Ariens snowblower auger wont turn

Just finished repairing my ariens, 6 years old with aluminum gear box. Same problem encountered. The problem turns out to be the BRONZE gear driven by the worm shaft. Shear bolts did not shear and bronze gear broke about 5-6 teeth. This is why you can move the auger a half turn or so, there are no gears in one area of the gear and as the gear turns to engage the worm drive it will stop. The fix: the cast iron replacement from ariens! About $200 including shipping, got mine from Jack's Small Engine (MD). Fairly easy repair if you are mechanically inclined. Buy yourself a set of roll pin extractors ($20 from Sears), new roll pins, new woodruff key for shaft. You will also probably have to press 2nd stage impeller from shaft with hydraulic press & heat (took mine to my local auto garage). What stinks is ariens seemed to have admitted the design problem with the aluminum gearbox, yet won't help with repair cost! Anyways, I learned a lot about my snowblower for future repair (belt replacement)!

With the engine off check to see if the belt tightens up enough when you engage the auger, if it does will have to check to see if there is a filler plug on the gear box if there is than pull the plug (if there is 2 plugs then pull the top one) fluid should drizzle out if nothin comes out than you need to add fluid. you can get a breakdown of your machine at Ariens.com. As far as the shearpins go, there soud be 2 on the auger shaft itself (1 on each side where the auger paddles are). I think it's going to be either the belt needs adjusting or something to do with th gear box.