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 I hope I don't screw this up..Last week I bought a dump truck. She's a 1973 Peterbilt 359 Narrow cab  15 foot bed, with a good PTO and a non leaking lift cylinder.  The paint is rough as hell, but it looks pretty good from about a hundred yards away, while the sun is going down. Rain and overcast helps a lot.  The rubber is good and brakes a near new and well set up. Want pics? Ehh, maybe if you ask nice, I'll have to go crawl under the truck. There aren't any door seals, so the cab leaks air a little bit, but that's ok, because the heater is basically always on. Air conditioning? There's a fan bolted to the roof pointed at the driver..... Not much works, but it's not too far from being road legal. It's safe, but some lights aren't exactly as you say...working?  No, I'm not kidding. None of that poo poo works. 'Only fill left tank?' wondering about that? I put that there after the first trip to get diesel. The right side tank....isn't hooked up to anything and isn't plugged at the bottom. I found that out after putting about three gallons in there. Jakes? nope. Not even sure the engine has them, it might be a troll. What engine you ask? well, if you're a real Peterbilt nerd, you'll know that it's got a 855 Cummins small cam, 325 or so hp in it. I don't have a picture of the engine right now, maybe later, i'm sure that I'll have to have the hood up soon. Trans? I'm glad you asked, I am not sure what the hell to call it, It's a 5 speed with hi/low splitter and behind that is a 4 speed brownie. Yeah, 40 possible forward gears, but you don't use all of them. So there's two sticks and a pull knob. Unloaded it doesn't matter, it's got enough power and low enough gears in the tandems that you don't have to split poo poo. I start in 3rd on the back box, run the low side, split to the high and then when I hit ninth i throw the back box into fourth and then into tenth gear on the main box. That make any sense to anyone? Loaded....i'll get back to you. When I get good at it I'll make a shifting video. It does dump, I'll get pics with the bed up later. Along with the engine and the two stick trans. From the markings on the truck and what's on the title and what I have seen on the truck I am pretty sure she lived her whole life up until now in the mountains. She was a workin girl big shouldered and strong backed, forty forward gears, there wasn't a grade she couldn't climb. The painter's hand not touched her flank since 98, I bet she sure was pretty with all the purple and gold. Double framed and strong built, she's as solid today as she was when the boys turned her loose from the factory back in april of 73. I've already hauled a few loads with it a couple around on the ranch and two all the way to my house.  Dog is my co pilot.  I'm getting in to shooting videos and basically being a youtube noob, I'll get some dump truckin action captured and i'll put it here. I also have skid steers and some other cool toys, here's a short dirt work movie I made. http://youtu.be/xVzlxds1pTM What else you wanna know?
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May 13, 2013 05:58
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oRenj9, there's a place about 30 miles up the road that sells equipment, trucks, trailers and a few other things. He's got a wacky selection most times, and it's 40 years old BTW. I paid 15022.00 with tax and drove the bitch home. The passenger whopper is an inside joke with my family. my live-in girlfriend 's dad remarried a younger chick from Poland, and when she orders at Burger King she either gets a wiper or a seizure salad. The labels help me learn the controls. Who the hell am I and why do I have a dump truck? I operate a 7,000 acre cattle ranch in south central Kansas that has been in my family for over a hundred years. This is my second year of being the manager full time, my pop is stepping aside and letting me run things, I make all the decisions and he just provides a little labor. I'll use this truck to haul sand for my roads. There's 1/3 of the ranch that is barely developed and the road network is terrible, so that's on the list to get fixed. I have a pair of John Deere 333D track loaders with a pile of attachments, including a flip blade and a rotary tree saw. My plan is to keep the truck two years and then pass it on. My neighbors also have some use for a dump truck so I am sure it will be loaned or traded around for work. There's a lot of work around here that's traded for beer, weed or just "i owe you one" and no one cares. Mostly I'll use the truck on the ranch or to help out friends and neighbors. The longest trip it's likely to take is 22 miles to town for diesel fuel, unless I say gently caress it and run red fuel in it, then it won't leave the ranch. I'm either putting farm tags or antique tags on it, not sure, so I don't have to have a CDL (I have one anyway) or deal with any of the DOT bullcrap and take logs. Farm use only bitches,  The answer you're looking for is, I'm using it for business, but it's my business and not for hire. I have been looking for a dump truck for a couple months now, and a neighbor got one from his brother's dead dog's hairdresser's estate and offered it to me. I told him I would buy it, but before we could match orbits and I could give him money he decided to be a buddy fucker and sell it to someone else after he promised it to me. That's ok, I know how to hitch up to his house.
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May 13, 2013 15:02
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I had cowboy poo poo to do this morning, and then some skid steer work that I videoed and will hack and upload later. Comfortable to be in all day? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA! It's a loving 40 year old dump truck with out a heater, a/c, working fan or door seals. The seat isn't bad though. I guess all things considered I spent most of the afternoon dump truckin, and I wasn't uncomfortable, but if my boss gave it to me to drive and expected me to drive it for a living 10+ hours a day, I'd tell him to gently caress himself. I haven't looked at those cats vids lately, but the white one with spots is the Jr Tom, we call him 'fat lard' the fuzzy black and white cat is 'flatface' the grey fuzzy cat that hides is 'line stick box' the big orange bastard is 'Bob' and he's the Sr Tom. Those cats are funny, they follow you around like dogs. Flatface and my girlfriend's golden are buddies, we joke that Alley has a pet cat. I needed to haul about three loads of sand to start on a road project so I can start on my tree project. Here's the office. At least I have a nice seat, Bostrom Talledega on my side at least. I haven't looked at the passenger side, but I don't sit there, so I don't care. The gizmo on the floor, lower right in the picture is the switch for the air locker on the tail gate. The PTO and dump control are in the middle between the seats. Yeah, the clutch pedal is CLOSER than it looks, it's hard to jack my leg around to get to it.  15 foot bed, she's a little rusty, and that isn't likely to change. I just don't think that I'll move enough material fast enough for it to polish up.  Tail gate, with a spreader plate under it. Its nice to be able to tail board out material.  Da faq is tail boarding? it's when you only crack your tail gate open while raising your bed and driving forward. The tail gate is held open at a distance that you choose with hold back chains.  I set my time lapse up on top of the cliff at the sand pit and shot some B roll of loading the truck, anyway, here's a picture from up there.  I have a ton of skid steer work footage that I need to hack together, I'm figuring out how to mount my gopro on my skid steer better and getting a better feel for how long the batteries last (not very fuckin long.) I Amazon primed a couple more batteries and battery charger for it, so I can film all day instead of getting hosed by batteries at lunch. Remember how I said the truck is double framed? Yo dawg, i heard you like frame rails with your frame rails....  Here's the other side.  And that brings me back around to the engine. Real trucks don't have intercoolers.  Fan shroud? Pfft, don't need one of those either! I actually ran her pretty hard today all things considered. It was about ninety outside, and when I was loaded I pretty much gave it hell the whole time in the top four holes and she showed no signs of overheating.  Here's a LOL, pron shot of the left side...  I parked the truck next to the little Suzuki truck I use to deliver mineral to the pasture, didn't think anything of it. Pop said something so I turned around and about died laughing.  The size difference is a little comical.  I could put the Suzuki inside the dump bed physically, but the tail gate is in the way. Until I can figure out how to deal with that, I am not even going to consider ramps..... By request, I have made a video of me shifting that beast. Keep in mind that it's literally my third time driving the truck, and I have a total of maybe a hundred miles in the seat. I've driven other trucks though. I cut everything but the shifting, enjoy. http://youtu.be/HrbvQLxCjLM
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May 14, 2013 04:29
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Maybe I can get a mod to change the title to 'Dump trucks, skid steers, epic beards and other ranchy things.' The wind is blowing a hundred mph here today, and we've got a B day party for Smalls this evening. So I am not doing much.
