EQUIPMENT: Blow Out

Caleb Auman can’t imagine life without backpack blowers. These portable tools are an indispensable component of his operation, says the owner and president of Auman Landscape Co. in Lancaster, Ohio. In addition to his maintenance crew, his design-build crew uses these powerful portable cleanup tools. “I would hate to think what it would take to sweep off a sidewalk without a blower,” Auman says. “The labor involved, especially with doing so many properties, would be overwhelming.”

Recent scrutiny and legislative efforts, though, threaten to prohibit blower use as the issue over its audio impact on the general public is debated. However, conscientious self regulation by contractors may be the answer to strike a happy medium between the need to move light lawn refuse efficiently and the general public’s desire for a noise-free environment.

GOOD SENSE. Jo Solet, a Harvard Medical School researcher who studies the effects of noise on the body, claims in a recent Boston Globe article that the decibel levels emitted from leaf blowers are to blame for raising heart rates. But most studies on leaf blowers have shown that the bulk of the machines sold today produce decibel levels comparable to normal conversation (60 to 70 decibels). By comparison, a telephone dial tone is about 80 decibels.

“We need to draw the line that says we shouldn’t have to put up with the noise and what’s being put into the air,” Solet says in the article. Should some sort of ordinance pass, commercial use of leaf blowers within 150 feet of residential areas would be illegal.

As backpack blowers’ power and popularity in the green industry increase, complaints by some homeowners have prompted regulations to limit sound levels produced and the hours or days of use, says Jay Larsen, marketing manager for Tualatin, Ore.-based Shindaiwa. Typically, regulations focus on elevated noise levels that purportedly affects the ears. But legislation under review in Cambridge, Mass., would for the first time cite blood pressure as the reason for an outright ban on blowers.
 
Most leaf blower complaints can be mitigated through operator training, Larson says. Several blower manufacturers are actively working with local municipalities to develop responsible operator training programs. These training programs have been very successful in reducing and sometimes eliminating leaf blower noise, he says.
 
Interestingly, most of the high-pitched whine from high-performance blowers comes from the impeller, Larsen says. Some manufacturers are producing blowers with a feature that temporarily reduces the engine’s RPM around noise-sensitive areas.
 
Contractors like Auman can’t afford to be noisy. As responsible stewards of their environment, Auman has strict rules about blower operating hours. “For any work we need to do before 7:30 a.m. we don’t run the blowers, especially if we’re in a residential neighborhood,” he says. As a rule of thumb, it’s time to put away the machines as night falls.
 
Larsen applauds this consideration on the part of landscape contractors. “Most operating do’s and don’ts for blowers involve courtesy and good sense,” he says. “These are things like paying attention to noise, avoiding use when people are sleeping or having meals and not running equipment early in the morning or late in the day.”
  
BLOWERS IMPORTANCE. Commercial-grade backpack blowers handle the toughest job site assignments, such as cleaning-up debris in large parking lots, moving wet-matted leaves and hedge clippings, Larsen says. Smaller displacement handheld blowers perform lighter duties such as pushing dry grass clippings, bark dust and other debris from pavement surfaces.
 
“Personally, I prefer backpack whenever I’m out in the field, just for the power of it,” Auman says. “One of my guys prefers a handheld because of the size of it, because he can get into little nooks on the job site.”
 
Les Hart relies on blowers to remove debris after his crews have installed sod or laid seed. He tends to select machines in the middle of the power spectrum because they’re mostly used for a quick cleanup tasks around a client’s yard or job site.
 
“It has to be something that’s easy to operate and lightweight,” says Hart, the owner of Harts Landscaping, Paris, Tenn. “You must make sure it moves the volume of air you need for the job.”
 
If backpack blowers are the leading choice for landscape contractors, then a quality commercial-grade handheld unit is an ideal supplement, Larsen says. “In a business where time is indeed money, a solid, commercial-grade handheld blower is a fantastic choice for those fast, truck-to-task jobs,” Larsen says. LL