[mitchmaine]

thanks scott for finding that one. that was great. those little hosses were pulling a load.

[mitchmaine]

hey george, try writing john hershberger, 4582 township road 184, millersburg, ohio 44654. he used to have a mower repair shop there and you could get whatever you wanted ups from him or go there. he might be pretty old by now but i’d try it before i went cutting up a good six foot bar. good luck, mitch

[mitchmaine]

thanks geoff, i didn’t have the courage to ask. if we are talking about what it seems, there’s no preppin’. if this cookie crumbles it going all the way, i think, and thats anarchy. most farmers i now are independant and strong willed but not warriors. the big grocery chain here in maine has 2 days of food on the shelf and three more in the warehouse. imagine your whole state running out of food cause the trucks couldn’t move? how friendly would your neighbors be and for how long? i don’t know either and i don’t want to. we gotta try and keep this mess going and make changes slow and easy, i think. but we’ve been preppin along time

[mitchmaine]

same here, donn, hays making in a day.
wind came off the water today. strong breeze. couple of hay devils showed up and you were probably baling some of my hay over there in new york.
we have a church of the brethren family two roads over. seven children. the oldest boy found us sugaring one day and they stop by to help now and again. they are growing up pretty fast. one is married with a baby of her own. but the youngest girls showed up today while penny and i were picking up a couple hundred and i couldn’t get down to the ground fast enough to grab a bale. we have a buncher and those girls loaded two wagons faster than we could do one. same at the barn. they are the best gift i ever got save my three own sons. life is good. carry on.

mitch

[mitchmaine]

thanks richard for the extra photos. seems like you can’t just pull te shaft out clean. although pulling just the flywheel while in the machine would be alot of strain on the pinion gear and bearing. does it look like it might have a tappered key? anyone out there with some knowledge about this? help needed.

mitch

[mitchmaine]

hi erika, i have the same drill. the rear box with the gears is for fertilizer. it actually did have discs but the whole undercarriage seems to be just about gone. doesn’t seem like a good parts drill, but you never know. i share your passion for saving that stuff. seems every time i “clean up” around here, sooner or later i need what i junked.

mitch

[mitchmaine]

richard, a friend called with a problem on his one horse mcd mower. he broke his flywheel where the wrist pin joins. he doesn’t think he can pull his pitman shaft with the flywheel on it because of the cast housing in front of it. can’t see to well from your photos but do you think the same? if so, you’d have to pull the flywheel while the shaft was still in the mower?? let me know what you think.

mitch

[mitchmaine]

good news. the long horned beetle(enemy of the hard maple) was detected and eradicated in worcester, mass. they flattened 64 acres of neighborhood shade trees to get him. great.
the bad news. they took the wood(hundreds of loads) and chipped it, and trucked it across eastern mass.,new hampshire and into maine. 300 miles in vented chip trailers over highways and side roads. eggs, larvae and 60 mph winds across 300 miles. but don’t panic. all necessary precations were implemented and trained professionals did the work. right.

[mitchmaine]

i hate dentists. horse or people, its always some big deal. but a friend of mine said he had this guy float his (horses) teeth and he was really good. we hadn’t had it done in a spell cause i still hate it, but i thought i’d better get it over. so i called this guy and he comes over (two towns over) and pulls up in the yard. young fellow. we went into the barn and he goes to work. usually we have the hobbled, gagged and crosstied for the event. but this guy takes them out on the barn floor, with just a halter and starts grinding away. they start backin’ up and he backs them right in their own stalls till they’re sitting in their own bunks and away he goes talking a blue streak all the time and an hour and a few minutes later everyones done, including dick who needed an electric grinder on an erupted molar way back. he’d broke off a lower tooth. he doesn’t usually put up with much nonsense but he stood there while that guy really ground away on his mouth. i was totally amazed. either i’d hired all the worlds dubs first, or this man was a wizard, but either way it was a totally great experience. hes in new glouster, maine and i’ll forward his name to any that wants. some people out there just have a way with critters and its fun when you don’t expect it.

mitch

[mitchmaine]

We were talking about maine accents the other night. Not that I ever paid much attention, but I started listening to people talk, and they seem to fall into groups. The old folk have what you might call an accent. all the kids and people with real jobs keep trying to sound like the people on television. Fisherman speak a foreign language that nobody understands. Loggers have their own lingo. And then there is the farmers. We all understand what they are saying no matter how they say it. Then there was my dad.
My dad had a funny way of saying hayrake. When he’d say rake it sounded like he was saying wreck. I heard him say it a thousand times but it always sounded queer to me. I got to thinking all our machinery might not be as good as somebody elses. He’d say “hook up the wreck…” ????? “and go wreck that hay.” What does that mean? What do people sound like that come from where you do? Do they sound funny to you?
This guy walks into a bus station and asks the stationmaster for a round trip ticket. The stationmaster say “where to ?” and the guy says “back here.”

[mitchmaine]

hi leslie, there is a rod connecting the heel of your mower to the pitman guard. it runs right across the front of your mower and looks like and is protecting your pitman arm. it should be threadede and adjustable. unbolt the end by the pitman guard and see if you can turn it. thats your adjustment in or out as you need it. when all else fails you can cut a new pitman arm and adjust the new length to suit. its important to close up that knife in the guards. but now you have to start thinking about the lead of your cutter bar. does it seem like the grass board end of your cutter bar is ahead, even or behind on square to the mower? should be just a little ahead if possible. good luck, mitch

[mitchmaine]

hi leslie, i’d start with the mower first. make sure its working well and easy, before i thought about your horse. if its hard to pull he’ll balk. easy stuff like sharp knife and plates. and see if you knife is in register( meaning if you run it by hand, does the knife stop directly under the section before returning ). if all is well, then question the horse. best luck, mitch

[mitchmaine]

hey all, a few photos penny took tonight kicking hay with our mower forecart. dick, molly and our new little twitch horse, belle(the dark horse).

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mitch

[mitchmaine]

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hi phil, here is a photo of that scoot i made. needs shoes. the beams and pins and ash runners are the same as ben’s. i shod mine with beech and pinned them on with 1″ hardwood pins. the nose chain takes a pole through the big ring in the center. the draft chains pass through that ring also and hook to your evener. you can use it without a pole on bare ground just like it is. we use it for sap and wood. its a tough rig. loose enough to work while its going.

mitch

[mitchmaine]

hey phil, ben thresher was my hero too. he got hit by a car crossing the road from the mill to the house and that lead to his end. hes buried up the road in peacham. family plot, i think. they saved his mill, but with good intentions, swept it and cleaned it up and lost alot of ben when they did, i think. the dam and race are gone. if they hadn’t touched it, maybe you could have found something on the bench that might have gave you some insight into how he worked and built the marvelous things he did. i built a cross of one of his sleds and a maine scoot. it had the three beams and was pinned and lined up like his, but i shod mine with beech and left out the pole and roll and replaced that with nose chains. no way near as nice as his sled. the guy was a genius. i guess its the way of things, but we seem to be losing alot of the good ones lately. its up to you now to make one of those sleds and keep it going. best o’ luck. mitch

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