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May 14, 2013 15:59
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doritos posted:Do you talk like Jerry Reed in real life, too? Sometimes, depends on how mellow I am. Hughmoris posted:Great thread, can't wait to read more. How old is that awesome dog? Awesome dog is ten, near as I can figure, eight at the youngest. I'm pretty humbled by the response, I didn't think anyone would give a gently caress. I'm also encouraged to keep taking pics and videos. This evening we had a BBQ, about 20 friends and family over. What I am saying is I really didn't work today other than making sure the cows are where they are supposed to be. It was a windy whore this morning, about 30 by 9am. So I went home and got poo poo ready for the party. Tomorrow is going to be a long day. I'm getting 67 more cow/calf pairs on two trucks that each require a different loadout chute setup. I also have a cow move to do and a mineral hump planned. Then after lunch....I'm going to get into trucker mode and haul pop's skid steer to the house, change the oil on it and truck it over to the west pasture so i can do dirt work with it and get ready to cut trees. After i change the oil in my machine, it gets moved over to the tree project as well. I'm excited about cutting the trees and getting some film. I think it will make some cool footage. I built a magnetic mount for my gopro yesterday that's better than anything I can find on Amazon. Regular GoPro mount with adhesive removed  1/4 inch Neo magnets, in a grid superglued on.  And a couple coats of flex seal and we're done!  Have I found any other uses for Flex Seal? gently caress no. Ask me about boots some time. The flex seal has pretty much flattened out. I put it there to keep from scratching up whatever I put it on. The magnets, let's say they are ridiculously strong. I don't think this thing will have any problems holding up a gopro. I'm starting to get some hazy ideas of poo poo to show you guys, if there's something you wanna know, just ask. We do our moves with utility vehicles, I ride around in a Polaris Rzr S all day for a work truck when I'm not in the skid steer or skating off elsewhere. I've had the GoPro in it, and the stuff that I do all day that totally terrifies about anyone that rides with me in it just doesn't look all that wild on camera. I can do a rzr ride video, but I bet it turns out boring. Have some pics of my badass dog while I think of something else to write.     Nope. couldn't think of anything. I'm going to bed, 0600 is only like six hours away, ranch life starts early. Might stay up and finish a youtube thing, if I do, i'll update thread. http://youtu.be/XrGR4Lj5-y8 <-- video will be there when it's done. not sure how good it is, i think it's ok, trying out a few things, I sped up some parts instead of cutting. I think it worked out ok. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 06:41 on May 15, 2013 |
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May 15, 2013 06:08
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FML. My bobcat rep is trying to sell me another piece of equipment. I have been thinking about buying a excavator for awhile..... It wouldn't shock me greatly if she just drops it off tomorrow, you know, for me to "Take a look at." Here's something cool; this is a tub that had some salt in it. Oh, the miracle of evaporation and deposition.    And now for a little tease.... This bastard goes on my skid steer, that blade is 30 inches across and it has ten carbide teeth. How fast does it cut? Frickin fast, ok? How fast does the blade move? fast enough to make it cut a four inch tree like a frickin lightsaber. How about that poo poo? The head also rotates 90 degrees. It's one of my favorite tools. I'll explain why we cut trees in a later post, probably when I start cutting them. All you fuckin tree huggin prius drivin california livin people shut the hell up, I have a good reason and I will explain it. Just not now.  Tree cutting is the next project, after a little truckin some shop time and build a road....and whatever other emergency comes up. I try to aim for a couple big tasks every day and let the sand fill the cracks. I usually work until I feel like stopping for the day after my big rocks are done. Sometimes noon, some times dark. Today, I feel like dark. Lunch break over, time to do some hauling.
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May 15, 2013 19:02
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Just rolled in the house. it's been a long day. unloaded cows, humped mineral, did some work at my sand pit and finally, hauled a skid steer back to HQ. Flex seal? Ok, I thought I had a good idea by putting some on the toes of my boots. Lemme 'assplain, I wear steel toe boots or what amounts to slip on low cut boots. My work steel toes had leather and then plasticky rubbery toe cap over that. That crap doesn't last, and I've had these boots for three years. They are good fuckin boots, BUT they leak water because of giant holes in the toe caps. So I have this miracle flex seal poo poo that the manager at the hardware store wanted me to try. so I gave my boots a few coats on the toe, I even had the rest of the boot masked off so it doesn't look like a total redneck did it. This is what they looked like after curing for a day and me putting them on once and walking around the yard* post flex seal left boot!  right boot!  That yellow wagon in the background? Total crap. "total rated load 880 lbs" my fuckin rear end. Not real sure how the hell they came up with that number at the factory in bumfuckistan or whereever they made that thing. I didn't even have 400 lbs of bricks in it when the drat wheel bearings literally fell apart and out of the hub. Bottom line, crap wagons, don't buy one. As long as I can keep repairing the one I have for cheap I can't justify buying a new one. I've seen them and various farm and home stores, places that supply tractors and that helpful hardware place. Flex seal is still poo poo, but it's working OK on my GoPro mag mount which got abused as gently caress today. Couple places got skinned up  I've already put another coat on it, should be curing in the setting sun right now. I did some skid steer stuff today, I'll work on hacking together something for youtube. *my walking idea of walking around the yard is likely to be dramatically different from what most of you are used to. Edit: VVVVV The mineral is loose packed in bags and mixed onsite with salt 50/50. I can show you , but I didn't think anyone would give a crap. I'm working on a skid steer video that involves that salt and mineral project today. I don't have pics, but I do have a little video, maybe I can pull a frame out of there. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 01:50 on May 16, 2013 |
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May 16, 2013 01:15
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I took a ton of footage today and haven't had much time to chop it down. I did make a quickie that I just tossed at youtubes, it's uploading right now. Don't laugh too hard at my movie making skills, I don't have but one good camera (gopro), one time lapse camera, a four year old Nikon P&S that will record 1080p and a fairly new Samsung P&S that also does 1080p. A couple of cheap tripods, some mag mounts and a few other mounting gizmos and that's all I film with. Most of this stuff I have done enough that I know what it looks like and what to expect. I don't think setting up cameras is going to be too hard. After my last post I had to go back to work, I had some cows that decided to take advantage of a gate that was left open. I'm going to blame the pumper, but I forgot to check this morning, and it really lands on me at the end of the day anyway. Oh well, checkin the gate would have saved a trip out to the ranch and about 45 minutes of cowboy poo poo tonight. One of these years I'll get it all right. So the mineral I have been talking about is a custom blended mineral that we've developed with this client over the last couple years by doing manure samples. Using the samples, you can see what the animal ate, what is used and what isn't and what the animal needs. I sample forage and manure, got to know the inputs and outputs if you want to know anything about the conversion. This time of year with the drought, we're going with a little more potassium and zinc and dialing the salt back just a bit than we normally would. It comes in 50 pound sacks, mostly multi layer paper plastic sandwich type bags, but some come in heavier plastic. Most generally though, 50 lbs give or take an ounce. The feeding rate is usually 2 to 4 oz per head, per day. I'm fuckin glad I paid attention in math class and know how to do word problems because my life is math word problems. (expected comsumption rate)*((number of cows)*(1.25 because of the small calves, they add comsumption)/(16 to turn oz to lb.) 2oz*(212*1.25)/16=lbs/day min. it's 33lbs or so on the bottom side, 67 at most. I've seen some cows suck down 8oz a day of mineral product for a week and then not touch it for a month. Fun part...Some paddocks they cows only stay there for 3 days. If the minimum quantity you can put out at a time is 100 lbs total salt/mineral mixed and the minimum practical quantity you put out is 300 pounds for bunk space reasons, how should you place your mineral tubs for most effectiveness? I spent a lot of time picking up half empty mineral tubs and moving them. At least I don't have to deal with the 125 pounders this year. gently caress that ever again. So if I put out 400lbs in one paddock that they will be in for four or five days, and 400lbs in another that they will be in for 4 days and I added another 55 critters to the herd today, when do I need to go move mineral tubs, and how much will be left in each paddock? Have fun with that one. A couple years ago I had a client that wanted to use a cooked mineral product. it's crystallized mollasses and crap in a giant fuckin plastic tub. They weighed 125, give or take a few and were nearly impossible to load one manned, but I got 'er dun. Last year we got stuck and had to use some, but it wasn't a catastrophe. When they sent it to me, I had a machine there to unload the pallet, and I put it straight into the back of my pickup and went right out to the pasture to deliver it. The cooked stuff is weather resistant alot moreso than the loose stuff so it can live in the pasture for awhile and not degrade. Humping mineral is hard work, but it's no harder than it has to be. I have video, it's going to get made into something someday. My youtube thing is done, enjoy. I'm going to bed. http://youtu.be/rQXyakyYxUQ edit: a little more tease, I had to dig my gopro out of the dirt and sand twice. I may or may not have caused a small collapse today at the sand pit. Stay tuned for video some other day.  I got some great footage of the cows grazing and being turned out to pasture too. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 07:01 on May 16, 2013 |
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May 16, 2013 06:54
