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Just spent five hours with my buddy Tim cutting, splitting and stacking firewood, holy balls am I tired. Tim might have had too much to drink last night, we got the last load in my woodshed and he walked out, turned the corner and  about six or eight times. We called it quits after that. I had my time lapse out, but guess who forgot to check the batteries? Have this instead, we shot some tannerite last weekend. This one is just a couple fairly close shots to a pound of the stuff. Next time I will move it a little closer. http://youtu.be/X7yc3a_30DI Helped my neighbor gather, sort, work and ship 70 odd head of calves last week that was fun. I haven't seen some of that crew in a long time. I haven't laughed or worked that hard in a long time either. The end of my cow season is in sight and approaching FAST. Within three weeks everything will go home. 
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Oct 20, 2013 22:24
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Did you ever get that bull for your neighbor?
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Oct 29, 2013 14:08
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dreesemonkey posted:Did you ever get that bull for your neighbor? Not yet. I've been working on roads and a couple other projects I will share soon. In the mean time, have another dump trucking video! http://youtu.be/s_AHufASkJA
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Nov 2, 2013 04:36
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Picture time! All the cows are getting ready to go away in the next two weeks. I'm shipping out 266 on thursday, they are leaving on trucks. The rest are walking home on the 11 or 12, all they have to do is cross a fence. To the cows, that will be just like any other move, just walk through the gate. Loading trucks is a little harder, but all these cows have been on trucks before. We'll start at 8, order the trucks for 10. They will probably show up closer to nine and we'll get done about noon. I broke a couple ribs a little over a month ago, and that slowed me down a bunch, between that, crappy weather and trying to get my yard at home cleaned up before the winter sets in, I haven't done much. Here's a road I worked on so it was passable with our overloaded equipment trailers. Before:  after:  Found this dude out cruising around while I was working on that trail. The crescent wrench is eight inches for reference.   Tarantulas aren't known to be aggressive, but they can jump and they can move mighty fast when they want to. I've learned that when they rear up like that, it's time to gently caress off and leave them alone. I got my pop to come out and help my neighbor and I prepare some fireline that is only a half mile from my house, on the other side of the river. Here's some brush I cleared. before  after  Pop with some brush   My neighbor's baby Cat 262C with a grapple full of brush.    Our home base for about a week  Gratuitous dog pictures   Found this guy  and this little guy  Think this belt has any more hours left in it?  I've talked about the suck wagon/cake truck/candy wagon before, this one is my neighbors  Chute stowed  deployed and dropping cake, it's hard to drive, operate the feeder controls and take pics all at the same time. I need two more hands.  Here's the controls for the feeder, the toggles on the panel run the feeder, the giant knobs run the arms for the bale loader. The switch on the far left is for the siren (to call in the cows)  Bought a load of firewood since I've been hurt too much this year and didn't get enough put up.   About a third of it wasn't cut to the right length, so I got the guys to refund me some money  Pop decided that he needed to buy a new Ute for the ranch. So he found the first Kubota RTV-X1100 on a dealer lot within 250 miles and now he owns the first one in the state. Our local dealer told us that they weren't looking to even see one before the first of the year. Getting parts might be fun for awhile....    the transmission and cab have been redesigned, and it's a whole lot better of a machine that the old RTV-1100. I'm going to try to shoot video of loading the cows and make a loading and unloading video of working in the corrals if the footage turns out decent. e: tables! Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 21:49 on Nov 3, 2013 |
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Nov 3, 2013 21:47
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Great pics. How did you manage to break your ribs? You healing up okay? That baby Cat is adorable. The enclosed cab of that Kubota seems very livable but looks hilariously out of proportion from the external view. Those are 4WD, no?
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Nov 4, 2013 21:43
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I guess I didn't tell the broken ribs story. Wasn't wearing my seat belt in my skid steer, bailed off a little drop that looked like about 9 inches, turned out to be more like over two feet. The dozer blade in front bit hard, the machine stopped, the lap bar and windshield stopped me. Then I worked the rest of the day, the next and hauled rock for six hours the day after that. Then I took a few days off to heal up. That Cat 262 isn't a baby, I just tease him because next to my JD 333D it looks small. 262C's have 70 or so hp, they are good machines. The cab in the new Kubota is amazeballs. The ride is so much better and they kept everything good about the transmission, made it better and fixed what made it suck. It's a 1.1L 3cyl diesel with a two range Hydrostat transmission behind it. 4WD is available, the front is a limited slip now and the rear is a locker. It will climb things in Hi range that the old one would need to be in medium or low to crawl up. The cab LOOKS big until you put two dogs and me in there, then it's a little small. 
