pat32rf
Veteran Member
A few days back I was visitin' with an old guy out in his barn. He went on about always loosing money, poor crops, bad weather, crummy govment, etc. Nothing new.
I then noticed a piece of chain hanging from a beam in an open area of his barn. When he saw me looking he explained that no, he wasn't about to "stretch his neck", but that was how he changes his implements all by himself.
Each of his implements has a lifting ring, or chunk of chain fastened to the top, at about the center of balance. He backs up under the chain with the 3pth raised and hooks onto the chain and lowers the 3pth until the chain takes the weight. He then uncouples and picks up a skid with his FEL forks. He lifts the skid under the implement until the chain unhooks and then he sets the skid out of the way while he picks up his next implement (on a skid) and hangs it from the chain. With the implement hanging and free to move, its a simple job for him to line up the 3pth and make the connections.
He showed me how easy it was for him to remove his back blade and install the snowblower, using only a small carpenters hammer to tap the arms and PTO shaft on or off....
Even if the lifting point is not exactly right, its a simple matter to tilt the free swinging implement by hand. On some (cultivator) he doesn't bother with a skid. On others he has fastened blocks to the skid (back blade) to balance the load in place.
He tells me that the hardest part was finding the center of gravity with the chain in the barn, then taking every thing down to the welder in his shop to weld on a ring, or short piece of chain. When I asked why he didn't just hoist with his FEL (at the shop) to find the CofG, I got a real funny look.......
I then noticed a piece of chain hanging from a beam in an open area of his barn. When he saw me looking he explained that no, he wasn't about to "stretch his neck", but that was how he changes his implements all by himself.
Each of his implements has a lifting ring, or chunk of chain fastened to the top, at about the center of balance. He backs up under the chain with the 3pth raised and hooks onto the chain and lowers the 3pth until the chain takes the weight. He then uncouples and picks up a skid with his FEL forks. He lifts the skid under the implement until the chain unhooks and then he sets the skid out of the way while he picks up his next implement (on a skid) and hangs it from the chain. With the implement hanging and free to move, its a simple job for him to line up the 3pth and make the connections.
He showed me how easy it was for him to remove his back blade and install the snowblower, using only a small carpenters hammer to tap the arms and PTO shaft on or off....
Even if the lifting point is not exactly right, its a simple matter to tilt the free swinging implement by hand. On some (cultivator) he doesn't bother with a skid. On others he has fastened blocks to the skid (back blade) to balance the load in place.
He tells me that the hardest part was finding the center of gravity with the chain in the barn, then taking every thing down to the welder in his shop to weld on a ring, or short piece of chain. When I asked why he didn't just hoist with his FEL (at the shop) to find the CofG, I got a real funny look.......