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Cow move this morning, I haven't even watched the video, but it bet it's got cool stuff in it. Carolina boots are the shizz, that's what's normally on my feet. Or Ariats. I set my time lapse up to watch the watering trap on the east side of the paddock for  because it's interesting to see how the cows move across the landscape and how they graze, when they come to water and what influences those behavior patterns. Cow psychology I suppose. The broad strokes of the idea is that you can make the cow work for you by encouraging her to do something that she will already do, but do it where you want her to do it and make her think it's a good idea. I generally put the mineral out in a pasture as far away from the water source as I can. That way, they have to walk to get it, and they will walk a great distance to get salt and mineral. If I put out protein tubs with molasses in them? Those 267 cows and calves I have turn into a fleet of bulldozers. They will plow anything aside to get to those tubs. Sand hill plum thicket? Put some cow candy in there, sit back and watch them destroy it. Speaking of which, that would be something to time lapse. Here's an interesting picture:  First person that is even close to being able to tell me which is the better side and why wins at being one of the only other people that can see it. I won't even tell you which side is mine. I was working on my Skid steers today, and took some pics. Just basic maintenance, oil change today.  How much oil? 13 quarts of JD brand specific oil that you can only get at JD. (i know it's damned ole CJ-4 grade 10w-40 and it doesn't cost more.) Now usually I am a pretty smart guy and don't pay much attention to owners manuals beyond a cursory skimming and I figured that an oil change would be no problem. Every other machine I have had there's been a drain plug on the pan.  The answer would be no. I got the filter changed, but no luck in figuring out where the oil comes out. Then I had a thought....I could always go maybe read the manual?  Ah ha!  gently caress you and your drain plug.  Sam says hello.  the oil filter is easy to get to.  Engine bits.  more engine bits.  The area around this huge fuckoff drive sprocket must be kept clean and free of debris.  It's fairly robust, but you don't want sand dirt and grit grinding away next to your seals ALL the time, do you? I have a decent size shop to work in, we built this shop in the fall of 2009. I did all the wiring....there's over a half mile of wire. But I will NEVER need to re-wire again unless I need something really fuckin wacky like 400hz.  Time to load up and go cut trees.  That looks nothing like a saw blade, and you're right. I have to take a blade and bucket to build roads, the grapple to move trees and then the saw will come with the other machine. Here's the temporary staging area that I'm going to use for a while. The next move will a long half mile, to what we call 'West Pond.'  here's a little teaser before and after. Before:  After:  According to the tags on the photos, there's seven minutes in between those pics. We're going to use that low spot to start stacking cut trees in. If the woman decides she wants to be a oval office tonight I might do another video. Maybe a little teaser. We'll see. The feedback is great, keep it coming. I'm in a difficult place in my head right now. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 02:40 on May 17, 2013 |
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May 17, 2013 02:18
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Grumbletron 4000 posted:I destroy boots at work and I can get a solid year and a half out of a pair of Red Wings. They're expensive but worth every penny. Get a pair with the Vibram rubber and your feet will love you for it. I'll take a look at some Red Wings just because you guys said so. You just gave me a great idea for a narration for the video that I have in the works. I hope it turns out ok. Thanks for the feedback. I have lived here basically my whole life, or at least most of it. I'm from here, I live in the house that I grew up in as a child. I got the chance to buy it a couple years ago and didn't hesitate. I did have another life, I lived on the east coast for a while when I was in the Navy, but that isn't pertinent to this thread. I'm giving a shot to raising 29 Guineas this year too, in addition the the garden that is in my videos. We started with 31 but two didn't make it. Honestly If I can make it through the year with 15 I will be surprised. edit: Ought ten, there are mammoth costs and expenses. Every year it gets harder and harder too. The government doesn't make it easy at all. Our Government is taxing my way of life literally to death. And you're letting them do it, but that's not this thread either. All of my dirt work has a purpose, there's very little fuckoffery when you burn 4 1/2 gallons of fuel per hour. when I'm cutting trees and the machine is really singing and working to beat hell, more like 6 1/2. Red diesel is about 3.40 a gallon here, clear is 3.80 I think, it's been awhile since I have been to town and looked. Fuel ain't cheap, so I try to do get the job done as best I can as fast as I can. I won't tell you it isn't relaxing as hell to get in that machine and just shift earth around for a couple hours. Makes me feel strong as gently caress. steveobob, if I get around to building some of the things that I want to and have designed in my head I'll make some fab videos and shop work stuff. Do you really wanna see me do oil changes? Most poo poo I just take to the dealer or my cousins shop...lol. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 04:39 on May 17, 2013 |
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May 17, 2013 04:28
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I'm going to bed. I made this thing. I like it. http://youtu.be/e0oh4wNg37w I have some ideas on how to mount my gopro to get footage that I want.
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May 17, 2013 07:00
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Started lovely, continued being lovely, got better, not bad now with a chance of bitch later. Due mostly to my own stupidity, I hosed up some wiring on my saw and spent 3 hours driving around getting the right pins to fix it.  These loving pins. They cost about .12 cents each, but when you don't have one.....   Stuffed in the block  mostly assembled.  My badass wiring notes.  the other end of my wiring clusterfuck  Getting there.  Orange with white stripe to red, black to black, blue to green and green to purple. Got it?  Let's go kill some trees! But first, LUNCH!  Warfighter approved warfighter reccommended warfighter designed for warfighters fighting wars in warzones yo. The track holds the FRH at just the right angle.  I ended up eating everything else waiting for the FRH to do it's thing and heat the meal...and I was full by the time it was hot. Oh well. It kept nice for an afternoon snack. I loving destroyed trees this afternoon. Here's a little spot I worked on for a few minutes.  after:  Here's that low spot that I cleaned out yesterday. My pop comes out and works with me when I have projects like this. It's nice to have him around...sometimes.  Another Before:  after:  Teef!  Even though it's Friday, tomorrow is still a work day. Parts run first thing and it goes from there. It's been a long week and my woman and I are not getting along and it's starting to get to me, but this isn't that thread. I really didn't want to do any youtubery tonight, but are I saw a little of the footage I shot today, I had to hack something together real fast. It's that cool. http://youtu.be/IAPF7SuIZac That's probably all you get, I wanna do something else with my world tonight. Edit: gotta amazon prime some more GoPro mounts, SAW CAM didn't do what I wanted it to, but it's still a kick rear end shot. Next I'll do a boom cam, set the camera further back on the boom to keep it out of the brush a little more. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 01:02 on May 18, 2013 |
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May 18, 2013 00:55
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Thanks for the avatar you awesome bastards. I love it.  I might not be here tomorrow. I'm right on the north end of the darkest color.  Square in the middle of this fucker.  In the second worst part of this one.  Here's part of my 8 mile drive to work. This is my neighbor's place and he's a pretty good operator. He cut those trees about 6-8 months ago.  Everything is ultra green this time of year, but it won't last. A year ago at this time it was a hundred or so. Cows in sea of green   Here's a panorama I shot with my phone that I have no clue how to share properly.  Any suggestions? it's a full 360 shot. I did another one, but I must have hosed it up. oh well, it would have been a cool picture. I deduced the transmission combo on my Pete, it's an Fuller super 10 with a single over Brownie 4 speed. I can't seem to find any published shift order or the gear ratios, can anyone help? E: the weather is already starting to get really intense. national Weather service posted:.DAY ONE...THIS AFTERNOON AND TONIGHT We're in Torcon 6 which as far as I know hasn't been issued before. I thought the scale only went to five. Don't worry, if a tornado comes this way I will get good pics. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 21:27 on May 18, 2013 |
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May 18, 2013 21:09
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Annnnnd now we're under a tornado watch. Fantastic. Oh hey, I have heard tell of one on the ground about 100 miles from here. The line is moving this way, sky is still clear, but there's a lot of energy in the air. Last year I had two rotating wall clouds buzz my house at low altitude, and a rope tornado dropped out of a third one that missed me....by about a mile, literally. That's pretty fuckin close if you ask me. edit: from my twitter feed; Public reporting golf ball sized hail 4:13pm 4 miles SW of Utica in Ness county That's a long ways away. check out chasertv.com Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 22:25 on May 18, 2013 |
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May 18, 2013 22:12
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The last time I drive it is when I made the shifting video. I think I ran up the low side in second on the brownie, got to the high hole and went to direct before I ran the high side. I'm just wondering if I am splitting the top two holes right. If it's not a super ten, it's still a ten speed that is a poo poo load easiser to stir around than the Rockwell RM 10 that's in my dad's Freightliner. There's a factory shift pattern data plate above the driver's visor but it's badly worn and faded. I'll try to get a pic of it next time I am out there. It shows both transmissions, so I think it's factory. I watch the SPC convective indexes daily this time of year. I live and die by the weather a lot more than you realize. I have a Wx station at my house, one on the ranch because it's seven miles away and conditions can be vastly different. A half inch of rain can mean several days of grazing. The light show last night was awesome, and then again about 2:30 this morning it hit again. I laid awake in bed for awhile and just watched the sky flash and listened to the thunder and rain on the roof. I'm always happy when it rains, it means I get to stay in business a little longer. Three trips to mecca this week, they gave me a hat. Don't ask what this one cost. I know a guy that bought an optioned out hat at about 285K and he got a free combine.  As usual, Dog is my co-pilot.  I had 1.29 inches of rain at my house, and there was 2.16 at the ranch. I'l have to go ride the pasture as soon as the mud dries a bit and see if any got zapped by lightning this morning or last night.  This pic didn't turn out like I wished it would have. The clouds were a lot cooler in person.  Sup dog? 
