Hay fire Today

[kthompson]

As an insurance agent do not ever think the size of an operation means how they think about any issue, much less insurance. I have sold with what was the largest insurance company at that time and all it meant was they were the largest. Nothing else. Did not mean they were the best, the smartest, best products...only the largest. Same thing with a farming operation or any other industry.

 

[Texasmark]

Only hay fire I ever had was in a round baler caused by a hot bearing. It can happen, even though I maintained unit and kept watch for hot components. I was lucky. Realized it and dumped bale....no fire in the roll, just the loose chaff that stays on the belts after dumping..... was close enough to water, ran over with the gate open and put the fire out....no damage. I could see the bearing smoking. Baler is '91 model I take it was from PO leaving it out in the weather.....rusted bearing.

 

[Tx Jim]

I wasn't as lucky as you as I lost a JD 435 rd baler to fire about 20 yrs ago. I thought I had fire extinguished 3 times then belt caught on fire & my water fire extinguisher became depleted of water. I disconnected baler from tractor & saved tractor from burning but baler was totalled. Lower tailgate brg was the culprit. IMHO having comprehensive insurance is a must have for rd baler & tractor.

 

[MHarryE]

Could someone please tell me which large tractor or combine needs to be stopped to do a regen? If I still had access to my files I could show you dozens of combine fires I investigated in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s. Driving with parking brake on, failed bearings, electrical shorts, not cleaning chaff out of engine compartment, spilling oil during oil change and not cleaning it up so chaff collects instead of being blown out by air blast. Actually tractors with DPFs are less likely to start a field fire. Growing up our Farmall H and Allis-Chalmers B started several hay fires. We used them to pull loaded wagons to the barn and several times got there to find the load on fire due to hot carbon deposits from the heavy pull (for those tractors) blowing out the exhaust and starting the dry hay on fire. With the DPF there are no hot soot particles with which to contend. One sees more reports and pictures of fires now because we have the Internet and everyone has a camera phone.