bout have new toy done--- forto play w/ D8- don't know if 50 bolts will hold cover on chain case:

Tanker, what is that big black box on the back of the Cat?

Those are great photos NIF. We here in the flatlands of KS are amazed at the hill farming you do out there. If it weren't for prairie dog mounds we wouldn't have a hill at all!

Tanker, that looks like quite a project. That chain cover looks like a project in itself!! Nice work!!

These are from the '08 harvest, rare opportunity to get all three together with the cart. That C65 is one of the first ones ever built and still going strong.

Tanker, can you get some video of that tiller when you fire it up? I like your gearbox design, what was the donor rig?

Bleedinred do they use any Shelbourne type headers on the hill-side wheat fields? Lot of the Shelbournes around here but wondered if they worked on a sidehill.

"Bleedinred" wrote:

That C65 is one of the first ones ever built and still going strong.

The tracks look like they are reversed on that Cat or are my eyes going batty, Bleedinred.

Bleedinred- I really like that first shot, three good looking combines- if only they were on a little steeper slope to really show off the levelers.

If I remember correctly that is a 9500 sidehill? How much more capacity does that have compared to a 6622?

NIF, its one more walker but the shake starts a lot sooner. Header is 25' but it doesn't push the cleaning envelope like the 222 header does on the 6622. I would say it will run .5 to .75 mph faster in good wheat. Would have been slick to have a few "9532"'s made up before Rahco quit. It won't make a very exciting hillside shot at 14 or 18 percent leveling.

Old Tracks, yep, your eyes are great! When the tracks were replaced some years ago the Cat guy suggested reversing them for better traction when backing up heavy equip. and secondly, supposed to not tear the ground up as much when turning. I'm not sure there's much difference in the latter but that's the way they are. I think it's harder on the bars this way on the hard pull.

Jim, have not seen any Shelbourne headers in these hilly parts. Up until the early 90's JD hillside headers were propriatory to their hillside combines as were IH's before the 1470's came out. That's all I can speak to, and after watching one run I would say it wouldn't work because you can't judge cutter bar height good enough. Our stalk height varies quite a bit due to topography and soil variances, and I don't know of anyone that has ever used auto header controls in this country either.

"cojhl2" wrote:

Tanker, what is that big black box on the back of the Cat?

- the square one is the battery box & other is hyd tank.

I have already posted these before but I figured I might as well post some again to keep the thread going a little longer. I will also try to summarize the local farming practices here that cover most operations nearby.

After harvest is over we decide what type of tillage will need to be done to the wheat stubble, if the crop is light without much residue we just chisel without doing anything to the stubble. If it is heavy and we still want to chisel then we try to roll it once or twice on a dry afternoon. A few neighbors will heavy harrow the stubble instead of roll and in areas without as many rocks such as the palouse and further down the ridge from here they will often use a flail or mower on the heavy straw. All of these operations are best done when it is dry soon after harvest.

We generally roll wheat stubble with the 1155 because of its faster speed.



If we decide we want to moldboard plow the stubble instead of chisel and do it dry to kill perennial weeds then we also do that soon after harvest. Only a couple guys around here do the plowing early.



Once that is done we focus on getting ready to seed, that often means just disking the weed patches and smoothing them out and spreading residue. On canola stubble and some other neighbors plant winter wheat on spring cereals that ground gets tillage of some sort usually though a few do no-till. Many other guys near here work all the legume stubble with a cultivator once or twice and getting into the deeper soil areas toward the palouse they often put fertilizer on before seeding.

By late Sept and early Oct. the winter wheat seeding is going strong, we put on phosphate fertilizer with the seed. We always pull the drills in the fall with the D4D.







After fall seeding, tillage is done on the rest of the ground going into spring crop. D6C does most of the heavy work in the fall.





On the ground that was rolled we end up having to go around and round the field the same way as the roller for it to work right and then work the corners out, goal is to get the residue flat and mixed in with the soil rather than all still standing.



On spring wheat stubble and the other that is not rolled we prefer to chisel back and forth crossways and on the contour when possible.



If the residue it heavy we usually try to harrow the chiseled ground in the fall to help try to grind the straw up a bit and smooth the ground out. Some guys have harrows on the back of their chisels but we havent gotten that to work well.



We also do some spraying in the fall on winter crops if there are weeds present to prevent disease over the long winter under the snow or in the wet.