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May 19, 2013 15:47
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from what IV8 posted, it's a straight up ten with a splitter, not a super ten. I have a feeling that if I drew the shift pattern it would look like a bowl of spaghetti. bighouse, yeah, it's a Cummins, yeah, it's turned up, yeah it rolls coal, yeah I tow really really heavy poo poo with it. It also gets 23.4 mpg stepping down the highway at 75. I also make cows and sequester more carbon in a year than you can think about offsetting with your Prius. e: wall 'o text incoming, scroll down for tl;dr. I don't quite have the next part written out in my head yet, it's a collection of my own quote and observations, but it will outline some of my philosophy. Here's a brief overview. I am always thinking about what the land looked like before us white people came and screwed it up. I wonder what the grass looked like, where the trees were and what they were. I wonder what the streams looked like, and how the Bison and Antelope lived. We've made a lot of negative changes to the landscape and the balance nature. This landscape evolved of the course of fifty thousand years, since the last Ice age. We've taken the finely crafted balance that it took nature thousands of years to create and destroyed it in less than a hundred. The native tall grass prairies on the great plains are some of the most biodiverse places outside of tropical rainforests. We are only here but the blink of an eye, and we're consuming resources that took hundreds of millions of year to create and wasting them foolishly in support of an unsustainable lifestyle that will be gone when we are. What are we leaving behind for our children? How about their children? These might seem like abstract philosophical questions to you, but it's something I think about every day. As I look across the land I wouldn't see what you see, because I attach a different value to things than most. Everything has a place, nature is unordered chaos operating in an unbalanced manner seeking but never attaining equilibrium. It's a system, a vast interconnected web so intricately woven that it's almost imperceptible sometimes. A tire track can change the course of a stream. Building ten feet of fence can change the grazing pattern for a 200 acre paddock. A ranch trail up a hill washes and becomes a gully and impassable. To think that we're in a static environment is foolish. To think that our climate will always be the same is asinine. I heard it said a couple weeks ago by a meteorologist that's actually well respected that global warming is probably keeping us out of an ice age. You don't like GMO crops and hate Monsanto? Then don't eat. Literally, don't eat anything except poo poo you pick off trees and bushes in the wild. I guess you can have Mushrooms and whatever meat you want, as long as it's from a wild animal that isn't finding corn some where to eat. EVERYTHING has something in it that is GMO these days, if it didn't we would have starved in the 50's. GMO hybrid corn from the Garst company saved this country from starvation during the drought of the 50's. Corn, wheat, rice, all the cereal grains have been genetically modified throughout mankind's' existence. Today we do in a lab what took the Native Americans a couple years to do in a week. We grow what we grow because that's how it had to be done to get to this point and feed the world. Modern production agriculture in the US has become what it is for a couple reasons. 1. Death tax. 2. Consumer demand for lower price first, then taste, then availability, then quality. You want it fast, cheap and now. Think we're getting rich? http://www.nfu.org/images/April2013_Farmers%20Share.pdf Nope. (linked for auto changes, it that's not cool i'll change it.) What does death tax have to do it anything? Call your banker up monday morning and give him this scenario: Your father just died and you inherited everything. His will said 'hey guys (your name here) gets all my poo poo, kthaxbye! He was a farmer and owned 1,000 acres of land, and all the things needed to work it. Say two tractors, a couple pickups, a 'nice' car, a gently caress off huge shed that has accumulated 40 years worth of debris from life. A house, a combine harvester and a grain truck. That land is worth 3,000 bucks per acre sale price, more depending on mineral and/or water rights. And that's the floor for lovely farm ground out here. it gets cheaper going west, but not much until you hit the front range. Basically, land price follows historical rain fall averages which drives how productive the land is. So between the land and all the poo poo you need to run the operation, you just inherited four million bucks worth of stuff, say a floating note of about 50k on 8% as operating funds and no debt load. You can't farm less than 1,000 acres and make a living. Imagine you're living your current life, with the money you have in the bank and you get that call, what the gently caress do you do? Know what the taxes are going to be under Obama to transfer those assets? Fifty loving percent if it's under ten million. So now you're on the hook for a tax bill of two million bucks, due RIGHT NOW because, LOL IRS. Let's go to the bank and ask for two million bucks to pay that, based on you taking over an operation that will, in an average year cash flow about 100k profit, a bad year, maybe lose a hundred grand. Oh, you have ZERO experience in doing even the most basic farm task, let alone crop rotation planning. And the banker knows that. You pretty much have to sell. First you pay the death tax. Then if you have to sell the land you take the hit there if you sell real estate and don't buy real estate, boom taxed again on gains. So that four million dollar farm you inherited? Here's what happens: Can't pay the tax due to poor estate planning, so everything goes to auction. The neighbors get to pick through all your dad's poo poo and buy it for a little more than they would have paid him for it when he was alive. Maybe some rich neighbor will by some of your land, but most likely it will go to someone that lives out of state, hunters probably. They won't keep up the fence, won't maintain their place and get mad at their neighbors when cows tear down their unmaintained fence. More acres are taken out of production every year by people that fail to think things through and see how what they do affects everyone else. Oh,there's crops in the ground that you'll need to do something with. You also need to decide what you're going to do with those and that potential money. And depending on what you do with the land it will have different tax consequences that are going to be very very hard to understand. The most valuable resource that we have on this planet is the top six inches of soil. It gives us life, it gives us air, it gives us food and it gives us our shelters. We're doing an atrocious job of keeping it safe and taking care of it. Every year we have to produce more on the same or fewer acres because they aren't making more land. Our input costs go up every year and we have little to no control over the price we get when we sell goods. We have to be more productive with less. Technology is really starting to come of age in the ag sector, we're getting some really cool toys to save tons of time and literally tons of diesel fuel while growing more tons of food. Inch perfect GPS navigation for tractors to seed and fertilize. Digital control over chemical application at the nozzle, to precisely control the amount and location to increase productivity. A brand new, top of the line John Deere S690 Combine set up for multi crops that we have around here, Corn, Beans, Milo and Wheat with the new GPS set up will run about $350,000. Oh, you'll need a header to actually do anything with it. 36 foot flex draper header, last I knew they were about 75 grand. And then you'll need Row header for Corn, and a sixteen row is the smallest you should put on a monster like a S690, that'll be another hundred grand. Pimpin ain't easy. Every once in awhile I have some friends that ask me to come help with harvest, sometimes corn, sometimes wheat. Just depends on who else is around, if I go, I'll be sure to take pics. If you have a window that the sun shines in get off your rear end tomorrow and go get a pot and grow a tomato plant. Grow something and EAT IT. Eat something that you helped create, be a producer of some of the things you consume. The word sustainable, I have a problem with it. I think it means that we have to maintain things in the current hosed up state that they are in. I don't want that, I want things to get better. I want to be able to look across the hills when I'm 70 and know that I'll be leaving it better than when I found it. We have to stop trying to sustain and start regenerating. Sustainability? Let's talk about that when there's seven billion less people on the planet. The drought we're in currently is worse than the drought in the 50's. The drought we're in is literally the worst drought in recorded history. It's literally a biblical class drought as far as the weather geeks are concerned, but they only care about what white men have seen. The natives tell me that it was like this in the 1840's and 1850's and it didn't recover until the 1870's. And then the white men came, or rather they stopped and settled instead of passing through the vast waste land that Zebbie Pike said couldn't sustain human life. He was right....when he was here. I'm trying to maximize the productivity of the land, long term and only produce from it what it can support. Feeding hay is silly to me. wWy take your forage to your cows instead of taking your cows to forage? They have legs and are self mobile, make them pay the fuel bill. They have mouths that are purpose built and designed to cut and grind to size the forage that they intake, so why do part of what they are going to do anyway for them? I bet you like food stamps and welfare too, don't ya? tl:dr, No, I don't grow any hay.  What you saw was probably in the video where I am stacking mineral pallets. That's a 50/50 bale of prairie hay and alfalfa mixed that we keep around for whatever.
