Some days you have a bit of luck

Today I headed out to the farm to help Dad replace the motor on the manure auger with a spare so he could have the one on it rebuilt or replaced, as in the last couple days it wouldn't start on it's own without him going up and spinning the pulley first. Bad capacitor I figured, but we didn't know much of the history of the motor.

I got there and they had tried cleaning the gutters first, but the chain came off the jackshaft because a bearing just went out too. I tore into it (while it's snowing for the first time, and it's heavy wet stuff, of course) and to my surprise, everything came apart with ease. I got the good bearing off without a torch, all the pulleys (motor, jackshaft, and temporary replacement motor)and the sprocket came off without a fight of any kind.

We got a list of what we needed which was a pulley that would fit the temp. motor, and (2) 1 1/4 pre-lubed bearings. Went to Fleet Farm with Dad and we found only a single strand pulley, but it fit with the tapered hub on the temp motor, and the last 2 bearings of that size.

When I got home I put the new bearings in first and got that done, and while I did that Dad opened up the box on the motor to remove the wires- and that's when he saw the problem..... A wire had come off the capacitor.

So in much less time than we had figured, we had fixed the auger and were back up and running without having to put his fingers on the line to spin it first. Saved around $400-600 on either rebuilding or replacing the motor this way.

Donovan from Wisconsin

It always amazes me when things go well. Too often
it's the other way. Glad it worked for you.

Good deal. Sometimes you get lucky, and more often, not. This time, things worked out and you replaced a couple of the most often failed parts before they failed. Cool. Glad it all worked out.

Mark

Good for you. Usually a cold snowy day and fighting something apart go hand-in-hand. Jim

That's great, I remember many times in the last few years, on
the coldest nights my friends badger barn cleaner chain
would break, I tried painfully to get him to replace it with a
patz, but he got another used badger. The hook, loop system
on a patz is so easy to work with, vs the badger bolt together
system!

Our barn is all badger, but we replaced the chain not too long ago, and the year before we pulled out the slide and installed the auger.

Pretty sure you can actually go with the hook & loop chain with badger as well, you just need a different sprocket and corner parts. New chain does make a big difference.

Donovan from Wisconsin

Don , glad to hear you where able to get your gutter cleaner fix back to working, with little cost. I think my gutter cleaner and milk pipeline have saved me a lot of work over the years, compared to the time spent on repair. We had a Patz in our last place, but when we bought this farm it came with a Berg. Just like you , I can get bearings shaft pulleys sprockets, or whatever from any suplie house. We changed the star sprocket on the gutter chaindrive for a Houle, and put in a Houle gutter chain, this works very well for us.I believe you will find that Acorn stable cleaner parts will interchange with your Badger cleaner in many cases. Bruce

To be honest, I never heard of acorn until a few years ago. Badger used to be made about 5 miles from the farm so lots of badger around here, and still good support. I do make some parts myself, and things like bushings I order from mcmastercarr.com.

Donovan from Wisconsin

Good for you. I thought the capacitor was going in a bandsaw
motor last fall but when I removed the cover I found that the pulley
was walking off the end of the shaft and all I had to do was tap it
back to where it went and tighten the set screw and now it starts
fine.
Zach

Boy that takes me back....I remember getting up to head to work on the farm back in the late 70's and the folks on the radio reminding us all of how cold it was and wishing us luck on starting the car.....CRAP! I would think. I have 3 silo unloaders 2 stable cleaners,feeders, conveyors and waterers that all have to run today let alone blow snow to get the milk truck in and get the grinder mixer out to the corn crib and back.I would get home at night and Dad would ask (with a goofy grin) what I was busy at that day. After a bit of thought I would answer "chores I guess and it only took all day" The winter my boss broke his leg (thats a story of its own) my work load doubled. The motor on the stable cleaner in the milk cow barn gave up and I had got it repaired and was ready to put it on. The boss had a friend that was a police officer who was over to visit for the afternoon. Dennis ( the cop) offered to come out and help. I wasn't sure how that would work as there is barely room for one out on the end of the chute, but Dennis said he would be there for moral support. So there I am with this OLD 3 hp motor which my memory makes out to have been the same size as a 50 gallon barrel and it weighed about the same as that barrel if it were full of sand. A nice breeze was howling in across lake Huron (probaly originated in WI LOL) so it was really cold to say the least. I got that sucker bolted into the mounts,got the belts on and tight and was getting ready to do the electrical work when I turned around to say something to Dennis. Here he is, no hat on,bald head exposed to the world and his parka not even zipped!I said I really appreciated him being there but that there had to be a better way to spend your day off. Dennis just grinned and said it sure beat the heck out of sitting out on a roadblock in a snowstorm informing the 400th idiot that the blankety blank highway was really closed!I have thought of that day a lot of times over the years when wrestling with other similar projects and it often make the job go better. I guess I am stronger for it. Sorry for the long rambling post, Bob