Another Exciting Day on the Farm
Sept 19, 2022 21:16:43 GMT
jackscrap, tourerjim, and 2 more like this
Post by BuckSkin on Sept 19, 2022 21:16:43 GMT
Clear Springs Road - Half Acre Road - Russell County - Kentucky
Sunday_18-September-2022
John Deere 5820 Self-Propelled Forage Harvester, also known as a Silage Chopper, catches afire and burns to the ground.
Within the week, this machine has received a new battery, a new alternator, new belts - lots of them, new knives, a new fuel filter, and more.
The big front tires were same as new.
Before beginning the day, forty gallons of fuel was added to the 210-gallon tank.
With the operators 6-yr-old daughter riding along in the chopper, we went into the corn and loaded the truck I was driving.
I pulled away and headed to the silage pile to dump my load and another truck took my place alongside the chopper.
Once he was about half loaded, he saw that the machine was afire.
6-yr-old Andrea bailed out and took refuge in that truck and the operator took out across the field toward the water hose; it is a good thing he lost forward motion before he got there, else he may have burned a house and two or three big barns.
The entire length of the field is 0.45 mile (some 800 yards); however, an impassable gully divides it into two sections, the section we were working being 0.34 mile (some 600 yards) at it's longest point.
The excitement started on the far side of the field, near the woods.
He drove the burning chopper 1/4-mile to the spot where she burned to the ground, 105-yards from the water spigot at the calf barn.
I am sure glad he didn't get overcome by the smoke and slump over the wheel; getting that big 400-pounder out of there would have been like trying to get a hog out of a dug well.
The big right-front tire shot like dynamite when she blew, sending blazing pieces of rubber a couple hundred feet in the air.
I found the fuel spout and cap some fifty yards away, the cap and spout looked good as new.
It is between these two photos when the right-front tire shot like dynamite and blew up; you can tell by looking at the cutterhead.
It is hard to believe that it held so long in such intense heat.
I wish I knew how many PSI it was holding at the microsecond before it blew.
It was not quite so dramatic when the left tire went quite some time later.
He pulled the kill-cable when he bailed out, but the engine kept running wide open; it ran for a long time before it finally quit.
It went ahead and burned to a skeleton; all four tires burned completely away, leaving only the rims and the steel cables that formed the tire beads.
The sheet metal melted and burned as well.
The plastic five-gallon buckets that are seen in several of the photos, left sitting here and there by the bucket brigade, melted into blobs of plastic.
Sunday_18-September-2022
John Deere 5820 Self-Propelled Forage Harvester, also known as a Silage Chopper, catches afire and burns to the ground.
Within the week, this machine has received a new battery, a new alternator, new belts - lots of them, new knives, a new fuel filter, and more.
The big front tires were same as new.
Before beginning the day, forty gallons of fuel was added to the 210-gallon tank.
With the operators 6-yr-old daughter riding along in the chopper, we went into the corn and loaded the truck I was driving.
I pulled away and headed to the silage pile to dump my load and another truck took my place alongside the chopper.
Once he was about half loaded, he saw that the machine was afire.
6-yr-old Andrea bailed out and took refuge in that truck and the operator took out across the field toward the water hose; it is a good thing he lost forward motion before he got there, else he may have burned a house and two or three big barns.
The entire length of the field is 0.45 mile (some 800 yards); however, an impassable gully divides it into two sections, the section we were working being 0.34 mile (some 600 yards) at it's longest point.
The excitement started on the far side of the field, near the woods.
He drove the burning chopper 1/4-mile to the spot where she burned to the ground, 105-yards from the water spigot at the calf barn.
I am sure glad he didn't get overcome by the smoke and slump over the wheel; getting that big 400-pounder out of there would have been like trying to get a hog out of a dug well.
The big right-front tire shot like dynamite when she blew, sending blazing pieces of rubber a couple hundred feet in the air.
I found the fuel spout and cap some fifty yards away, the cap and spout looked good as new.
It is between these two photos when the right-front tire shot like dynamite and blew up; you can tell by looking at the cutterhead.
It is hard to believe that it held so long in such intense heat.
I wish I knew how many PSI it was holding at the microsecond before it blew.
It was not quite so dramatic when the left tire went quite some time later.
He pulled the kill-cable when he bailed out, but the engine kept running wide open; it ran for a long time before it finally quit.
It went ahead and burned to a skeleton; all four tires burned completely away, leaving only the rims and the steel cables that formed the tire beads.
The sheet metal melted and burned as well.
The plastic five-gallon buckets that are seen in several of the photos, left sitting here and there by the bucket brigade, melted into blobs of plastic.
