O/T Photos of picking corn

Included (I hope) are photos of my first adventure of picking corn. The picker is a New Idea 324 with New Idea 329 sheller, JD 2950 tractor. I had never used or even seen the picker used before I set out to use it this fall. It has lived it's entire life outside and hasn't been run in 3 years. I had many problems and now can say I think I know a great deal about adjusting and repairing it. It took a total of 3 rounds of picking corn, fixing what broke then picking again before i got finished picking my small plot of 4 acres of corn. Two of the repairs involved chains. One just a broken one and the other broken then removing a link of a #62 elevator chain. The first repair involved the picture showing the large gap in the sheller screen. It had separated at the inside end and the corn was pouring between the gap into the fan housing. I repaired this gap with some roof flashing and bolts through the rust holes on one end and screen holes on the other. Works so far!

I am proud to say that after the last batch of ordering parts and adjusting the machine that it is now running smoothly and i know how to use it and and what to do to get ready to run it next year

Thanks for the post and for the pictures. I really admire what you have done. Someday, I'd like to plant some small grain or corn on my farm. The cost of equipment for harvesting and storing is more than I can handle now, but I hope to be able to swing it some time.

Good luck with your ventures.

Tom in TN

I'm not sure what you are asking regarding efficiency vs. a combine, but if you are talking about speed then I do know, a combine would have to be MUCH faster. I had to pick at the lowest speed the tractor would go (no creeper gears). Anything faster and the sheller would get backed up with trash.

Then when the wagon was mostly full, unhook the wagon, pull forward some, unhook the picker completely, hook-up directly to the wagon and drive it to the grain bin where I had a Ford 3600 attached to the bin loading auger. Had to splice the drive shaft on the auger twice with some pipe where it broke and once had to heat it and straighten it.

Its all working fine now, course I'm finished....