So I’ve had the snowblower for many a storm this winter, including the most recent Nor’Easter, Blizzard of 2026.
Throughout these experiences with Yarbo, I have seen one thing more than anything else:
Over the season, Yarbo is prone to getting stuck more often on the borders of job areas.
This is because of many things, but particularly the sagging and melting/compacting of snow from previous storms flowing out towards the work area. This snow is hard and nasty, very hard to work through.
To help counter this, I would like to request a more thorough and, if the last step is performed, energy intensive snowblowing mode: Start in Center.
Start in Center has three features:
Begin by blowing a strip in the center of the work area, rather than working the borders first.
Back out of Step 1 instead of trying to turn - do this run twice so Yarbo has enough room to move around.
Work outwards from the center until you’re nearing the border of the job area.
Utilize the auger to attack the edges of the border head-on, instead of attacking from the side. (toggleable, this will take a good amount of time)
These three steps will get the most work done, instead of constantly getting stuck at the border.
You could split your area into 2 sections and try slope mode. It seems to have a really large unmodifiable safety buffer though so you might have to map a little bit outside the area you want to do. Also slope mode still uses zeros turns, a smarter turn option would be nice
“This is the way”
This is exactly how I do it with the gas snow blower and Yarbo in manual mode.
Three lanes of 30-50% overlap center cuts with back outs.
Then do the expanding oval racetrack in the center, moving outward each lap. Aim the discharge chute facing the side closest to it. This works for conventional driveways really well.
In the mapping, maybe map a centerline and the perimeter as part of the configuration.
I believe it’s more like 2-3cm. But that is highly dependent on the reference base stations accuracy. The biggest reason is for track slippage, ice, bumps, etc can cause the unit to drift past this accuracy rather quickly. Yes it does take longer than it should to detect track slippage. Also another reason. But if you combine poor GPS with dead reckoning and add track slippage which throws off DR, then the unit can get out of bounds rather easily. This is why the safety buffers are rather large. I think this will get better as VIO and hopefully VSLAM are added.
Yup if you can throw snow both ways this is definitely the most efficient way, I hope they’re developing that for the new M series and the angle plow, hopefully that covers most of the code
Thank you for taking the time to clearly describe both the issue and your proposed “Start in Center” approach. It’s a thoughtful suggestion, especially for dealing with compacted border snow over time.
Since this would involve changes to the current route planning logic, it would require evaluation from our algorithm and product teams. We’ll need to assess feasibility, impact, and overall priority alongside other planned improvements.
That said, this idea has been logged as a feature request, and I’ll continue tracking community interest around this approach. If we see broader demand, it will help strengthen the case for further development consideration.
We truly appreciate constructive feedback like this — it helps us better understand real-world use patterns across the season.
