Posted by JBMac on August 22, 2011 at 16:42:37 from (68.165.82.2):
Rough weekend making perennial peanut hay (kinda like thin alfalfa)! Took Friday off work, went to borrow neighbor"s NH Sickle mower (my Fella disk is down with gearbox problems). Somebody's broken down truck was blocking the neighbor"s gate! Guy finally showed back up after an hour delay and towed it away.
Hooked up and mowed at 1:00 pm Friday.
Saturday at 4:00 it was looking right. Humid, but hot all day with wind. Raked into windrows with my newly refurbished JD 640 side delivery rake, that despite every adjustment I could make, would leave half the hay on the ground (got some advice on this on another post). So after it took me 4 times longer than usual to rake, of course it rained for 15 minutes.
Sunday, dew burned off, got real hot. Hay still looked pretty good, flipped the windrows. Tops got dry, flipped em again. And again. No leaf loss and was drying nicely. I was supposed to catch a flight to Lousianna for work at 7:00 p.m., so I was getting panicky. About 2, it felt pretty dry, so I got to baling. This stuff was making dadgum 80+# bales, a little wet. They are usually 40#"s cause that"s what the horse and goat ladies like. Help didnt show up, punk kids!So,my wife drove around the field with 2 kids screaming in the truck because it was nap time, driving her nuts while I single-handidly loaded, stacked, and put in the barn over 180 of the heaviest bales of hay I"ve ever handled in my life. Had to fly out this morning instead of yesterday. Wifes keeping an eye on a thermometer in one of the wetter bales for fire danger. Should have them sold within a few days to a huge dairy goat farm, they know they are damp, I think they"ll feed before any mold problems.Here"s what I"ve learned:
1. I need a haybine to speed drying, it"s only 20 acres, any model recommendations (prefer New Holland). Actually, Fella offers a crimper attachment for my SM 320 disc mower,but it might be too heavy for My MF 583, any experience with this set-up?
2. I need to sell the JD rake to someone with a different species of hay and buy a "V" rake
3. I am not in the high-school wrestling fighting weight condition that I used to be. It was 97 degrees with 95% humidity, but 180 bales isnt anything crazy.Need to toughen up.
4. I have a bad habit in my life of tring to stuff 10 pounds of crap into a 5 pound bag.
Thanks for reading my rant, I"ll always take any suggestions you might have. Any body want to trade a JD 640 rake and a Vermeer 604J round baler for a haybine and V rake?!
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Today's Featured Article - Hydraulics - Cylinder Anatomy - by Curtis von Fange. Let’s make one more addition to our series on hydraulics. I’ve noticed a few questions in the comment section that could pertain to hydraulic cylinders so I thought we could take a short look at this real workhorse of the circuit. Cylinders are the reason for the hydraulic circuit. They take the fluid power delivered from the pump and magically change it into mechanical power. There are many types of cylinders that one might run across on a farm scenario. Each one could take a chapter in
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