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Nov 5, 2013 01:15
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Just wanted to join the raving about Kubota. My G/F's dad just picked up a new compact utility tractor... and let me tell you that has got to be the most fuel efficient, extremely powerful and comfortable tractor. Its a nice little machine and can really get some work done while being easy on fuel. I would dare say that its almost better than a Deere of the same size for half the price.
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Nov 5, 2013 01:48
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Can that Kubota actually comfortably haul more than 1000lb? We've demoed a bunch of new UTV's at work and they're all utter garbage these days. Fast as gently caress and fun to drive, but otherwise useless garbage for hauling aggregate. I just want a couple of old kawasaki mules.
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Nov 5, 2013 01:53
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Kubota makes really good small tractors. Nothing really in the size that anyone around here uses for actual farming, but a lot of guys have them as loader tractors or to be a PTO power source for things like augers, pulling hay rakes, balers, things like that. The RTV x1100 is rated to haul 1,600lbs in the bed, and it's a got hydraulic dump. A couple hundred pounds of fence supplies is nothing. My neighbors Ranger will haul about as much, but it's a plastic bed and it doesn't dump. His also doesn't have A/C, heater or a radio. Hypno, tell your boss to look at the Kubota UTV's. Most of them have dump beds, even the older plain RTV series usually has a dump bed and they can haul a lot of weight for their size. If it's really muddy on your jobsites they might not be the best rig. With the trans in good shape, even an older RTV-900 will haul 1,500lbs of whatever you can stuff in the back at 20mph on flat ground, any hills though and you're stuck in low range and limited to about 7mph. Medium gets you about 15 and high tops out at 27 or so. The RTV-X series has a new trans, only two speeds. Low goes to 15 and High goes to 27+, but the pumps and reliefs are re-calibrated for more power. This morning the first pile of cows went home. We gathered and loaded 265 head this morning, started at 8:15, trucks rolled in at 9:35 done at 11:20. Nice easy smooth day. 
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Nov 7, 2013 19:48
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Does "cows going home" meaning turning them into delicious burgers? Or do they go somewhere else for the winter? Despite living in a rural area, I'm pretty ignorant about how long it takes a cow to fatten up to where they can be shrinkwrapped. You don't have to answer this one if you don't want to, but what are the economics of cattle raising? I know you're at least loosely paid on the weight of the cow, are there different pay rates for their condition, how they're fed, etc? Can you give a ballpark average you receive per cow? Do you sell hides too or is it mostly just for meat? That kubota looks awesome
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Nov 8, 2013 15:14
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I have a dumb question regarding 4WD systems. You mentioned the Kubota having a high, medium, and low range. Most 4WD systems I've seen on passenger vehicles that have a transfer case usually just have high and low ranges. Does the middle range simply mean the addition of an extra gear in the transfer case with a ratio in between the high and low ranges?
