working hay loader

riverbend

Well-known Member
It was a little surprising how little work it took to get this hay loader working, new wooden bars and two grease zerks. Here it is behind my H Farmall. The second image is the business end of the loader. It rakes that hay ahead until there is enough for the forks to grab. Then it feeds it up the bed and onto the wagon. Sides for the wagon would make for bigger loads.

Greg
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I know where one of those is sitting for sale. It is one of those things you just find really interesting and want to try but then you realize who needs another friggin project waiting on line. Like the pictures!
 
That's one thing I want no part of. I can remember helping Dad when I was a kid. A nice hot day loading clover hay, and it's one thing you really don't want to remember. The only thing worse was a hand tie baler. There were no sides on the wagons, just a tall back engate like today's bale wagons and a front ladder.
 
Greg
Dad bought one for 10 bucks at auction in about 55 or 56. Sure beat the heck out of loading from the ground with a fork. Never baled his hay, had plenty of room in haymow. Didn't have to spend cash money for twine either.
Hint- when done using it, tip the front end down. A quick gust of wind in a thunderstorm can lay it over on its back. Don't remember the procedure exactly, but think there is just one pin to pull & lay it down.
Willie
 
All of the local Amish farms here have those so they have become quite a common sight in our area. I never got to try using one, though. Looks like a nice project.
Zach
 
They were a bit before my time, but not much. Dad had hay bales; I don't remember if he had it baled or did it himself. I do vaguely remember them threshing wheat and the big stack of straw. I was born in 1947.

Larry
 
My youngest boy and I happened to drive by an Amish farm when they were unloading loose hay, loaded with a loader, with a hay fork. Gordie took one look at that and came to the conclusion that baled hay was a dumb idea when we could just unload a whole wagon load like that. Some days I agree with him!
 
Probsbly be a good way to burn a barn down if one happened to get some damp hay mixed in the loose mess that must have been in a hay mow....
 
That's the way we did it when I was a lad. First with horses then a Ford 8N. Neither could pull it slow enough. Started with a wood spoke wheel wagon then stepped up to an Oliver running gear with the rack from the old wagon.There was an end gate on the rear that was low enough to back under that adjustable piece on the top of the loader. and the front had one about the same height. I drove the horses and my father "made load". Never had any side racks. Dad would take the hay from the loader with a fork and spread it around the rack, stomp it down and load it til we couldn't get anymore on. Then unhook the wagon from the loader and haul it to the barn. Hauled it up the ramp into the barn then unhooked one of the horses, walked him out past the load and hooked him to the large hay rope. I would set the old harpoon style fork into the back half of the wagon, signal the horse driver and the horse would haul 1/4 of the load up til the fork hit the carriage on the track then it would ride along the track til dad hollered, I tripped the fork to dump the hay then hauled it back to reset it in the front of the load. Fork forkfuls and the wagon was empty. Later on we got a fork with 4 big dangling hooks that thing came down the track like a rock and you better not be under it. Then we got the 8N to replace the horses. Mom was driving it up a hill with a load once when the front wheels came up. It settled back down she shut it off and walked home. With the Ford we had to unhook the wagon and with one guy steering the tongue the other pushed it up in the mow with the ford.
 
Is it a New Holland? I have one that is very similar, but a "Minnesota", made at the Minnesota state prison.
 
We used a New Idea hay loader. It had the big wheels on the front and the smaller caster wheels on the rear. The first hay loader we used had a wooden slat conveyor with flat link chains on the ends and about 6 ropes stapled to the slats that went all the way around the conveyor. Ropes were old and kept breaking.
 
I'm told my grandfather's brothers pulled their loader with the '50 Chevy truck. Load up, drive back to the barn, dump on the barn floor with the truck hoist, go back and get another load while the guys in the barn put away the dumped load.

Nice pictures.
 
Here a go! no sides needed. Dad used slings rather than a hay fork. Probly a learning curve to tromp it flat as you fork it even from the loader. I was in the second grade the last time Dad put up loose hay.

This is it in half size.

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Loaded with loose hay

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Local club member demonstrated one in the parade.....kept forking the hay off the front of the wagon and let the loader load it again. Taught a lot of folks that day, just how it works!
 
