nasty, cutting a road out of a mountain when its sidehilled off 40-45 degrees and you have half a track with nothing but air under it can get a little intense to say the least but know what ,,, its all worth it when one person tells you the trails are great!!!!!! And I do it all volunteer as many do , but I am also the coordinator and a State Trainer man if I could just turn it into a fulltime paying job It couldn't get any better!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Here are a couple of short (crappy vids) as I was solo and trying to take vids and run a 12 way blade etc so they are a little rough weather was a bit nasty this night!!!!!!and thanks to the peeps who appreciate the trails!!!!!!!!


http://media.putfile.com/GROOMING-3

http://media.putfile.com/PICT0105

http://media.putfile.com/grooming-vid-2

http://media.putfile.com/grooming-vids

arcticrider, I think the videos are great. I have had a lot of times like that out at night with my motor graders. You have that little sphere of light around you all night and by daylight I wouldn't even know where I was.
Let me ask a question. Could you groom if you weren't allowed to use the front blade while pulling a drag?

 

[R J]

R J, Would you be able to groom trails well if your boss would not let you use your front blade at all when pulling a drag?

I used to run cats without blades. Our club that I have been with used to have cats with nothing on the front and we simply pulled the drag behind. It did alright, you do have to keep up with it more as you can only do so much with a drag.

Mainly we use it for road crossings, driveways, drifted areas and only when the operator knows what's under the snow he is going over. I stress it a lot in our operator trainings that the blade is there to help you do your job, it's part of a bigger tool box sort of thing.

If our club said no using the blade, it would come off, be placed in the shop and we would do everything with the drag. Our trails wouldn't be as nice in one pass as before and we would be buring up more fuel as we would have to go over everything more often to keep it all smooth.

Use that last part as ammo for running with the blade. Try to do at least 25% of the work with blade and the rest with the drag. Make sure you know what you are doing though as it's a bad deal when the "boss" says I told you so!

 

[Wolfrun]

I used to run cats without blades. Our club that I have been with used to have cats with nothing on the front and we simply pulled the drag behind. It did alright, you do have to keep up with it more as you can only do so much with a drag.

Mainly we use it for road crossings, driveways, drifted areas and only when the operator knows what's under the snow he is going over. I stress it a lot in our operator trainings that the blade is there to help you do your job, it's part of a bigger tool box sort of thing.

If our club said no using the blade, it would come off, be placed in the shop and we would do everything with the drag. Our trails wouldn't be as nice in one pass as before and we would be buring up more fuel as we would have to go over everything more often to keep it all smooth.

Use that last part as ammo for running with the blade. Try to do at least 25% of the work with blade and the rest with the drag. Make sure you know what you are doing though as it's a bad deal when the "boss" says I told you so!

Thanks RJ, Everything you said makes real good sense. It's not for me, I am an old retired motor grader hand but i have a friend who is in this predicament and I have tried to help him. he has a lot of areas that have gotten outsloped and reverse banked on turns. Pretty hard to fix without the front blade but they won't let him. Thanks again.

 

[arcticridr]

Let me ask a question. Could you groom if you weren't allowed to use the front blade while pulling a drag?

No way ,Saturday night I was cutting a road with 50-60 degree sidehills with no mans land below, took me an hour to cut and groom 100' of trail. Besides I dont pull a drag I have a 16' wide tiller and feather behind the cat (PB260D). I am constantly recambering roads from slough off, recambering corners, moving snow in from the sides, moving 6' windrows from my first pass on double pass 32' wide trails, moving and cutting 15 foot drifts, cutting out the ruts and whoops to make the trails meet our state standards, pretty much take my blade and ya cut my hands off !!!!!!! Might as well stay in the garage!!!!

 

[arcticridr]

RJ.... 102 hours I feel for ya!!! that is bout what I had last year in our cat , got a bunch more doing state training in other areas to make up for it... right now I am on pace for 400+ hours am at 275 now!! Let it snow!!!

 

[Wolfrun]

Let me ask a question. Could you groom if you weren't allowed to use the front blade while pulling a drag?

No way ,Saturday night I was cutting a road with 50-60 degree sidehills with no mans land below, took me an hour to cut and groom 100' of trail. Besides I dont pull a drag I have a 16' wide tiller and feather behind the cat (PB260D). I am constantly recambering roads from slough off, recambering corners, moving snow in from the sides, moving 6' windrows from my first pass on double pass 32' wide trails, moving and cutting 15 foot drifts, cutting out the ruts and whoops to make the trails meet our state standards, pretty much take my blade and ya cut my hands off !!!!!!! Might as well stay in the garage!!!!

