My low-buck potato hiller and digger

[sixdogs]

I like potatoes. But I hate hilling and digging them, especially in clay soil.
So from ideas of other guys here I built my own inexpensive set.
I had an old toolbar off a Dearborn planer of some sort. I had to add angle iron to it for a spacer because the bar was too small.
Then I had parts from an old Ford 1970's cultivator and used some of the units that clamp to the toolbar. They hold my hiller discs and these are the blue parts.
This setup allows me to clamp in the disk things that I already had that were on shanks.
Come digging time, I use that curley-Q cultivator arm--off Massey Feurgeson -- with a shovel on it and just remove the discs and clamp that to the toolbar.

While I have not actually used this one yet, I have used similar. I hill the ground a little first, plant a potato eye and hill as they grow.
I plant in one long row and succession plant so when it's time to dig, i just start at the beginning and did a little when i need them.
We eat over the summer as new potatoes but if you wanted to store you would want to know relatve days to maturity so early ones go in first.

We don't let them mature but my notes say maturities of 80-90 days for Norlund, 90-100 Superior, 100-115 Atlantic, 100-120 Russet Burbank, 120-130 Katahdin amd 130 Kennebec. Double check.

 

[Ford850]

Looks like a great system. I have never used the plow and alwys wondered if they damage the potatoes when digging, especially in clay soil. do the potatoes roll out of the soil or do you still have to "hand dig" them to find them after plowing?

 

[sixdogs]

Looks like a great system. I have never used the plow and alwys wondered if they damage the potatoes when digging, especially in clay soil. do the potatoes roll out of the soil or do you still have to "hand dig" them to find them after plowing?

They roll out of the soil.
No hand digging especially if the ground is good and dry.

 

[Stimw]

Just a tip from my experience having built my own a couple years ago and sold a few. They work better if you tilt the tops back and angle the discs forward they dig in and hill better.
It's kinda like a term used when plowing- "Suck" it refers to angling the tip of a plow down just a little causing it to want to stay in the soil. With the discs leaning back they tend to pull down rather than slide accross the top of the soil.