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Nov 8, 2013 16:01
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Used Sunlight sales posted:This morning the first pile of cows went home. We gathered and loaded 265 head this morning, started at 8:15, trucks rolled in at 9:35 done at 11:20. Nice easy smooth day. Do you know if the cows know something bad is going to happen to them?  What's in the cake you were giving them? I have so much to learn about farms. Excellent thread by the way, love lurking it. Michael Scott fucked around with this message at 18:42 on Nov 8, 2013 |
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Nov 8, 2013 18:39
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dreesemonkey posted:Does "cows going home" meaning turning them into delicious burgers? Or do they go somewhere else for the winter? Despite living in a rural area, I'm pretty ignorant about how long it takes a cow to fatten up to where they can be shrinkwrapped. I don't own any of the stock that I run, the ones that were sent home belong to Bar F, about an 1:45 minute truck ride away. Think about (mother) cows as the production, they make calves. Bulls make cows pregnant. After the calves are born, they stay with their mothers about a month, maybe two depending on the particular ranch. After a month, or as soon as two weeks, the calves are 'worked.' Working the calves involves giving them a round of vaccinations, sometimes a brand, but almost always an Identifying ear tag. The calves are then fattened up, drinking milk and eating forage for several months. Bar F and I like to wean the calves in the last two weeks of August. at that time they are a good size and ready to be away from mom. The calves are sorted off the cows and shipped out for further processing, more on that in a moment. Most of the cows I take for Bar F have their calves in late winter or early spring, there's about a 45 day window when they are all born. Generally the cow comes back 'open' with 30 days and is ready to be bred back. Bar F artificially inseminates all their cows and the conception rates are usually in the high 90'S percent wise. In fact anything less than 95% is bad, and can indicate a problem with your genetics or a mineral deficiency or some other problem that can be solved. Most guys are happy with 90% anyway. Cows that don't breed back and are 'open' generally get sold off ASAP. If the cow isn't carrying a calf, she's going to be pure cost until the next calving cycle. Bar F works the cows when they get shipped home, in fact, I think they are doing it today. This is when they will be checking to see how many bred back and how many are open. The calves on the other hand can have one of several fates. The girl calves that have desirable genetics will be kept for replacements (to replace older cows.) Most of the males will have their balls removed (calf balls are called Rocky Mountain Oysters in case you were wondering) and become steers. A steer's sole purpose in life is to eat, get fat and then be shrinkwrapped. Some will go back to grass, some will go to a holding yard, some will go to corn stalks, some will go to a dry lot, it all depends on what is available cheap. The Males that get to keep their balls become the next generation of bulls. Only the best genetics in both bulls and heifers (females that have had less than 2 calves) are kept. When a cow or bull reaches the end of their usefulness, it's time to go the the slaughter house and be turned into beef. To answer your first question, it takes about 12-18 months from birth to shrinkwrap. The economics of the business really depends on how your business is structured. Mine are pretty good, but I'm sort of in a niche all on my own. The cost to graze a cow on grass is partially based on the cost to feed a cow in a dry lot and hay/grain prices. I have already set my price for next season, I'll either make some or break even. I have to be cheaper than the feedlots, but I have to be high enough that I can make a living. Short answer: I charge by the head, by the day. Without getting into specifics and tossing around numbers that's the best I can explain it to you guys. I'd rather not have the whole world (especially my ex wife) know what my cash flows are. Almost every part of the cow gets used in something, nothing goes to waste. Like beef sticks? Wanna know what parts of the cow they put in that stuff? (trust me you really don't want to know.) Buy small label beef jerky, don't buy processed beef sticks. The hides go to make leather goods, even the eyes, brain and tongue are used for things. Hooves....Ever wonder where gelatin comes from? The Midniter posted:I have a dumb question regarding 4WD systems. You mentioned the Kubota having a high, medium, and low range. Most 4WD systems I've seen on passenger vehicles that have a transfer case usually just have high and low ranges. Does the middle range simply mean the addition of an extra gear in the transfer case with a ratio in between the high and low ranges? The older RTV was a pretty straight forward transmissionwise, the diesel turns a hydraulic pump, a variable displacement swash plate type pump. The fluid circulates through a series of metering and relief valves before it goes to the motors. There's one torque motor to help it get going and then as pressure drops on the low speed motor a high speed motor gets cut into the system and gives you some more output RPM. The output of both motors comes to a common shaft that is the input shaft to a three speed non syncro transmission. So it's more like a hydrostat that has three speed ranges. Michael Scott posted:Do you know if the cows know something bad is going to happen to them? Honestly, I don't know if cows can understand anything other than the immediate future and recent past. Cows are great at reading people and body language too, I think that they know something is going ot happen, but they don't know what. What's in 'cake' is a fairly hard question, as to specifics it varies a but form supplier to supplier. Basically, it's a protein source, an assload of vitamin A, some Non Protein Nitrogen (very important) a little fat, some phosphorus and a little calcium. I'm not real sure why there's vitamin A in it, but I'm sure there is a reason. The NPN (non protein nitrogen) helps feed the microbes in the cow's first stomach, and those microbes in turn are supercharged and do a great job of breaking down long chain starches found in lignified range grasses. It makes the cows a lot more efficient one poorer forage found late in the season. Cake is also used a treat or reward. Follow the suck wagon for awhile and you'll get cake. That sort of thing. Thanks for the compliments and questions. My world out here in the country is way different that your world in town. Speaking of town, I went there today. 2,500 people, first time in a week I have been to town. I don't miss it at all.
