70's and under is just fine with me Dennis. Hope to get out in a few hours to do some work, but already 77f and climbing.
Got up at 5:30, watered the garden and did some work in it, posted some on here, had coffee, posted some more, now I'm pressure washing the old Power Wagon and then going to mow soon.
It's 103f here today. Going to be this hot, 100f, at least through Friday. I changed all 3 blades on the lawn mower this morning. Unloaded a used John Deere 35a flail mower off a trailer and got it hooked up on the tractor. Greases every bearing I could and checked the gear box oil level. Took it for a short run and she seems to work fine. It's missing a side shield. Buying all the missing pieces is north of $600. So I'll make my own when the weather cools down. My youngest son helped me hook up the mower to the 3 point. Nothing ever lines up perfect. I told him that's the point of farming, every piece of equipment tries to hurt you a different way.
Meche_03 That looks in pretty good shape. What size is it and what is the model? I’m looking for a preowned one but they are not very common in our area except for those few used by highway departments and those are usually beat to heck! Nice find. Edit: I see that it’s a 35a
I got nailed by a yellow jacket this evening. 99 wanted a pit fire so I grabbed some of the tops of the ash trees (4) I dropped and processed this week. I knew they were there as I left the rounds laying in the woods once I heard them saw them flying around. I grabbed the rounds a couple of days later with no signs of them being there, so I thought all was good and they had moved on. Nope, they're still there and have developed a taste for Yoopers apparently! Yeah, we still had the fire but without all of one of the ash tree tops!
They're not real common here either. New they cost a few more thousand than what a rotary brush hog costs. Ive been looking and I couldn't drop $6k on a brush hog for 12 acres. And what I found in my price range was worn out. I did not want to replace gear boxes, blades, deck and pto shafts. I ran it a couple hours this evening when it cooled down into the 90s.. I got the model wrong. It's a 25a. I was looking at a 370 also. Got some numbers mixed up. The 370 was a 3 hour round trip and $200 more. I spent the time mowing and the price difference buying some old new stock replacement flails. The 300 series is listed as more heavy duty but I wasn't really seeing much different. The pulley system on a 300 series is double belt I think and the rear deflector is solid steel without a rubber flex strip. I think the gear box is the same gear box. At least on newer models. My 25a is a new model because it has John Deere imatch quick hitch and takes cat 1 and 2. It's the same mounts on the 300 series now. I paid more than I wanted at $1500. It is in good shape and that appears to be the going rate for them now. Pre Covid it would have been $600-900 at auction. A local farm equipment dealer got it at an auction with a tractor. It has new belt and one new bearing. I figure that's why the shield is missing. It's sitting on the old farmer's work bench when it got fixed to finish a job and never made it back on before the auction.
Looks like tomorrow will be the hottest day of the year so far at 89*. We've been in the 50/60/70's all summer with clouds and rain and little sun, bummer. I'm used to going weeks with only a sprinkle. LOL, this is lukem 's opportunity to laugh at me back when I laughed at him for wind. It's been high humidity all summer and we are not used to that. I cannot imagine bath towels not drying outside bogieb. Stay hydrated Meche
You've probably never had your car windows fog up on the outside. That's how it is here this morning.