The venerable old Massey 750 broke down Saturday. The water pump failed. The combine has been wanting to overheat for most of the season and it has been one thing after another. Small leaks in hoses, the rotating screen plugged up with fine dust, not to mention the A/C problems.
We had ten acres of Meadow Foxtail to combine and it is supposed to rain Monday. The Foxtail is a very very light seed and requires a very slow speed. We put cardboard over the intake on the wind on the combine so it doesn't blow the seed out the back.
We thought we had a spare water pump but it was of a different style. The Perkins engines change water pump styles with every application and they do not interchange. Then I got the bright idea of Texting fellow farmer Orin (who is not a lazy farmer) and it so happened that not only did he have a water pump but his father was driving to a family reunion in my very city. So, we had a new water pump within the hour and were up and running before long.
It was a relief to find out Orin was actually a real person, actually I did meet him last year at the ag show. Who knows with the internet. He could have been a lady in New York City pretending to be a farmer. You know that makes no sense. I've got nothing funny to say this morning...
Anyway, we got the combine running, but it still wants to overheat and now the water temp gauge failed and the sensor that tells you if the return concave thingy is working flew apart and then the wind started blowing so hard we wouldn't unload the combine, or fill the tank above half full, so we quit and put trucks in the barn.
Such is life.
I should be in Church right now so probably next week will be a mess also.
Tonight we are watching movies on the barn.
It will be a cartoon extravaganza!
(unless it rains)
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Sorry to hear of your continued issues. Have you tried blowing the radiator really, really well? I mean going over every square inch of the fan side, then making a 90 degree adapter to blow the rotary screen side (or pull the rotary screen, it is surprisingly easy) and then blow the fan side again? It is amazing how much that can help. Those little centrifugal sensors are a PITA to keep working.Not essential but it is nice to know when the returns plugs up...because that signals the 15 minute (give or take)countdown to when the cog clutch melts down and begins to drop chunks of hot metal on the ground. Dumb question: does Rickreall Farm Supply carry any MF parts at all anymore?
ReplyDeleteSorry, this comment is beginning to sound like a Machinery Talk posting. Thanks for the genuine Lazy Farmer hats! I would have liked to come up and visited you in person but the plowing must go on...I should become a progressive no-tiller so my late summers would be free, right?
Oh yeah, Regarding dad coming to Amity the same day you needed a water pump: I remember hearing a Red Skelton skit once where something worked out similarly and someone said "Providence is wonderful, isn't it?" and Red deadpanned "Yeah, so is the rest of Rhode Island".
ReplyDeleteIt was much funnier on the radio!
Orin, well we got rained out on the movies so probably won't be running the combine today. Plan is to totally blow out radiator and screen.
ReplyDeleteInteresting truck your dad drove out. Is that a factory diesel engine in it?
You know Rhode Island is not really an island. I read that somewhere...
If you want to go hunting or to basketball tournaments or set in the coffee shop, all you have to do is call me and I'll come up an do all your planting for you. Please leave me not quite enough seed and hopefully it will be in 50lb bags. Perhaps I could do 500 acres of wheat at 140lbs per acre with 50lb bags. On a hillside in the mud with 8 corners in the field! Then you could be a progressive no-tiller!
Oh, and afterwards you could argue with me about the acres...
Ha! Really funny post above. Dad's pickup is what is left of our diesel White 8800. We bought an adapter kit from the Perkins to the Ford C-6 tranny. We did that conversion in '98, back when 5.9 Cummins weren't so cheap and plentiful. It does have all the advantages of a Perkins, including the smoke cloud when started cold, and ability to suck air at any fitting that is not completely perfect! It does get much better mileage than the 460 it replaced.
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