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Nov 8, 2013 20:15
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Used Sunlight sales posted:I'm not real sure why there's vitamin A in it, but I'm sure there is a reason. Vitamin A is used mainly for epithelial tissue repair/maintenance (Things like: skin, respiratory and digestive tracts, etc.) and is somehow related/needed for night sight. I think there are some other things related to the kidneys and bone development as well. It's definitely important.
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Nov 8, 2013 20:58
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Viper_3000 posted:Vitamin A is used mainly for epithelial tissue repair/maintenance (Things like: skin, respiratory and digestive tracts, etc.) and is somehow related/needed for night sight. I think there are some other things related to the kidneys and bone development as well. It's definitely important. Vitamin A is also important for the immune system!
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Nov 8, 2013 21:56
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Viper_3000 posted:Vitamin A is used mainly for epithelial tissue repair/maintenance (Things like: skin, respiratory and digestive tracts, etc.) and is somehow related/needed for night sight. I think there are some other things related to the kidneys and bone development as well. It's definitely important. I thought the B vitamins were important for sight - may be wrong. I know the brits just fed their soldiers a ton of carrots so they got better night vision instead of having Lucas build them night vision scopes.
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Nov 8, 2013 23:02
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kastein posted:I thought the B vitamins were important for sight - may be wrong. I know the brits just fed their soldiers a ton of carrots so they got better night vision instead of having Lucas build them night vision scopes. That, and the fact that most of their test modules caused irreversible brain cancer..
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Nov 9, 2013 00:27
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West SAAB Story posted:That, and the fact that most of their test modules caused irreversible brain cancer.. Was that before, during, or after they caught on fire? 
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Nov 9, 2013 00:31
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Terrible Robot posted:Was that before, during, or after they caught on fire? Yes, yes, and yes, respectively.
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Nov 9, 2013 00:32
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kastein posted:I know the brits just fed their soldiers a ton of carrots so they got better night vision instead of having Lucas build them night vision scopes. Carrots are good for your eyes, but you're not going to be developing Predator-style multi-spectrum vision any time soon.
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Nov 9, 2013 00:42
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kastein posted:I thought the B vitamins were important for sight - may be wrong. I know the brits just fed their soldiers a ton of carrots so they got better night vision instead of having Lucas build them night vision scopes. B vitamins are primarily involved in regulating and promoting cellular metabolism (especially that of sugars).
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Nov 9, 2013 00:50
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kastein posted:I thought the B vitamins were important for sight - may be wrong. I know the brits just fed their soldiers a ton of carrots so they got better night vision instead of having Lucas build them night vision scopes. Mr Chips is right, B Vitamins are for cell metabolism. Carrots, more specifically provide beta-carotene which when combined with bile acids is converted into retinol (the active form of vitamin A). Fun fact though, 45% of people are unable to convert beta-carotene into retinol. Used Sunlight, obviously you've in the middle of a busy season/time right now, but what's the off-season/time look like if you have one? Just mostly upkeep/road building and things like that?
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Nov 9, 2013 02:47
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InitialDave posted:It's more we needed a cover story for how (now secretly radar-assisted) aircrews were achieving their disproportionate hit ratios on the Germans, and it just so happened that there was a surplus of carrots which people needed to be convinced were a good idea to eat more of. Holy poo poo, I did a research project on the development of RADAR in high school and somehow never put two and two together. Thanks for the correction.
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Nov 9, 2013 06:18
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Viper_3000 posted:
I kind of am getting into my 'off season.' Which will involve a lot of tree cutting and road building. My really busy time is in the spring, getting ready for cattle and the first six weeks while I am grazing cattle are by far my busiest times of the year. March 1 is really when the chaos starts around here. I get cattle around the first of May and things calm down in about the middle of July.
