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IndianaRed
07-02-2006 16:03:31
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The absolute coolest thing I'd ever seen in my life was the haywagons my grandad used to build for custom haying. I remember my great-uncle, the attorney/pilot, called him the greatest natural engineer he'd ever seen. He would get old school busses, strip them down, add a wooden deck, a steel trough the width of a bale sunken down the middle with a chain conveyor that was speed adjustable, rails on the back, and a hydraulic snout on the front that also had conveyor, hyd. cyl. for up/down, out slanted "gates" about 30-40 degrees to corral bales in if not straight, and skids on the bottom. Driver front left, radiator front right, 454 Chevy engine below. My uncles and their friends (working for a nickel a bale and making $300 plus a week way back then!) would FLY through those flat hayfields. One guy driving, two on the back stacking. An absolutely amazing site to see. If uncle Bruce was feeling especially frisky driving, bales could come faster than the boys could stack them and he'd have to stop the conveyor, but not if the boys were really trying. By far the hardest work possible for a human being. I'll tell you, by the end of the summer, those boys were IN_SHAPE! Non-stop stacking from the time they drove into the field. 15 hours a day just about everyday but Sunday, and sometimes had to work then too. If the fields were real flat they could do 30+ mph. It was nice if where they were taking bales a bit of a drive to stack so they could rest on the way. Had attachments to add lengths onto the snout for unloading bales way up into stacks and barns. They could load over 200 bales in well under an hour. Grandad would build these (I think he made 4 or 5 over the years), with no plans, just did it. Even made a few for other people. I remember Grandma making sandwhiches and I would go with her to take to the fields if they were working late or super busy. The crews were always at the house for lunches, if they weren't working too far away. As a small boy I totally idolized those guys. Was wondering if this was a fairly unique machine, or if others used these same type machines. We called ours "the monsters". It seems like I maybe remember him saying he might have seen something similar in a ag magazine that gave him the general idea. Asked him about using one today, (the last one is a sorry site now, rusted and piled high with junk on it, but restorable!! lol), and he said it would probably be close to illegal to use, and definately couldn't take out on US 50 highway like they used to. But I'll tell you what, I still haven't seen anything more efficient for gettin those bales up and out faster than this machine. Only thing that could've made it faster was if the whole deck tilted bales into a stack, but then, a lot of guys wanted bales stacked in a place where you couldn't do that. Hate to drone on and one about this, but it truly was the greatest contraption I've seen to this day. Happy Haying!!
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