Posted by JD Seller on December 22, 2013 at 18:41:51 from (208.126.196.144):
Middle son calls me late morning and asked me where the 10K generator is for the rented cattle yards. What?????
We have a rented farm that only has the well and waterer heaters on the electric service. Since we don't own it I have never installed an automatic generator setup. There is an old milk house that we just keep a 10K generator in. Just open the door and start the generator and plug it into the transfer switch.
The snow we got last night knocked down a tree that took down the electric line. So when my son did chores this morning the water was off and some of the waterers where frozen. He unlocks the shed and there is no generator. He calls me asking if I was using it anywhere. I was not.
So I asked him where the one from the shop was at. (smaller 8K one. It will run the well and about 2/3s of the heaters) HE said I really did not want to know. What the heck??? It seems my youngest son was using it at a friends and they dropped it off of the pickup coming home. They not strap it into the bed. Flatbed truck with out any side boards. It is destroyed!!!!
So I get dressed and head over to the farm. We have to move several pieces of equipment to get the old PTO generator out of the back of the machine shed. I asked the middle son why it was in the back as he had put the equipment away. HE said that since we had the backup generators he did not think we would ever need it. SCREAMING madd at this point. Had to cold start three tractors to get it out. I HATE doing that.
Get him heading over with the PTO generator. I go to the shop to get the K-1 space heater and some plywood to thaw out some of the waterers with. I checked the heater before I loaded it. ZERO FUEL in it. So I go and get the K-1 containers. I have four that are yellow just for this heater. ALL FOUR are empty. REAL HAPPY by now!!!!!
So I put five gallons of diesel fuel in the heater. Get over to the farm and the middle son has the generator going. It did not seem to be pulling much load. I asked him if he shut everything off and then flipped each breaker individually as we need them. NOPE just hooked it up, revved it to PTO speed and threw the transfer switch. The well pump had tripped the 220 breaker when it started out. The water heaters DID NOT trip out. I shut them off an went and checked the waterers out. Three of the four have the heaters melted down into the plastic liners as they had no water in them. Two of these three had burnt the element in half, they are submersible heaters. So the heaters are shot. $25 each thrown away. I am beyond mad by this time. I tell the middle son to WALK home NOW. IF he was still there in five minutes I was going to pound him to a pulp!!!!
I got the well going. Hooked up some hoses into steel tanks so the cattle could get some water. 500 head without water for hours. Thawed all the automatic waterers out. Replaced the plastic liners in the ones that had melted. Called a plumbing friend and he brought out some new heaters an helped me install them.
So five hours later the cattle where fed and watered. Have the tractor running over night until tomorrow. The electric company has to replace two poles an a bunch of wire. It arced as it went down and burnt the wires beyond what they will allow to be used.
Got back to the farm and the middle son an I had a REAL HEART to HEART talk.
Seems he used the last of the K-1 last week and just forgot to replace it. We have had two different days with freezing rain and then 6 inches of snow last night. HE did not think about needing heat anywhere. I told him to NEVER be completely out of K-1. When you use 2 of the four cans take them to town the next time and fill them!!!
Then I got on him about the generators. That PTO one is to be by a door at all times. It is a 75K one. It will run the entire farm or any of the houses.
Then I jumped him about not replacing things as they are broken. That smaller generator is used all of the time. HE was going to wait until after Christmas for the sales to be on. Two things wrong here. 1) The youngest son is who wrecked the generator. So he should be the one replacing it. YESTERDAY!!!! 2) Middle son should have told me ASAP about it. I have seen a dozen generators for sale on Craigslist. Guys are needing Christmas money now not later.
He is 31 years old. He managed a complete company in Dubuque. He should have been better prepared. He has worked with me since he was in diapers. I try to NEVER be caught not prepared. I told him that when you have livestock around you do not have days to get things working. You have hours at the most. So the things you always thought I was being an butt about are just for times like this morning.
I told him I will be there at 6 AM tomorrow. He had better have chores about done. We are going to inspect all the farms so we are not caught unprepared again. We are supposed to have 10-20 below zero temperatures tomorrow night here.
PS it gets better. The youngest son calls me tonight. HE loaned the 10K generator out to a friend that is snowmobile racing in Northern Wisconsin until after the first of the year. The friend can afford to take a two week vacation, race a 20K sled and have a fancy tow behind trailer but can't afford his own generator. I told the youngest son that he had until tomorrow afternoon to replace BOTH generators. I don't care if he has to dive to Wisconsin an get that one or buy brand new ones. There will be generators in place before it gets cold tomorrow night!!!!
These boys can be the best in the world and then turn around an do the dumbest things. I think this is because I have always covered their butts in the past. That is now over!!!! They are going to have to learn. IT very well could be the hard way!!!
End of RANT!!!! LOL I thought I was done raising them after they hit adulthood!!!!
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Today's Featured Article - Listening to Your Tractor - by Curtis Von Fange. Years ago there was a TV show about a talking car. Unless you are from another planet, physically or otherwise, I don’t think our internal combustion buddies will talk and tell us their problems. But, on the other hand, there is a secret language that our mechanical companions readily do speak. It is an interesting form of communication that involves all the senses of the listener. In this series we are going to investigate and learn the basic rudimentary skills of understanding this lingo.
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