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Straw that broke the camel's back

R

rrlund

Well-known Member
I was blowing corn stalks up in the top of the barn to bed calves with. I had just been up in there and turned the pipe because it was getting full,hadn't unloaded more than another foot out of the wagon after that.
I was sitting on the tractor unloading and heard a heck of a rumble. My first instinct was that the blower was plugging. I quick stopped the wagon,but the blower was humming right along yet. I looked in the window and saw the tangled,splintered mess. It had been full pretty much up to the peak.

At least I didn't have the calves in there yet,so I don't have to work around them to clean up the mess,but oh what a mess it is.
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I don't know how far you live from NW PA but I could certainly find time to come out a weekend and lend a hand with clean-up.
 
Mid Michigan. I'll get it. The boys were here gutting a deer when it happened,so they know about it. I'll just have to put the tine bucket on the loader and get in there and start grubbing lumber up out of the stalks. Thanks for the offer though.
 
Yuk, sorry for the mess. At a really bad time, with winter on our heels, you need the space for critters and dry space for the straw, and room to repair, and how do you sort it all out before winter hits us.

Not fun. But, when it is a good time to have troubles, never a good time.

I have a whole lot of bales in my 1909 big old dairy barn upstairs, I see some floor boards sagging between the beams. Some hay, some straw. I need to be careful too, one bale at a time doesn't seem like much, but it adds up.

Paul
 
Ya,we used to milk in there. If that had come down on the pipeline,vacuum line,lights,gutters,even if the cows weren't in there,it would have been a disaster,not just an inconvenience.
 
That is terrible! Real sorry to see that! Cleaning that out will be hard to do. Separating the wood/nails will be nearly imposible. Maybe just dig it all out and bury it. Any way you do it it will be a mess.
 
wanna borrow my old spreader and loader? Finally got both working the same day, and have been cleaning that mound out of the sheep pasture today. Not sure loader would do much - stuff would flow right thru the tines.
Sorry about your misfortune. Ray
 
Hi rr
Sorry to see you in a bit of a bind with this, Glad no body was hurt although sad and a bad experience for a farmer ,animals can be replaced. You /a family member or hired help No and a person getting killed or badly hurt affects a guy for life, sometimes animals will to. my last couple weeks on the farm have been no better. My muck spreading experience has been like somebody elses reply here. Finally Got the machines running together but now it's rained a week and we got a Nov 9 spread ban. I'm not 1/2 done and it's too wet!. Was kinda thinking about the nail comment, I bet they are all pretty well still in the wood from my experience in the hog barns when the hogs wreck stuff, or we tear it apart for repairs.
Regards Robert
 
We got the center section pretty much cleaned up this afternoon. I went up and baled the rest of the stalks that were raked,then I put the tine bucket on. I dug in to it and started piling the stalks. Kim pulled the lumber out as I unearthed it. It went pretty quick. I think I can save the south third. It's sagging,but if I can get a jack under it in the morning,I think I can get it jacked up and re nail the header,maybe put some blocks under it.
 
Wow Randy ! Sure glad you were not in there, so was it just a 2nd floor, wood framed, just failed or you think what was going in was heavier than you thought it was, more moisture etc.? That would really play with my head, loading up something like that and having no idea it could give way.

Well at least its inside, not the entire barn, we went through that on a 80x150 barn in '09, with that same corrugated tin, roof collapse of 2/3 of the barn. What a tangled mess to clean up, then re-build, in winter. I included a shot just as the framing was finished and it was ready for tin, I did a lot of work on this one alone, then had 2 more people working on it until the end. I will not do another large carpentry/framing job like this during winter again, no way, not happening, that was some really miserable work, hated being up on this roof for hours at a time.

Hopefully you can get it cleaned up without too much hassle, darned glad to hear no one or your livestock was injured.
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You win. Mine wasn't near as bad as that. I had one blow upside down a few years ago,came right over on a feedlot. I had to get my brother here with the extend-a-hoe ASAP to get some of that picked up,but that one was from a summer storm.

The stuff I put in last year had a lot more moisture than this did. It might have weakened it. I know there was one spot where some nails broke in a header and it dropped a little and pushed the plywood up,but I lifted that Sunday and re nailed it. That was on the part that's still standing. There must have been some damage to the header on the other side where it came down.
 
About the only problem I'm finding with nails as where boards broke and ended up in the stalks. I have to be careful not to drive up on any of it and get one in a tire.
 
Unreal, so you were monitoring and repairing as you saw it needed and it still came down. The same barn in the photo, the part that did not collapse, and was in much worse shape, I repaired the trusses, which mind you were beyond saving in my mind, held with an awful snow load in '11, when so many barns came down, new and old. I was in there, rushing to stabilize it, get help to get the snow off above and I could hear noises. I just hoped it did not come down on top of me. There was a sag, I was able to shore it up, and that repair was improved. Its still holding too, but the darned thing has outlived its useful life in a sense. At least the front 2/3rds should hold, one thing is for sure, if I ever have to deal with another one like ours, its coming down. The work and the risk of injury or worse to make these kinds of repairs, its like polishing the proverbial t_rd. I used to think some of these kinds were always worth repairing, not always the case. We can be thankful that this one was made whole again, but that back 3rd is going to come back on us someday for sure. Few more of the rebuild, darned miserable work and this barn bites, I gouged my leg open like a chainsaw would, then had to go work my 2nd job before I could get stitched up, I really needed to do that first, but the farmer I was driving for, early morning, evenings, he was not well and I was committed to make sure I got his work done too, bleeding or not, it meant a lot to me, never regretted helping him over the years for one second. Just makes for long days and hard work.
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If there's a bright side to this story, you had nice weather for the
cleanup today. Still looks like a royal pain from the pictures.
Holler if I can help.
 
Well that's not good, at least it didn't push the posts out and the roof come down! Do you think you had that Oliver wound up a little to fast and the force of the cornstalks blowin in there pushed the floor out? HEHE Sounds good doesn't it. At least the weather is nice.
 
You might be on to something. I always used the 1550 on the blower until this year. I had the 1365 on it this time. It must have been all that Fiat power.
 
"I'll have Kim call you first if the rest falls in on me. lol"

That might not be the time to trust me with a pitch fork! :)
 
What a mess! Maybe you can get the worst of it with your loader. Sure hope you don't have to do all of it by hand.
 
My day was just about as bad and maybe I will tell about it latter when I am in a better mood. Part of it included forking two full silage wagons full of feed off after breaking floor chains:( Tom
 
No,if I'd have tried it on Sunday,I'd have most likely been under it when it came down.
 
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