I have been grooming this season at a Colorado ski resort. We have some Pistenbully 400 and 600 groomers. We also have some Prinoth br350 and bison cats. For the first month I was operating the Pistenbully 400. Recently I have been in the br350 and bison cats. There are a lot of differences between them. The Pistenbully are newer, more comfortable and the tillers leave better quateroy. The prinoth are lighter, smaller, more nimble and better for park duty (building jumps and stuff. The biggest surprise was how different steel and aluminum tracks are. I got into a steel track prinoth for the first time and realized that I had been sliding all over the mountain in the aluminum track pistenbully. A steel track cat climbs and decends better. The steel tracks don't slide and hold on sidehill way better. They also do a better job of preparing the snow for the tiller. (grooming is a 3 step process, blade, tracks and tiller all work together to process the snow)
Anyone have any thoughts or experience with the steel vs aluminum? I really don't understand why they are so different. I am curious how they would compare in natural snow. (we stick to the man made stuff) I am also curious what a pistenbully 600 or 400 with steel tracks would be like. I am also curious if the new prinoth groomers have better tillers and have gotten more comfortable?
Aluminum
Steel
Steel
Anyone have any thoughts or experience with the steel vs aluminum? I really don't understand why they are so different. I am curious how they would compare in natural snow. (we stick to the man made stuff) I am also curious what a pistenbully 600 or 400 with steel tracks would be like. I am also curious if the new prinoth groomers have better tillers and have gotten more comfortable?
Aluminum
Steel
Steel