Dave's Ideas

Martin K.’s Shovel With Terrain Wheels

March 16, 2011

Martin K. from Maine is not a fan of shoveling his sidewalk, as the seams in the concrete keep stopping his forward progress. I can relate, this can be unpleasant - you are pushing forward then you are brought to a jarring halt by the seam in the sidewalk or a raised patch of sidewalk.

He devised a shovel with small wheels on the front of the blade that would encounter these rough patches and help glide the blade over them:

There are plenty of shovels out there with wheels behind the blade - similar to a manual lawnmower - to make pushing a little easier. This is the inverse of that idea, one that makes your shovel an all-terrain one so to speak.

I really like this idea, but Martin and I both concluded that there is the obvious drawback of a slight bit of clearance at the edge of the blade, so you couldn’t shovel right down to the surface of the sidewalk. But I think a thin film of snow left behind is acceptable.

My only addition was the handles at the middle, which would work like one of those large farming/garden sickles. I think it would be easier to lift snow in this fashion - a combination of raising the front handle and pushing down on the end handle. I’m pretty sure these kinds of handles exist on snow shovels, I just can’t seem to find any images on Google.

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Entry filed under: Environment, House. Tags: Design, Outdoor, Tools.