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May 19, 2013 23:53
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loving gently caress. I had a long rear end reply all typed out and I wasn't finished with it yet and I brushed a couple loving keys and EVERYTHING left. I are bad at computers. kastein, I have a water cycle rant that you'll like, but that's not today. bidikyoopi, Let's just say that the cap would affect me, but some creative estate planning 15 years is saving my rear end right now. I wonder what Carnegie would say about food stamps, labor unions, the IRS, OHSA and minimum wages. He'd probably say gently caress that, I'm going back to Ireland! The job isn't about the job. It's a life and lifestyle. I get to work outside doing poo poo I love in a place that I love to be at and I get paid doing it! N is for Nipples, 333D has tracks, not tires, so no wheelies. STR, cows get hit by lightning every once in awhile. You'll find one on top of a hill or ridge, on their back, legs straight up with their hooves blown off. It's bizarre the first time you see it. Brokenkuncklez, <3 you in the locomotive thread BTW. The land I run has been in the family for over a hundred years. Oh, gently caress Llamas. I hate those things. Alpacas aren't any better, they are just plain assholes. A lot of folks have to have other enterprises other than just farming or ranching to make ends meet. Col sanders, P much. Sucks about your car though, hope you have good insurance. Wichita goons, Hi. please don't stalk me. I have lots of guns and am highly allergic to strangers in my drive way. Content! Fun Fact, Farming/Ranching is the fourth most dangerous occupation in America! http://americanlivewire.com/most-dangerous-jobs/ I used to be a Vol Firefighter...I do construction work with my construction machinery....I fell, buck and process my own firewood too. Guess it's a good thing I don't like to fish. I'm working on the hutch for my 29 Guinea keets. Wednesday they will be four weeks old and it's time for them to move into their home. I'll post more later when I come in for the night, I gotta go get some more work done, pop might be coming down later to go 'shroomin. It's Morrell time here!
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May 20, 2013 23:26
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toplitzin posted:I only have one gun Lasting forever damage? Not too much i'd think, as long as there were no major fluid spills. There'd probably be some bad ruts, out here it would have to be done on top of a hill. I might have a spot, how big of an area do you need for one? I have a Subaru too, but it's not yet time for that in this thread. About the one gun, don't worry, it's not about the size of the weapon, it's how you use it. Giblet Plus! posted:you're confusing hybridization with genetic engineering 'Splain to me how they are different things. Hybridization is where you cross breed different strains or plants to maximize or reinforce certain genes. How is that not genetic engineering or manipulation? Next, I bet you'll tell me that dogs aren't related to wolves. Modern dent corn comes from a plant the Natives called Maize that they domesticated and engineered from a strain of grass. Hard red winter wheat is descended from a grass in the Grama family, and is almost so good at what it does that Monsanto hasn't been able to improve on it. I'm not trying to avoid answering any questions, I'll try to get to all of them, I'm keeping a list. Instead of just telling you what we do with our watering traps, I'll show you with pictures. I think I'm going to build a new watering center or two this year, so that will be a fun process to document. Content! Here's what I use for a portable air source.  I rotated cows this morning, Dog is my co pilot.    2011 Polaris Ranger RZR S. 800cc twin cylinder. I've put skid plates, a-arm guards, pipe and tuner on it. Front bumper and plastic roof too. Other than that, I just drive the poo poo out of it. I've got a bunch of footage from inside, just need to catch some cool poo poo, like slides around corners and jumps before I get serious about cutting together a youtube thing. I love taking it to the dunes and not washing all the cow poo poo off it, I get some really funny looks. Speaking of which, the woman isn't working wednesday, and I might just take the afternoon off and go to the sand dunes down by Waynoka, Ok. Saw this big bastard rolling through town while I was trying to eat lunch. There's much oil field activity going on down here it's nuts. I can only imagine what it's like in ND or up at the Tar Sands project.  Last semi random picture, if you don't cut your trees or do anything but simply turn cows out, your place will look like this: covered in cedar trees.  Remember how I said that you can make a large impact by concentrating herd impact?  There used to be a small plum thicket there. The little bit of rain helped. edit: eat or don't eat? 
Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 03:39 on May 21, 2013 |
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May 21, 2013 03:02
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N is for Nipples posted:...maybe you're just not trying hard enough. The length of track on the ground and lack of any sort of give like you'd have in a tire keeps it very well planted. We've got some visitors and I've been doing other stuff. I'll get back to mechanical mayhem soon. Some of us just need to agree to disagree, I don't want to argue with anyone, so we'll just move on. My Polaris has a couple things going for it: I know this place really well, I know where all the mud holes are. On demand true 4wd, a weight of about a thousand pounds, insane acceleration, great suspension and plenty of power. Translation: I haven't gotten it stuck, but when I do, I'm sure I'll need machinery to dig it out. I'd look over that garden cart real well. If it's got something sturdy enough to call a frame instead of just having poo poo bolted to expanded metal it would be better. Most of the problems I have had with my yellow wagon are wheels and tires. I broke a rim at the hub, twice. Just not a sturdy piece of kit.
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May 21, 2013 13:45
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About the mushroom, I sent a picture to my pop, cause he's a mushroom guy. He couldn't tell what it was in the 8mp picture I sent him, so he drove out to look at it. I wasn't sure if he would eat it or not. So I ran it over with the wagon on accident. Then he went to the river mushroom hunting and came back with 30 ticks. I keep telling him to remember to put his frontline on.
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May 21, 2013 19:13
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I run more acres than that, and it's still not easy. How much land you need follows how good your soil is follows rainfall. I did work today and I got some cool new camera angles. Question, what video should I make next? I did some things today. I sawed trees and I went dump truckin, so what do you want to see? Next poster with an answer to that question gets to decide. I'm going to go pull my time lapse camera tonight, it's been running for five days now I think. Hopefully it got what I want.
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May 21, 2013 23:45
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Team140, you're late. I'm alerady doing a saw video. There's some sweet dump trucking action and I almost started working on it. Glad I didn't. Any other ideas for camera angles and mounting places? I amazon primed ten more gopro sticky mounts. Most things are magnetic enough or I can find a good spot that is magnetic to stick the camera on, but there's those loving plastic places...and my saw vibrates waaaayyyy too much for the mag mount. I have all sorts of odd mounts, and I'm a good person to make poo poo work. Go watch that show called "Hilbilly Blood" for being guys with day jobs in NC, they are very very skilled in woods lore and just general how to get it done. Might be good for a laugh anyway.