Thanks arcticrider, That is what i have been trying to tell my new groomer friend. I told him the blade was critical to grooming in the mountains and he looked at me like I was crazy. I guess that's why the first decent trail I saw that he groomed this winter was the 3rd of Febuary and it wasn't good ,just decent. I wish he had you doing his training. Thanks, Wolf

 

[arcticridr]

Yea its to bad most states don't have a training certification like we do!!!!!!! Pretty rigirous and I teach blade techniques till I'm blue in the face, altough their are times when you just make more of a mess with it, just gotta know when not to use it... It is the only way to make smooth correctly camberd trails with a tiller set up, sorry to say if you got an operator that doesn't know when or how to use a blade your trails will more than likely be subpar especially in the mountains I wouldn't trade my set up for anything,(except a bigger badder PB,hopefully getting a new pb400 next year!!) specially in and on some of my terrain!!!!!!! Couldnt even get a mogul master down alot of my trails to many "S" turns and hairpins let alon severe sidehills with no bottoms on the down side!!

 

[Dobber1]

Wet Paint! Please stay off until morning.

Can you say....."SOLITUDE"

 

[arcticridr]

Dobber1,,,,,,,,,,yea baby thats what I call laying down the Courdaroy!!!!!!!!!

 

[Dobber1]

How many times have you said to yourself...."Someone's gonna really enjoy this in the morning."....while we're home sleeping 'til noon!

 

[R J]

Stuff like that wouldn't last till morning in my area. Guys would be all over that at any time of the night. I have seen sleds running till about 3am, and as early as 530am. Not many but enough to screw it all up.

That makes it all worth it right there.

 

[Dobber1]

We see very little night riding out here (West). Probably 40% of our riding was done at night in the East when I was a kid. There's a little more danger out here vs. back there. Anyway, when are we going to get a "Groomers' Area" on this forum?

 

[arcticridr]

Groomer area would be a good idea!!!!! More of us on here than you would think??? Hey Admin how bout it!!!!???? Would be a good place for rider input etc etc and operator tips and tricks of the craft.... Yea I love it when I lay out 50-70 miles of Courdoruy and then get up and my buds and I get to rip it up before everyone else gets their!!!! Also lets me see how things went the night before in the cat... best way to tell how your camber,bump cutting etc is and where it needs to be fixed is flying to the back country before it gets torn up that will tell you in a hurry!!!! Hey wolfrun, best way to show your groomer buddy is take him out on a mach 9 blast over some of his "SO SO" trails, he will either fix em or pi$$ blood for a week !!!

 

[32nBelow]

Groomer area sounds like a good thing to me. Help people understand what we do out there, it just not driving around in the dark having fun all the time. I think if your operator doesn't ride then you should make him go out on this trail and feel them. I let my guy use my sleds so they can under what I expect the trails to feel like.

 

[Wolfrun]

Yesss, I am all for a groomer area. I know exactly how you guys feel and I highly respect your abilities and the pride you take in your work. I contracted to the Forest Service to blade roads for about 24 years. There are a whole lot of mountain roads that I know every rock by their first names. I loved being out there by myself for weeks on end. I tried to think but I can't remember being *****ed at for a bad road. I always did them like they were my own road. I will be 69 in 2 weeks and those days were the best in my life.

Now I like to ice fish the high lakes, get my limit, and hit 80 mph at least once on my way out. Is that too much to ask? If any of you are interested in Wyoming, some groomer training sure couldn't hurt. Thanks ,Wolf

 

[Mrs Snowrider]

Indeed.

I've been looking at trying to get into the groomer gig around here, but then I think about all the jack*sses that do nothing but b*tch about the grooming in the snowies. I'm guessing they haven't gone out there on a night ride to see the groomer out there working, or they haven't been to the parking lot early in the AM to see the groomer dragging *ss back in dead tired from 12 hours running equipment.

And the best thing is this, everyone complains about how bad the grooming is by sunday night.

Do they not realize the shear volume of traffic the trails see? Of course they are going to get pounded out pretty quick when you start talking the hundreds, some days maybe even thousands of people on the trails. Everyone has to ride the trail at least a few miles before they can branch off. But, do you ever hear anyone say how awesome the grooming was saturday morning when making first tracks? Or even sunday morning after a short touch up run was made to try and smooth things out?

I would love to see the state completely stop grooming the snowies for a month, just one month, and see just how gnarly it gets. I know the grooming up there hasn't been the best, but its better then nothing and they are trying to improve things.

They did that last year when the State took over grooming! None until after January!

 

[R J]

I'm all for a groomer area, heck it can be tied into an area that includes people working in the field sort of thing.