Hello rob3314. Welcome to the forums. I plow snow with a Trailblazer (see my picks). The deepest snow I have plowed is about 10-11 inches. I run chains on the rear tires and keep the front tires pumped up to 7psi to reduced rolling resistance on the front. I spent many years plowing with an 18hp all hydraulics John Deere that had wheel weights and chains. The Trailblazer plows just as well as that JD. Chains are important on the rear. The differences between the Trailblazer and the other 250 class machines are the Trailblazer is wider, taller, more pulling power (850 lbs), considerably more suspension travel and automatic transmission. I have never pulled a mower but I assume it would have no problem. However, I do move my Jetski and quad trailer around the yard.
I hope this helps you
BryceGTX

 

I wouldnt worry about 4x4 for plowing snow unless you are wanting a 4x4 for the trails also. 4x4 is nice for the snow, but not needed most of the time. Most 2x4s with a set of 20 dollar chains will plow just as good as a 4x4.

 

Thanks so much for all the info! I've gone back and forth on the 4x4 thing. I think I'm going to go ahead and get it. I think I'm leaning towards these machines:

Yamaha Big Bear 400 4x4
Honda Rancher 350 4x4
Suzuki Eiger 4x4

Thanks for all the help!!!

 

With what I have read in this post.. you will be happy with any of those three quads..

Good luck and welcome to the forum

 

Yes, all of those are great quads. Although the Big Bear and Eiger have disc breaks up front which is a plus, I would go with who ever gives you the best price.

 

Those were the top 3 I was comparing... [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img] Good choices all IMO, but I felt the ranking was
First: Eiger, Second: Big Bear, 3rd :Rancher.

I'll tell you why I ranked them that way.

All seem to be reliable well built machines that run and drive great in most conditions. Rancher ended up third for a couple reasons, one of wich was already talked about... brakes, but even that wasn't the big thing. I wanted to be able to engage and disengage 4wd when I want it to. Then there was gearing, I very much wanted LOW Range gearing for hard going. The Honda and Yamaha didn't have that, but atleast the Yamaha had a noticeably lower 1st gear. Honda Rancher doesn't have a low enough gear for climbing etc. I've been on many steep rocky trails now with several Honda's and all of them W/O Low Range were overgeared for the terrain. 3rd thing I wanted was running boards. I really like that feature, and as I recall the Honda did have that, but the Yamaha didn't. So essentially the only machine that had everything I wanted was the Eiger, easy choice, but it was more difficult to get a good deal on it than the other two.

Your requirements or wants may differ from mine but I'm sure that wich ever machine fits you best you'll be happy with because they are all good machines. They just have differences.

Goodluck on the purchase

 

It seem I see the eiger compared more often with the kodiak.

 

You can't get prices like that around here except on used quads. The best price we got around here for the Recon when we were shopping last year was $3500 without tax and license. We shopped several dealers. Different markets = different prices.

 

I think it goes both ways... Since the Eiger is available with Auto or Manual shift, The Eiger Manual is usually compared to the Big Bear since its also a 400 manual shift, and the auto Eiger is compared/competes with the Kodiak 400/450 machines as they are automatics... So I could see your point there yes.

 

i would go for the 400 big bear.. they are one tough utility quad, other than that i like the new 300 polaris hawkeye, it has full diff lock, fully independant suspension, and its a sprty looking quad. thats my 2 cents.