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May 22, 2013 02:38
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Hey kastein, http://youtu.be/HrbvQLxCjLM I did some more dump truckin today, there's sweet gear jammin action to make muffinpox twitchy, but that will have to wait for another day. Viper, I have tons of just pasture ride footage. I'll try to put something together for you. Leica, I've kind of been doing that, I just cut out all the really boring poo poo. I really didn't think you guys wanted a diary or give many shits about my cows. If it's cool i'll put that sort of stuff here too. At some point I might mention that you can click to embiggen all of my pics. I let my 29 Guineas out this morning...and they left. Still haven't come back.  I'm sad. They're supposed to come back. Nine were around at lunch.   My office for the morning.  loving gently caress fuckety fucker.    That fucker almost de-tracked me. How'd I get it out? I put on my goddamn gloves and pulled it the gently caress out. How'd you think I was going to do it? nifty Before shot:  five minutes later....  RAWR. More before:  not long after:  There's a video uploading, link below! After sawing Sam and I did some dump truckin.  Her and my pop's dog got up a coon this morning, it took them both to the creek, but pop reported that they killed the coon. She's got a new battle scar. 10 or so years old and still needs no help to load up.  The old Pete out in the pasture.  I took a dump.  Three point turning that whore, man I am glad I have a lot of land. It's not the most agile or nimble of rigs. But I am falling slowly in love with her. Even though she'll try to slowly kill me with diesel smoke that somehow gets in the cab and I think the kingpins are worn out but I like her. Maybe this winter I will look into restoring her a little. Pulled 5 loads today, 15.3 tons first and the next three were 14-14.5. The last one the loader op frickin slammed me with 17.2 tons. Growling up the hill out of the pit with that much weight on was fun. The Cummins was screaming, but I was in the little hole on the top side (6th gear, ok?) in direct drive on my Browning. I did check out the shift pattern plates in the cab today..    I took about ten pics of each and these are the only three that came out. Have fun, cause I can't see poo poo. from what I can tell, the one for the Aux box, 3rd is direct and 4th is over, 2nd is under and first is so low that it's pointless. I tried it today, 15 tons of junk dirt and rock in the bed, and I just eased out on the clutch in fourth gear, low side, Double under. Not stalling, bogging or anything. I just took my foot off the pedal and looked out the window and I was moving about half the speed of smell. Youtubery uploading, link will be http://youtu.be/jgeDz-E1aBk e2: just watched the video and there's a lot wrong with it. Maybe I'll fix it tomorrow. It's still pretty cool. Enjoy. e: VVV Big drat stick stuck in between my track and hull, almost pushed the track off. I couldn't get it to roll out of there with power either, had to get hands on. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 05:42 on May 22, 2013 |
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May 22, 2013 04:23
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Eightbit, that's the first time I have ever heard someone outside my normal circle of folks say anything like that. If we haven't met, I bet we know some of the same people. PM me if you've got them. Sormus, I already know the pattern. I posted that for IV8 or one of the other pro truckers to maybe give me a better idea of what sort of boxes I have with trying to peel back 40 or so years of crud to try and find markings. But what you posted is basically correct. Pretty sure 1st on the aux trans is a double under, 3rd is direct drive and 4th would be overdrive. Those decals/plates in the cab would tell the tale easiest, but you see what's going on there. Motronic, you're 100% dead on balls accurate. The ecosystem(s) on the american continent evolved with huge herds of graze and browse animals. To maintain a healthy balance, the system needs browsers and grazers. A cow, depending on genetics, can make a living about anywhere that a human can tolerate the climate. Some cows do better on the native range that I have, some do better on the fescue over in Missouri and some would die in the mountains where some others thrive. Around here most guys have black cows, primarily angus descent. The local dairies run your normal Holsteins and JerseyX. I don't know much about cow genetics and breeds because most of what is taught is based on production ag, not what actually works. The model that the state land grant colleges teach is wrong. Ag can't and shouldn't work that way. 30 years ago when my pop started improving the ranch all the neighbors said that he wouldn't last five years and that he didn't know poo poo. Of those neighboring ranches, one was broken up for sale to pay debts. Another was sold because the guy wasn't making enough money and wanted to move on. And a third went to foreclosure on their op note because they failed to manage their grass and let the trees take over. Now the neighbors that are left are trying very very hard to replicate what he has done, and what we are doing currently and what I am trying as we move forward. I've learned a lot from my pop, he's a smart guy and I'll miss him dearly when he's gone. I have put a lot of blood and sweat into this place. Sam cam would be pretty boring I think. She's really laid back. Mostly it would be her following me around, looking out the windshield, watching me work or sleeping. I guess if you want to see three minutes of me walking so you can look at my butt I'll make the video, but it's a strange request. Content! When you live out here this time of year you have to scan the horizon all the time. In california they talk about a 2,000 acre wildfire that lasts a week. Out here, that can be minutes. There's nothing to stop the wind. When the wildfire came through the ranch in 08 the flame front was rolling about 25mph, but the spread was faster because it jumps ahead on the wind. 15 foot tall flames in grass, cedar trees basically exploding, it's wild stuff. None of the group I am a part of is planning on doing any fires this year, maybe next, depends on the rain.  This is about ten miles away. I know the guy, he was probably burning something close to a thousand acres today. Good day for it, no wind.  Maybe I shouldn't judge, I don't know what he's trying to manage for.  More of my big sky today.   Warming up my lunch!  A couple before/afters:     That's all you get today. I got home, fought with the woman for 2.5hrs, and then she left. took a couple bags and left. So I made some dinner and wrote this post. I'm going to go do something else for awhile.
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May 23, 2013 03:03
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Motronic posted:Is that an industry term? TFR crossover  Came from this video and my friend Dutch, now it's an inside joke, kind of slipped out. http://youtu.be/CRRLbDIvln8I haven't interacted with another person face to face yet today, I'm ok with that. If i didn't have to go to john deere I might be able to make it to tomorrow without having to deal anyone. The air seat on my skid steer loving broke, so I have to go to Mecca and look at the diagram. Probably ride my Harley since it's a decent day. I'm about done cutting from the first landing and closing in on the second. I guess I'll have to make roads for a few days and go dump truckin before the move. I should finish cutting off the first landing tomorrow if I get my machine running. Then transition to dirt work mode and dump truckin for a little bit. I wanted to get a teaser pic to post, but my seat fuckin broke just before I was heading to get that shot, oh well, maybe later. N is for Nipples posted:Boring to you, but riveting to us city-folk! I'll see what I can put together from 'stock' footage that would otherwise get tossed. Thanks, I think I have a good butt. EightBit posted:I'm from South Texas and can almost 100% guarantee our friend circles don't overlap. I know some ranchers/landowners around here and have read studies showing that taking the cedar out of a chunk of land surrounding creeks increases the amount of water that runs down them (and into your watering tanks) with the same rain coverage. We don't get much rain down here so every bit of water management is precious. Oaks are pretty benign and give lots more shade than cedars, so they're left to form windbreaks; you can also burn oak in a fireplace, cedar will make you sick. I bet there's some degree of Venn overlap management wise and who you've heard and who I've heard. I've got a copy of some water cycle and stream flow research that was done on the ranch it's interesting stuff. It will tell you how much rain gets into what part of the water cycle based on cedar cover, grass health and a couple other things. They drink a lot and specific numbers don't matter much to me, but the overall impact on the ecosystem is huge. The two thick canyons I sawed out fall/winter 11/12 were both flowing water in the middle of the drought last summer. The summer before....nothing. That tells me that I am going the right direction. The old old timers tell of when every canyon had water in it. During the drought in the 50's there were some local jackasses that decided that it would be a cool idea to plant Eastern Red Cedar trees around to help keep things from blowing. THEY PLANTED the trees. Insanity I tell you. ERC are in invasive species and I want to kill them all. "Cedar Slayer" I like the sound of that.
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May 23, 2013 18:47
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I'm sorry guys. My woman left me and I am having a hard time dealing with that, especially at this time of year. I'm going to check out for awhile.
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May 25, 2013 12:50
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thanks for all the support guys, it means a lot. Ebola, I'd PM you, but you don't have them. It's a very very small community and I've been pretty careful posting clues that would point to where I live. I don't mind sharing poo poo with you guys, but I really really like my privacy and anonymity.
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May 25, 2013 22:43
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She came back, we talked for about 14 hours and things are good.
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May 26, 2013 21:48
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Have a sunset. Just a typical damned old Kansas sunset.  In addition to my relationship flustercluck a bunch of stuff businesswise came up, not so much ranch work, but i've spent a lot of time on the phone in the last week. I got a little work done saturday, yesterday and today. Saturday morning I was about half mile away from the landing cutting trees. My machines have air ride seats in them because I pimped them out when I ordered them. If you're going to plan on spending a thousand hours in a piece of machinery, make it a nice one if you're going to be the guy in it. So anyway, half mile away from the landing, off in a canyon that's a real fucker to get to, I go to put a little more air in my seat...and when I let go it doesn't shut off. It just keeps pumping and pumping air. I'm bouncing around to gently caress in the cab, now the seat is tossing me towards the ceiling at a fairly dramatic speed. I'm already on rough ground, now imagine me trying to shut the machine down, stop the hydraulics, get to level ground and lower the arms all while holding down the air release to let the air out of my seat so it doesn't blow the fuckin bag. You need two hands to operate the machine and one to hold that lever and there isn't even room for dog in the cab (drat right she'd ride with me. When I run heavy equip that has room she rides with me.) Got it shut down and safe finally, dug around behind the seat and found the harness, so I unplugged it and started the machine. Fired right up, seat air compressor not running? Check! Too bad that harness also has the seat safety switch wiring in it. New plan, I went poking at the switch itself. Couldn't find anything, so I took the rubber skirting down and started poking around. I found a red wire and unplugged it. I couldn't see the bastard, but I can 'see' with my fingers pretty well. I took a picture with my phone, sure enough it was the power wire for the compressor motor.  I limped back to the landing and without a way to put air in the seat it was sitting on the floor with zero spring in it. You just can't operate that way in an operational environment. I went to the shop to scrounge for a momentary switch, my first idea was to cut the red wire, splice in a momentary switch on extended pigtails and tucked somewhere that I could reach it. Of course I went to Mecca first to see the parts break down, how much a new switch cost, how to take it apart, etc. New switch assembly, 137 bucks, and yes they have one in stock.  gently caress that. I'll just go get a four dollar momentary switch from the parts store. So I got it, made the pigtails gathered up all my crap to go back out to the pasture. Got out there and decided to plug it in and see if it was going 'fix itself.' Of course it had it had fixed itself and I wasted the better part of the morning running around finding poo poo. Seriously. What else do you do but shake your head and go on about your day. Sigh. I still have the parts in the machine to fix it if it does it again. Next project was moving to the next landing, I'm kicking rear end and cutting lot faster than I ever thought I would. Should have been fairly uneventful, I did a an unloaded run with the trailer to check clearances first, and no problems. So I loaded up the first machine and made it across the crossing that is a little sketchy, around the first tight turn, added power and didn't make it to the top of the hill. gently caress. I should have bought new tires last week.  On a sidehill and pointed uphill without enough traction to move forward. Being loaded heavy there's no choice. I have to back up, and there's a really tight corner that I am not sure I can make, if I can't, it's into the pond. So I started backing down the hill and the tail of the trailer catches. Double gently caress. I didn't think of that.   Now what? Go get the other machine, switch to the bucket and build a ramp! What would you have done? The tracks are from the the second machine, the one I used to build the ramp. I used the weight to compact the soil so it would be stable and hold the weight of the other machine.   I hopped in, actually put on my seat belt (who does that?) and backed it off the trailer.  It started to slide a little to the right just as I was balancing off the folded ramps. I won't say my bung didn't pucker a little bit, but it ended up being a lot less dramatic than it could have been. Without 12,000 odd lbs of machinery on board, my Dodge drug the trailer right straight up the hill. Reloaded the machine and off I went. Here's the corner and hill I got stuck on. I spread the dirt out that I used to make the ramp with and carried on.  Some of my typically  ranch roads.  I got some cutting done and all the sudden the machine started going into overheat protection made.  It's under 95 and I'm not even working that hard. I tracked up to on top of the ridge and let her cool for a few minutes then hit the reversing fan to clear the coolers. Temp didn't fall like it should and I know it's full of coolant.  Time to pop the hood.  Triple gently caress. That's not a hole in the cooler you see, it's a relief cut for the dip stick because engineering poo poo is hard y0. You are correctly seeing almost 1/3 of the surface area blocked with dirt. When I was changing oil in these things a couple weeks ago pop filled them, looks like he missed a little bit. The fill tube is right above there, I thought I had a picture of that. Back to town for a case of brake cleaner to flush all that crap out.   And after:  It's going to need a little more work next time I get over there. Only took me three cans to get to that point. I know the best way would have simply been an air flush with solvent to get all the oil out, failing that, hot high pressure soapy water. Or even better a steam cleaner, however I own zero mobile versions of any of those things. So It was brake cleaner a couple times and hope I don't catch the machine on fire.  I ran a few more hours and it heated up a little on me, so it will get cleaned again. here's a Before/after.   I went back down there and cut the stuff on the right side of the frame, got distracted and went nuts for about 30 minutes slaughtering trees. I have to go back over there, maybe I'll remember to get another picture. Soon precious, soon. 
