Monday, August 3, 2015

John Deere #3

       As usual, harvest brought wet weather this year, though not nearly as much as some years.  The lack of substantial rain was a good thing.  Had it rained much, we would have had a real weed problem.  Harvesting wheat with green weeds is no fun.
     We had one full day and two or three half days when the grain was too damp to store in the grain bin.  So we had time to get into mischief.
     There were three “subjects” of our idle-time bullying.  The old Number3 John Deere combine was the first victim.  It has rested in the same place since 1967 or1968 or something like that.
    The last time it was used, we had suffered early hail damage.  Dad watched the crop “sucker out”, meaning a new bunch of heads grew on the hail-damaged stalks.  Weeds took advantage of the late crop.
    Dad used 2-4D on the weeds, applying it with the old KB-1 International pickup with the Willie Suchanek spray rig and a 50-gallon barrel in the bed.  The 2-4D stunted but didn’t kill the weeds.  We borrowed a swather from a neighbor.  I was home from the harvest run, so it must have been in August.
    I swathed the 160 acres in two halves, north and south using a 2N Ford tractor and a 14’ swather.  We removed the reel and sickle from the #3’s header and mounted a pickup device which uses slats and springs to pick up a windrow.  It was a bit of work to resurrect the old combine even then, as it hadn’t been in use for a few years then.
     We picked up one half of that field and only had to unload on the truck a time or two.  Besides wheat in the grain bin, there were many chunks of dried weed stems about the same size as a wheat seed.  It was a mess.  We quit after picking up the first half.
     Dad drove the truck to town.  Dick, the local elevator man, took a sample.  He stamped the weigh slip and said, “Back it up and dump it in the cleaner.”  Which he did.  By the time the trash was cleaned out, we had enough seed to plant that fall’s crop.
    The old #3 went to the section line where it slowly tried to sink into the earth.  It survived the onslaught of the “hiders”, Uncle Ricky’s nickname for the iron salvagers who cleaned off tons of junk from the junk yard the section line became.  He compared the iron salvagers to the buffalo hunters who slaughtered the buffalo, skinned them and left the meat to rot, derisively called “hiders” by those early-day environmentalists who abhorred the wanton slaughter of the bison solely for their hides.
      It took a couple of those wet times to get the old combine unstuck.  Grass and dirt grew over the sickle bar.  The weights for the counter balance that allowed the combine operator to raise and lower the header deck with some ease were holding the oneway down.
     Getting the weights on the counter balance arm was a task.  Without the weights, the header slumped to the ground while the arm stuck up about eight feet in the air.  Each weight is 80 pounds.  Getting the weights from the oneway to the bed of the 4X4 was a task.  Getting them eight feet up and over the 3” pipe that serves as the counterbalance arm was the first challenge.
    A stepladder on the back of the 4X4 was not the answer.  The G had to be started, the farm hand charged with enough hydraulic oil to go up the required eight feet.  The hay fork came off and the dirt scoop went on.
     The weights were transferred to the dirt scoop.  Brother Harry accompanied the weights on their elevator and after a struggle, all eight weights made it onto the arm.  But even with all eight weights on the arm, the header remained earthbound. 
     There was also the matter of freeing the header from the dirt and grass.  That was done by tile spade on an earlier day, when we didn’t realize the counter weights were necessary to our project.  I was trying a bumper jack at various places, so Harry got most of the shovel work.
     Weights in place, dirt and grass shoveled, the header still resisted our Revile.  The Farmhand scoop went under the outside end of the header and with a little lift, the old header sprang up into the air as the counterbalance weights and arms came tumbling down.

    
    The G wasn’t up to persuading the combine out of its foot-deep tracks.  We had to chain individually to all three of the wheels and pull backwards to break it loose.  Some additional shoveling was necessary in front of the wheels.

  
     A tug forward, rock back, a tug forward, rock back, and finally, out she came.  Meanwhile, in the west the clouds blued out the western horizon. We removed the chain and hooked directly to the draw bar.  I raced across the stubble (in first gear), trying to get our prize to the farmyard before I got soaked. 
     The G decided it had quite enough.  It started running rough about halfway across the field.  By judicious use of the choke, I coaxed it along.  Nearing the west end of the stubble and nearly home, it refused to respond to anything.  It died and refused our resuscitation efforts.


     Fortunately, the rain didn’t amount to much.  We had time to pull the spark plugs and the battery before we got wet.  The next morning we returned with clean plugs and fully-charged battery, and the G revived and completed the trip.  A little muddy spot threatened to halt the journey, but we cleared that and the old #3 has a new resting place north of the farmyard.
     Now what?  Well, if nothing else, we have a new yard decoration, and a small piece of snow fence.  The motor is frozen from rust.  There are a few pieces missing, like the reel and the sickle.  Will it run again?
    We used to use the lofty grain bin as a goal for hitting baseballs, a sort of combination baseball-basketball game.  I guess it could be incorporated into the golf course. 


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