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Nov 10, 2013 18:18
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How's winter/icemageddon treating you? Heard most of the midwest got nailed, we just got a ton of sleet and freezing rain.
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Dec 7, 2013 17:28
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Used Sunlight sales posted:<all about hamburgers> Thanks for the informative post. What is the average lifespan of cows and bulls? How much do cows and bulls usually weigh, how much do steers normally weigh when it's time for shrink wrap? And last, how can they tell the quality of the genetics? Is it all a visual inspection or is there testing done to determine who the next lucky bull will be?
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Dec 7, 2013 19:56
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kastein posted:How's winter/icemageddon treating you? Heard most of the midwest got nailed, we just got a ton of sleet and freezing rain. Just bitter bitter frickin cold here. It was 1F when I got up this morning at 8am. I refilled the stove and went back to bed for another hour. Mostly, I'm just sitting around at home doing nothing or sitting at the bar playing pitch. I just got back from clearing the tank that the bulls are drinking out of from ice. It was only about 3-4 inches thick. As far as crap on the ground, we got about a quarter inch of snow the other day. Barely enough to coat the roads. I heat mostly with wood, and it makes the air in the house dry as gently caress. 26% humidity inside, I have about the biggest humidifier available for household use and it runs about 3 1/2 gallons of water a day. I keep a 6 quart pot on the stove, and that water stays about 200F or so. My water is really hard, so it has to be changed daily. Colonel Sanders posted:Thanks for the informative post. What is the average lifespan of cows and bulls? How much do cows and bulls usually weigh, how much do steers normally weigh when it's time for shrink wrap? And last, how can they tell the quality of the genetics? Is it all a visual inspection or is there testing done to determine who the next lucky bull will be? There's a lot of questions in there, I'll try my best to answer them all. Avg Lifespan IIRC is about 10-14 years for commercial cow, the ones that are bred to make calves, much after ten if she comes open (not pregnant) she will go down the road and be someone else's problem. Either another producer or a slaughterhouse after a short stay in the feedyard. Cow weight can vary wildly depending on breed, and location to some extent determines the dominant breed. Around here, the Black Angus and Angus X cattle that we have, the cows will weigh around 1100-1400lbs. Bar F and I both like smaller frame cows, so most of his are down close to 1200lbs. Some of the Three Bars bulls that I am taking care of right now weigh in about 2,400lbs. Most are about 1800-2000lbs. Steers can be anywhere from 800 to 1,200lbs when it's time for them to be shrink wrapped. Genetic quality is harder to determine. I think Kit Pharo out in Colorado has the right idea, and Kansas State is full of crap. K State would have us all believe that cows should stand around in a dry lot and have feed hauled to them. KSU likes big cows that throw big calves. Big cows are really not as efficient as a smaller animal at converting forage into muscle mass, so it takes more input for maintenance and gain. The smaller cows that bar F has bred still throw a good size calf, but they are so much easier to take care of and need less forage than a bigger animal does that the profits are better on smaller cows, because you can run more of them. The answer to your genetics question is really half a question, what's your goal? At every stage of the animals life the owner makes notes, then over the winter a lot of guys spend time going over their records and seeing is working and what isn't for his goals. I have a bit of a dilemma. I watched a truck wreck on monday, caught some of it on my dashcam. I'm thinking about stripping the audio out (I say my name and give a exact location when I call 911) and posting it. No gore, just an an overturned truck. Post to youtube or ? What would you be concerned about seeing in a video like that? The driver was walking around on his own power, his ear might be a little worse for wear though, it was basically hanging off my a little flap of skin. The driver did get a helicopter ride to Wichita though.
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Dec 7, 2013 23:56
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Used Sunlight sales posted:The driver was walking around on his own power, his ear might be a little worse for wear though, it was basically hanging off my a little flap of skin. The driver did get a helicopter ride to Wichita though. Heh, sounds like he got a helicopter ride just to try and save his ear! It's not every day you get a story like that. I'd like to see that video.