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May 29, 2013 01:59
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I keep it in the field. we're two miles back in the brush, it's a long haul back. In the pic in question, I'm on the right side. The left has barely any leaf and no litter cover on the ground. On the right, we've got some old grass left from last year, new cool season growth and the warm season grasses are starting to wake up.
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May 29, 2013 03:21
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Still playing watch the radar and the skies. Storms blow up here in 30 minutes sometimes, it can get pretty intense. Had some wacky poo poo go past the ranch this morning while I was working. I'll post pics when I get back from my trip... I get a big enough winch the do everything I would need, I'd have to buy a D6 to move and power the winch. I've really never had a use for one, anchor trees are either way too far or at the wrong angle. A lot of guys around have had winches, but self recovery winches just aren't used around here. I suppose you city boys don't always have access to heavy machinery or tractors and 3 inch chain. Places where us country boys get stuck, no trees, but plenty of yellow or Green iron around to help out. I have a 3,500lb winch on the front of my RTV 900 and it's not quite up to the task. I have been stuck with it numerous times and actually had a successful self recovery using the winch maybe once. I tried a couple different 'land anchors' forget what they are called, and there wasn't one that worked in all the conditions that I might encounter in a day. Mud, to sand to high centered and maybe a few more tossed in for good measure. The most use I have gotten out of it is during burning season. I've used that winch many many times to pull poo poo out of the way or simply as an already attached two line that I can get to fast to hook a piece of debris and move it. That all being said, i've gotten pretty good at not getting stuck. When you work alone and there's no one to help you out, you have to call someone to help you get everything moved and dug out. It can really turn into a project, occasionally, if you're hosed up bad enough and the right people hear about it, it will become a spectator sport. Too bad we haven't had enough rain in the last two years to do anything but just make the dust calm down. IV8, it's a 40 year old dump truck with jesus knows how many miles on it. She's running fine the way she is and I need to learn to shift better, not more power. I'm going to be on the road for a few days. I'm attending a conference...that I am being paid to go to....they are paying mileage, for a room, meals, AND giving me a stipend. How about that? edit: Weather this morning that went blasting past the ranch:   Back side of that sucker:  VVVV Our dogs go to his house, he's leaving on a different trip saturday morning. My woman gets back friday night to get the dogs, and I get home late saturday and hopefully things aren't totally hosed when I get back. If I was leaving for a length of time I would either have pop check on things or get my neighbor to do it. Things just sort of should maintain themselves. Two years ago when I was racing karts, we were on the road almost every other weekend. It's been done before. Good question though. Cows pretty much stay where you put them as long as they don't want to leave. Ya just gotta make them want to stay until you get back and can figure out what they want/need next.
Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 18:08 on May 30, 2013 |
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May 30, 2013 17:55
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two days of hell, two days on the road and I de-tracked my cutter about two hours ago. I'm at home eating and getting tools to head back to the brush to fix it. I'm planning on time lapsing the repair. FML. edit: Yeah, it's been a long day. I'm about to crack the cameras and see what they have for the day. I might do a youtubery thingy if there's anything good to string together. The teeth are supposed to be inside the flanges.   edit2: the fix: http://youtu.be/KY_agE2R_3k Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 02:53 on Jun 4, 2013 |
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Jun 3, 2013 20:00
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Sorry in advance for the double post. Hi, my name is Used Sunlight Sales and I'm an Alcoholic. It's been exactly eight years since my last drink. 
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Jun 5, 2013 05:10
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Thanks for the support guys. Some days are easier than others, and I've had some hard days lately. I had a birthday a few days ago, my 35th, and it's starting to hit me that I might have less years in front of me than I do behind me. Every year thats getting statistically more likely. Fo3 posted:I'd probably stop drinking if I have any hope or future, or could smoke pot without any repercussions instead. I realized I had a problem and started taking steps to deal with it before I ruined my life. Delivery McGee posted:I always wondered about rubberband tracks. So it works more or less like the serpentine belt on a car? Pull back the tension pulley, slip it over and crank it back out? The tracks have steel cross bars, that's what the drive lugs engage on, and there's a good size steel cable inside each side too. The cables link the lugs and it's all rubber covered. They make steel tracks for bobcat brand machines, I haven't operated one, but I understand that it's a niche thing on a skid steer. If you need a big rear end skid steer on steel tracks, the job can usually be done better by a dozer. There's also some serious wear issues at higher speeds. My machine will run just under 8 mph, Bobcats run 11 on wheels, 8-9 on rubber tracks and 6 on steel tracks, so there's also a speed advantage. I bet they sell a lot of steel tracks on forestry only machines up north where they use big skids with mulch heads, but I haven't seen one in the wild here. You've got the basic concept of how to roll it back on, but it's a little harder to do in reality. You're the first person since I registered to get it. edit: 11:10pm, I have a Compost stealing Racoon in one live trap, and a second trap still baited. A second coon has been sighted in the area, and he's tried to rescue his buddy/lover. total catch so far: 1 Racoon (he was tried and convicted of compost theft. awaiting his date with his maker in the morning.) 2 cats, both released back into the wild. edit2: Total trap count: 2 cats, both released back into the wild. 2 coons, neither will be a problem ever again. Kicked rear end sawing this morning and got some good footage. I have some errands to run, hopefully I can finish the editing later and upload it. I've got a bunch of pics too, just need to sort them all and tell some sort of a story instead of a random pic blast with just captions. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 23:25 on Jun 7, 2013 |
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Jun 6, 2013 22:34
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Cakefool, I never really planned on making a thread like this when I bought my account. (the how, why and the day I bought my account will make for a good story I think. ) the name is clever and witty and I love it for this setting. I don't think many people get it, but I bet there's a lot that do. InitialDave posted:Where do you stand with these things? Are they considered vermin, and it's illegal to release them if caught, or is it up to you what you do with them? Racoons are vermin and a disease vector. They are very clever and master thieves. They can teach others by demonstration and have an excellent memory. Once they start getting in to your trash/compost/catfood/etc, they will go to the easiest source of food. In my case, for now that's my compost bin. There's still more of them on the loose that know about my compost bin, so the traps are getting reset tonight. I guess the answer to your question is no one cares about them, and mostly, there isn't any loving bleeding heart tree hugging clueless morons to tell me that it's cruel to shoot the coons, so I do what I want. I use live traps because kill traps can catch a lot of stuff that you would rather be left alive.