I started farming on my own, and around 69 7-0, I bought a IHC loader. Had to replace the wood pitmans. Seemed when I was on the back that it was 2 windrows comeing up it rather than just one. I would pitch towards the front and work it back to me. Pitched as high as it would go, then I would stand and tromp on that while I filled in the back. When I had the back high up, I would start at the front again till I had a load. IF theres only one man, and the hay in the back gets even with the apron, then it gets bunched up, and will eventually got over the sides if your in heavy hay, as it has nowhere to go but straight forward.
I built me a hay rack. used for running gears a set of JD thresher axles that had been used to haul logs at a small sawmill run by a Wallas tractor. The bed is 12 X 24 with detachable front and back racks. I can put the 2 uprights in welded sockets I have front and back then bolt on the side rails to them. The back is lower than the front to allow for the loader apron.
I have a NI loader now. Have never used it yet In case some pics come up in this post, they aint me or mine. I was trying to figure out how to send pics of my loader and got these instead.
 
Hi, I can just remember riding on the hay wagon with an IH hayloader behind all being pulled by an IH SC, a hired local teenager stacked the hay on the wagon.
Originally they had an older horse that would pull the hayfork cable from commands from in the hayloft.
Later the tractor was used to pull the hayfork cable.
In 1952 Dad ordered a NH forage harvester with pickup and row crop heads, blower and 2 IH wagons and hardware to build 2 false front wagon boxes.
2 years later he bought an IH 45 baler as he didn't like the hay produced by the harvester as all the leaves had been blown off and the stems were left.
JimB
 
Had one parked next to the gas barrel while I was growing up, when we got a diesel tractor dad finally cut it up and hauled it away, made room for the diesel barel. Never really looked at it proper as it was just 'there' as I was growing up.

Neat.

Paul
 
(quoted from post at 10:46:14 07/20/14) Probsbly be a good way to burn a barn down if one happened to get some damp hay mixed in the loose mess that must have been in a hay mow....

And baled hay won't do that? I don't think theres any more chance of green hay making into the barn with loose than with baled. In fact, since someone is handling most every bit of the loose, and since it's not packed so tight, the chances might be lower.
 
(quoted from post at 05:24:25 07/21/14)
(quoted from post at 10:46:14 07/20/14) Probsbly be a good way to burn a barn down if one happened to get some damp hay mixed in the loose mess that must have been in a hay mow....

And baled hay won't do that? I don't think theres any more chance of green hay making into the barn with loose than with baled. In fact, since someone is handling most every bit of the loose, and since it's not packed so tight, the chances might be lower.
Lots of guys still use the trick of "salting" down the hay when they put it in the barn.
 
I was told that it is a John Deere, but there is no marking on it. My neighbor is in the Two Cylinder Club and is going to see if their magazine shows one like it.

No chance of burning down the barn. The hay is going to mulch tomatoes. I do still have the carriage and ropes in the barn. Even the big hook on the side of the door for a pulley, but no slings or clamps.

Glad you guys liked the pictures.


Greg
 
Dad never had a baler. We had a NI loader: a 1943 vintage JD wagon with an 18"x 8" flat body, 2 pointed stakes about 6ft high in the rear, and a rack made of two 2x4x8ft oak with three 3/4" oak horizontal boards that ran forward over the draw bar on a 60 degree angle: and a 1942 John Deere tractor.

I learned at a young age how to "properly" build a load, starting with the two rear corners, then filling the back center, and going up several layers, then letting the hay roll forward off the loader and repeating the procedure. This locked the load so you could build it up to desired height and have square sides and no chance of the hay falling off. The rear stakes anchored the load, and the angled front rack allowed you to maximize. By building the back and letting the loader push the hay forward you minimized the physical labor required. Unloading at the barn was with a four- or six-tine clam-shell type hay fork running on an overhead track.

No idea how much hay we had on the wagon, but loads that would not fit through the hay barn door, occasional blown trailer tires, and too much weight for the John Deere to pull up the asphalt hill to our farm were not uncommon problems. It was back breaking work compared to our round baler today.
 
"](quoted from post at 09:51:34 07/21/14)
(quoted from post at 05:24:25 07/21/14)
(quoted from post at 10:46:14 07/20/14) Probsbly be a good way to burn a barn down if one happened to get some damp hay mixed in the loose mess that must have been in a hay mow....

And baled hay won't do that? I don't think theres any more chance of green hay making into the barn with loose than with baled. In fact, since someone is handling most every bit of the loose, and since it's not packed so tight, the chances might be lower.
Lots of guys still use the trick of "salting" down the hay when they put it in the barn.

With modern equipment and weather forecasting hay is almost never salted anymore. I've been making hay for over 25 years and have never come across anyone doing it since about 1966.
 

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