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Dec 8, 2013 00:05
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Used Sunlight sales posted:I heat mostly with wood, and it makes the air in the house dry as gently caress. 26% humidity inside, I have about the biggest humidifier available for household use and it runs about 3 1/2 gallons of water a day. I keep a 6 quart pot on the stove, and that water stays about 200F or so. My water is really hard, so it has to be changed daily. I hope you have a powered log splitter. My uncle heats with wood as well, and I had to help him split wood last year...what a huge pain in the rear end. (I wound up pulling a muscle in my back and was bedridden for a couple days after) This year I convinced him to buy a powered one that runs on gas. We lined his covered shed wall with 2 rows about 5 feet high. He might not have to split more next year if the winter is mild this year. Used Sunlight sales posted:Genetic quality is harder to determine. I think Kit Pharo out in Colorado has the right idea, and Kansas State is full of crap. K State would have us all believe that cows should stand around in a dry lot and have feed hauled to them. KSU likes big cows that throw big calves. Big cows are really not as efficient as a smaller animal at converting forage into muscle mass, so it takes more input for maintenance and gain. The smaller cows that bar F has bred still throw a good size calf, but they are so much easier to take care of and need less forage than a bigger animal does that the profits are better on smaller cows, because you can run more of them. Speaking of universities, how much credence do farmers/ranchers give to them? I know where I come from, most farmers take their advice/findings with a heavy grain of salt or brush them off. Do you have much interaction with them? Used Sunlight sales posted:I have a bit of a dilemma. I watched a truck wreck on monday, caught some of it on my dashcam. I'm thinking about stripping the audio out (I say my name and give a exact location when I call 911) and posting it. No gore, just an an overturned truck. Post to youtube or ? As long as the driver made it out without significant damage, I don't see a problem with it. If the guy wound up dead I wouldn't want to see it.
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Dec 8, 2013 00:36
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Used Sunlight sales posted:I have a bit of a dilemma. Having spent a lot of years on the meat wagon (I was a paramedic) I don't need to see any more of that, so my opinion may be different than most. But my first question would be: how the hell would you feel if you were that guy? My guess is not happy. And I'm betting this is nothing novel......it's just another bog standard accident and injury that's been posted and posted plenty of times before. Why be "that guy?"
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Dec 8, 2013 00:38
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Thanks for your informative reply about bovine! As for the youtube dilemma, did you get any footage of the wreck or did you just roll up on the aftermath? As interesting as watching some dude staggering around with his ear torn off sounds, I wouldn't post that kind of video to youtube due to privacy issues. All the car wreck videos I remember watching on youtube are usually just a few seconds before impact + mechanical carnage and cut off as soon as the cars stop bouncing.
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Dec 9, 2013 00:37
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I haven't updated or posted here in a while. It's been a rough cold rear end winter. It's really hard to get a whole lot of stuff done when it's this cold outside, not to mention the 6-8 inches of snow that's been hanging around for a week. Not much exciting stuff going on. Building a couple roads, some on my place, some for a neighbor. All the stock I have on the ranch right now amounts to 38 bulls from my partner. When it's below freezing and there's snow on the ground he's over there to feed anyway, so he checks the water and breaks ice. I just get paid for the grass. It's a sweet deal that helps me out a bit and helps him out a bunch. Kinda sorta going in order, here's a pic dump. I have some pics of starting projects, but very few in progress and almost none finished. I get in the zone and have been forgetting to take along my GoPro, time lapse and just simply whipping out my phone to snap a few pics. Sorry about that. I will try to get better. A friend drank just a bit too much, got in a fight with her sweetie on the way home from the bar. He had to walk a couple miles back towards their house, she went back to the bar. She didn't make, blew the last corner before town at about 70. The corner is behind me, you can see where the car went, it did at least one roll and came to rest PAST the first cedar tree you can see.  She got life flighted out to the nearest ICU. This was a couple of months ago, she's home now recovering. I got a new welder, my trusty Millermatic 130 poo poo itself. The gas control solenoid quit working. I had a thing to weld, so I tossed in some flux core, re-set up the polarity and less than ten minutes later the breaker popped on the main panel. reset the breaker and the welder won't turn on. Something something transformer, so I just bought a new machine.  