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Jun 8, 2013 01:40
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My woman and I have a pretty fair size garden, (I can post pics if someone wants) and general household trash has it's own set of problems when you live where we live. So we have a compost barrel. It's pretty cool until the frickin Raccoons figure out how to open it, pull out all the rotting things that are composting while looking for food treasures. So traps, Caught this one last night  And the second sometime after we went to bed.  Happy red dog is happy. Found a giant rear end beetle cruising around the other day.  That's 5.5 kVDC BTW, showing a small current drop. How the arrow points towards it faults is some sort of electronic devilry that I will never understand. How the frick does it make ONE point of contact on the wire and grounding through a metal plate on the back, through my hand, body, boots and ground and know which way I need to look on the fence?  Maybe the wrong thread, but it's the right subforum. 27hp, 54 inch deck JD 830A. It's a badass lawn mower, still takes 3 hours to mow everything that we mow here. And I loving HATE mowing.  SOme more AI content? sure, I can do that. Here's tensioning the tracks... You have to lift the front off the ground. The book says to use jacks. I say jacks are for suckers. I say the machine has built in hydraulic jacks. I operate this machine daily and I am well aware of how fast the cylinders and valves leak and which way. Not 100% engineering approved, but I'm way out in the brush and you gotta make do.  Front up, tracks loose like your mom after a frat party.  All tightened up again.  Well that doesn't look TOO bad...  Ever seen a machine with tracks at full power in reverse still sliding downhill? No? I have seen it from the drivers seat.  That was hairy as hell by the way. The fun part? There's a pond at the bottom of the hill. I didn't get that on video because I had the camera set up to catch both pop and I working today since I knew that we were going to be in the same area. One of the times in the video that I leave frame is when I go cut that muddy wet hillside. Video you say? Oh, a link. Here ya go. http://youtu.be/D2odzR-tHw4 Enjoy.
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Jun 8, 2013 05:29
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Cakefool posted:Well if you keep taking the trees down there won't be any I'll leave some, I'll need more firewood eventually. Speaking of that, it's about time to start that loving adventure for the year too. ugh. Who wants a time lapse of me processing firewood by myself with suboptimal splitting device? The Locator posted:Those are some pretty good size trees. I'd love to break in to the cedar biomass business. There's a lot of trees that need to be cut, it's a shame to let them go to waste. I want to find a way to process them in one or two steps and have a saleable products. I have a few ideas. Billy Tully posted:This thread turned out way awesome and its a much bigger dump truck than I thought, mine are just little baby one-tons. I drive ZTRs for a living and losing traction on a hill is the scariest thing since there is not much you can do except ride it out. Last time it happened to me I almost went over a 3-4 foot drop onto a road but I managed to save it in time, it was a wicked pucker moment. I own a landscaping company and your job is very similar to mine but on a much larger scale, I'm always either working or fixing a piece of my equipment or trucks. Going out right now to fix one of my tractors, its running lean and backfiring huge flameballs out the muffler that are louder than a rifle shot. I enjoy playing in the dirt and making stuff. I'm pretty good at it and I think that eventually I'll be able to make a pile of money doing it. The amount of calls I have had from neighbors about hauling for them has been pretty unexpected. At least three times a week I get a call. I really need to get my rear end in gear with that truck and get tags on it. There's money to be made and favors to earn. Having (Ted) Turner ranches in your debt is never a bad thing. Yeah, that guy with the There's something to be said about working outside in the fresh air all day. I love it. I didn't mention it, but I got 31 more Guineas last friday to replace the ones that ran away. Well, five died today, I think I figured out why and I will know in the morning. My woman and I went out to check things on the ranch this afternoon and then go cruise around in the Rzr all day and goof off. 1pm, everything is cool. 3pm, fences are blown out, voltage on the wire is 600 volts and the cows are spread out between five different paddocks. 6pm, fences fixed, ground fault found and fixed, 7,000 volts on the wire and the cows are where they are supposed be. poo poo like that only happens on a sunday. Only on a sunday. All we wanted to do was goof off for a bit and go fishing. Oh well. I have to get my spray rig back out and ready, it's time to spray some brush. I'll show you and explain in a future post about all that crap. It's been a long frickin day and I'm going to bed.
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Jun 10, 2013 05:05
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It's been an interesting week. Not much dump truckin or tree killin, just lots and lots of cowtastrophes. Including writing this post twice, because I can't remember how to properly switch tabs. Squeeze, I've been working at this most of my life I just kind of know what needs to be done. I have a room that I'm converting to an office at a basically glacial pace, I have things written on the walls and a couple of white boards around to remind me too. I work until I can't work anymore or everything that needs to be done that day is done. I've had some long days this week putting cows back where they belong. I trapped some more Raccoons in my yard.  That makes a total of four. I've kept the traps out for a week now and there hasn't been anything else so I think I'm good and our compost pile is safe again. I picked up blades for my pop's mower and helped him change them last week.   His is a 48 inch 17hp I think, still takes him 2 1/2 hours to cut his grass. We have a 54 inch, 27hp beast and it takes 3 hours to get around it all. Weed eating? yeah, that's a three hour project to do it properly. The hotter it gets, the less fucks I give about keeping my yard looking decent. Who wants to spend three hours in the blazing rear end 115 degree heat and dust mowing when you've already been out in the heat most of the day. I would happily trade room/board for a yard and garden worker. I also have a greenhouse kit that I bought and we're going to put it up soon. I saw this guy the other day, anyone got details?  How about some ranchy poo poo? The oil companies are supposed to maintain their fences to keep cattle out of their pumping units and tank batteries.  How's that going.   Just another minor cowtastrophe. Moving mineral tubs, I use a different rig most of the time, it just happened to be the easiest way to do it that day.  That big black shiny plastic tub still had about 90lbs of product. FML. I had to go deal with a broken pipe on my last remaining windmill. What's a windmill?  That's a windmill. Wind turns blades, motor box at the top turns the rotation into reciprocation and jacks the pump at the end of the rod up and down. The white tank is filled from the 10,000 gallon tank (silver) in the background. When the foreground tank is full it feeds the lower tank that the cows have actually been drinking on. I can also fill the giant storage tank off of the ranch's south water system.  Someday I am going to be forced to drain that tank and clean it out. Maybe next time I have have an intern.  That's evil nasty shovel work. The brakes on the windmill motor didn't work over the winter and it let water freeze in the standpipe. Look for the most vertical pipe, that's it.  Here's the damage:  I closed up the gap a bit  And then I fixed it, with silicone and fiberglass. And I will be damned if I can find those pics. So that brings to me to today's disasters. First thing the cows come north through the water trap, root cause? This fence charger somehow came open while still attached to the post, the battery got knocked out and somehow it reclosed and latched itself. It took me a few minutes to figure out what was going on. It stormed last night, so that explains it. It also explains this.  Which I have to explain to you is the fence between the 267 pairs that I have and my neighbors 40 pair. Notice the missing gate? During the storm they broke it down. I patched it up real quick with scavenged wire. I know where bits and stashes of wire are around. You finish your repairs generally at a corner or other brace and usually whatever extra supplies I have already cut out, I'll loop around the center brace post. Not all of them, but enough that it saves me a few trips to HQ for supplies a year.  A patch job will hold the cows for a few minutes. I ran to HQ to get some supplies to fix it right.  Then I called the neighbor and my cowboy crew and spent all day pasture cutting and sorting out the neighbors. It was a long long day, but hey, it was only 87.  A little more fence repair.  It's been a really really long day. let me know if the images are all working, I'm having cache issues.
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Jun 18, 2013 03:01
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So there's more than one Potato King. I'll remember that next time that guy tries to use 'royal privilege' to cut in front at Taco Bell. He was on US HWY 54/400, I was out of my territory, not him most likely. edit so I don't double post... How's your day going? Here's mine.    I might have gotten a little rowdy, couldn't see what was going on though. Made it back to the landing and shutdown. Parts from John Deere are on order, so I guess I don't get to cut trees today. I was in the groove and kicking rear end though. Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 19:47 on Jun 19, 2013 |
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Jun 18, 2013 15:10
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All my parts finally showed up at JD yesterday, so I'm heading up there in a little bit to get them. Yeah, it's sunday, but it's also wheat harvest. Everyone has extended hours around here, especially tractor stealerships during harvest. I haven't got much done between waiting on parts and putting cows back in almost every day. A week ago I got tired of the poo poo and just started building new fence when they broke down the old instead of patching the wire. These cows have a wonderful ability to find every single weak spot in all of my fences. It's getting annoying. My face is fried, I've got blisters on my nose. Only about 2 weeks early this year. I'm also getting another 253 cows tomorrow (monday.) Sup with you guys?
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Jun 23, 2013 21:33
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