Hi-Boy

1954Frank · Oct 24, 2018

When I was small there was a Hi-Boy on the farm where my grandparents lived and worked. That's what Pawpaw called it. The platform and driver's seat were about 5'-6' above the ground. There was a 4-cylinder engine with a radiator and hood that looked like a Model A Ford. He said the engine was a Continental "Red Seal". But he said the transmission and rear axle were both Model A. There was a steering wheel, and clutch and brake pedals and a hand throttle. It had a small dash with a couple of gauges and switches. Attached to the rear brake drums were large sprockets with heavy chains running down to sprockets on the wheel hubs. (Man I wish I had a picture of that thing.) I don't remember exactly how the steering worked. All wheels had fenders. They used it for spraying over the top of corn and beans. It also had some kind of tassel cutter they could mount on the rear of it. I don't know if they stopped using it, or what. One day we went to visit and it was gone - scrapped.
Anybody seen anything like that?

Doug - Iowa · Oct 24, 2018

Lots of farmers' homemade stuff out of necessity. Early spray rigs, detasslers, insecticide applicators, and such went thru many iterations on the farm before commercially produced.

Here's a pic found on the net

JMOR · Oct 24, 2018

Spraying tomatoes.

MT pockets · Oct 24, 2018

Mr.Frank, I think the ones here in north Mississippi were made by Barrantine. You have described it to a tee.

hd6gtom · Oct 24, 2018

Wife's uncle ran a scrap yard in central Iowa. In the late 60's, early 1970's he bought over 100 made with 8n fords. They were low hour'd units. He stripped all the high boy stuff off them, and made them back into standard 8n fords. Then he hauled all of them to Oklahoma, after he spent bunches of dollars on them getting them to run.

Jaden · Oct 24, 2018

Hahn also made a "High Boy" sprayer that was 3 wheeled, if I remember correctly.

Frank Dodson · Oct 24, 2018

We had a Hahn sprayer we sprayed tobacco with. It was a three wheel machine with the front wheel doing the pulling and it was powered by a 4 cylinder Wisconsin. That thing was sure top heavy.

woodbutcher · Oct 25, 2018

American Pickers would offer $500 for that "as is".

Butch

Moonlite37 · Oct 25, 2018

I had a steel customer who built his with a "B" Farmall mounted above another set of 9 x24 tires. The machine had the tricycle front rear and the thing had the operator above the machine like a cotton pucker is mounted. He had an oval tank low on the center in such a way that it could pass between the rows. all four 9x 20 tires were Firestone Field and Road the tread provided the final drive. In his opinion it was better than a manufactured machine. It looked like a factory job. Saw this and talked to him about 25 years ago. Much of his machinery was custom built from various other agriculture machine. Visiting his shop was more fun than any farm show. His shop was zone heated and would hold 12 tractors 2 M H 300 combines and one truck with enough room to work around them. He had compressed air and electric power at each station. he had some good Mississippi River bottom land but lived in a very common house

Billy C. · Oct 25, 2018

You are correct. I welded at Barrentine in Greenwood MS. during the summers of the early '60's to make money for college. They made a lot of the spray rigs as well as trailers to haul cotton. They are no longer in business and the factory has been torn down. I wish I had one of the Lincon "stove pipe" welders we used--the smoothest welder I have ever used. Also a company in Texas converted a lot of tractors to spray rigs. A man in Georgia has the only one that the Texas company ever built using a John Deere 420 as the tractor. He has been shown on RFD TV and was a feature article in "Green Magazine" a few years ago.

bmack95hd · Oct 25, 2018

8N on stilts, guy down the road has one with I think he said a sulfur sprayer mounted.

DR. EVIL · Oct 26, 2018

Seed corn company I worked for 2 summers in early 1970's bought 4-5 John Blue detasseling machines that cut the tassels off with hydraulic motor driven blades inside a half a 30 gallon steel drum used as a mower shroud. Three guys on the 6 row machines, driver sat in middle, operator to his left & right, one controlled height of 2 booms for 4 rows, other ran one boom, simple single spool hyd valve. Machine had a 100 hp Ford V-4 industrial engine, actually from a British built car, 4-speed transaxle, hyd pump driven off engine with couple heavy v-belts. Ran 3 to 5 mph in the field, could run 12-15 mph on the road. You sat above the dew, bugs, out of the mud. Beat picking tassels by hand both riding and especially walking.

Some farmers didn't want the seed corn on their fields cut off, afraid it would stunt the corn, reduce yield, but eventually everybody bought into using them, even after all the corn pollinated, they would run them doing the male rows before picking and cut the stalks off right above the ears, let them run faster with the pickers.

Hi-Boy

1954Frank

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Doug - Iowa

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JMOR

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MT pockets

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hd6gtom

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Jaden

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Frank Dodson

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woodbutcher

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Moonlite37

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Billy C.

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bmack95hd

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DR. EVIL

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