It's a sweet rig, welds a lot better than my Miller. It has a plug to run 110/220, just change the ends. I like that, especially if I have need to take it with me somewhere out of the shop. I have enough generator to pull. I got a new skid steer toy, got a grader blade this time. I've done a bit of work with it, and it works real nice. It's made with a 5/16th inch shear pin on the blade swing mechanism, so it won't handle heavy ripping and cutting, but that's what my other blade and scraper are for. Getting things roughed in, then I bring in the grader and make everything pretty.  Again, I forgot to get any pics after we uncrated it, put it together or any of the work I have done with it. I'm a failure at taking pics lately. The first or second day of running, it developed a pinhole leak in one of the hoses.   Kind of frustrating to have a hosed up hose on a brand new piece of equipment. My loving wagon broke again, good luck to have it happen AFTER my woman and I already pulled five loads of firewood down to the house. I did rebuild it, no pics of the process. Next time I get teh wagon empty I'll take some pics of how I fixed it. Everything under the front end was bent or out of shape in some way. It's been reinforced and built a bit heavier, it shouldn't break again up front. It does need a new wheel...again. It's got a rim on the back where the hub is cracking out of the center of the wheel. I might try to weld it, or I migh tjust break down and buy a new five dollar rim.  Here I'm working on a road project for a neighbor. He calls it his 'Mountain pass." I got the dirt work done a month ago and it hasn't been warm enough yet for me to even want to think about getting the Pete started.  I did a catch basin clean out for him too. The soils we have here are extremely erodible in places and they create a lot of sediment. This little pond was to catch sediment before it runs into the creek. Does a good job too, the landowner said that he cleaned it out not less than 7 years ago. Made a few passes to test the ground. One of the worst places to be stuck is in sediment that isn't dry.  A couple hours later.... The hole has been dug out, the dam rebuilt and widened from 6 feet to 12. I was able to cut in both directions with a fill dump on either side. My total cycle time from load to unload to being ready to load again was about 40 seconds. I moved a lot of dirt in two hours.  Another angle. You can see depth of cut on the other side.   I started taking flying lessons at the first of the year from a great instructor locally. I only have to drive a half hour to get to his private airport. It's a grass strip with all kinds of strangeness, like an irrigation pivot on the south end, a sub station on highway on the north end. I'm getting close to soloing, got 9 hours in my log book already. Anyway, the fella owns a helicopter too, and he literally dropped in on my a couple weeks ago.  He landed in the field behind my house, loaded my small person, her friend and I in that revolving death wheel and flew us around the area for about 20 minutes. On approach for landing, I can see my house from here!  Since we've got all this bullshit snow that won't leave, we've been running around burning brush piles. Remember back in the spring and early summer all those trees I stacked up?      Remember this video? http://youtu.be/D2odzR-tHw4 These are the tree piles that we're building in the video. I'll go back over there in a couple days and get some more pics.  Teaser for an upcoming post:  I have permission to be in that barn, it's just a matter of getting over there and taking some pics and doing a write up about it. I'll have to talk to my pop and make sure I have the details correct about it (at least as far as he knows,) and make a post about it. It's pretty cool and don't know why I haven't thought about doing a write up about it before. I also shot some video of burning brush piles, I'll look at it later and maybe make a youtubery thing. We're burning some of these piles to reduce the hazardous fuel loads close to where we plan to have our fire lines in the spring.... Wait, what? The ecosystem in my area evolved with an environment of periodic wildfires. These fires controlled the cedar trees and regenerated the grasses. When the whites came, displaced the indians, killed all the Bison and Antelope, fenced the world and put out the fires a degradation of the land started to happen. Things got real bad in the 50's when a couple guys went around and planted cedar trees. Two methods of control, sawing which you have seen, and prescribed range burning, which you haven't and we'll be doing starting in about a month. edit: here's the tree pile burning video. http://youtu.be/sFn5H6-Ptes Used Sunlight sales fucked around with this message at 23:38 on Feb 9, 2014 |
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Feb 9, 2014 20:35
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The worst thing about fuel loading is how it has affected wildfires. For those who don't know, wildfire prevention leads to "fuel loading" due to the dead trees not being burned away. Fires are a natural occurrence in the wild and putting them out leads to extra detritus being left over and the forest floors getting very crowded. Now what happens is when a fire starts it burns extra hard and hot because of all the dense material left to burn. Instead of clearing out the area it completely devastates it down to the soil, leaving it unable to recover for many years. California is a good example of this. This forestry lesson brought to you by a community college class I took 10 years ago.
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Feb 10, 2014 01:22
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Used Sunlight sales posted:
We have an organization with a strong presence in Kkkalifornia/Nevada called the Sierra Club They lobbied hard to ban the clearance of any underbrush or dead foliage by forestry services on the grounds that it disrupts wildlife. Normally if nature were left to her own devices this would burn away somewhat harmlessly. But because the forestry services aren't allowed to clear it out, AND the smallish burns are extinguished, when forest fires do really get going, and become unmanageable by FD's, there is so much fuel down at the bases of the trees that the flames lick all the way up to the treetops and huge areas of forest are completely destroyed. You're left with tall spikes of black wood and black/gray ash on the ground as far as the eye can see.
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Feb 10, 2014 03:59
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What kind of Hobart is that anyway? Yeah I've seen some fires get out of control pretty bad before. Between pissing matches from who owns what land, and what you can and can't do on rez soil, some streams got ash choked right before the rainy season, gently caress, 15+ years ago? Not sure what was left in those streams but the ash leeched out enough crap because nobody was allowed to do a controlled burn I think the fishies still haven't returned.
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Feb 10, 2014 05:45
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I almost bought a Hobart Handler 140 for $369 when Zoro Tools was doing their 20% off- They are great little machines, you do know they are owned by Miller right? My 210 is more than enough for me, I just wish it was 120v. Guess it's a good excuse to have a 220v 30amp generator like a Honda EB6500 then, haha.
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Feb 10, 2014 05:55
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InterceptorV8 posted:What kind of Hobart is that anyway? 210 MVP. I'm going to get either that one or the Miller version (if I can get a deal from my friend at a local welding supply place) after I buy a house. Being able to run either 120 or 240 with the same machine is such a brilliant idea.
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Feb 10, 2014 06:14
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Natural fire is a good thing for the environment, South Australias just had about quarter of a million hectares of land go up in smoke because fuel loads are getting extreme and fires are uncontrolable. prescribed burning works good too- we had a fire in a national park that was started by a freight train on a day with a catastrophic fire danger rating- 43 degrees, 60kph northerly winds (hot winds from the desert in the middle of aus) and 8% humidity. Fire took off like a rocket and burnt into on of our prescribed burn areas and practically stopped dead.
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Feb 10, 2014 09:01
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Galler posted:210 MVP. I'm going to get either that one or the Miller version (if I can get a deal from my friend at a local welding supply place) after I buy a house. Being able to run either 120 or 240 with the same machine is such a brilliant idea. I have the Miller version and love it. The 120/240 option is really nice and the thing makes even my lovely welding ability look good enough and make very strong welds.
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Feb 10, 2014 15:20
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CharlesM posted:The worst thing about fuel loading is how it has affected wildfires. For those who don't know, wildfire prevention leads to "fuel loading" due to the dead trees not being burned away. Fires are a natural occurrence in the wild and putting them out leads to extra detritus being left over and the forest floors getting very crowded. Now what happens is when a fire starts it burns extra hard and hot because of all the dense material left to burn. Instead of clearing out the area it completely devastates it down to the soil, leaving it unable to recover for many years. California is a good example of this. California's policies about burning and wildfires baffle me. Not to mention the people that build houses and fail to mitigate the fire hazards around their million dollar home. drukqs posted:We have an organization with a strong presence in Kkkalifornia/Nevada called the Sierra Club Yeah, I want to kick open the door next time they are having a meeting and ask how well that's working out for them. Kind of like the how the ASPCA and PETA kill shitloads of animals in the name of preventing cruelty. This ecosystem needs fire to flourish, in fact, most of them do. It's a periodic cleansing by nature, a totally natural process integral to our food chain, Smokey Bear doesn't know that. The welder is indeed a MVP 210. I love it, easy to lay down good beads. I also got a spool gun with it and some aluminum wire, just need to get the right gas and find some aluminum that needs welded so I can practice. NitroSpazzz posted:I have the Miller version and love it. The 120/240 option is really nice and the thing makes even my lovely welding ability look good enough and make very strong welds. It hides my lack of welding skills very well.
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Feb 10, 2014 23:41
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