small scale haying

NH-Rob · Sep 6, 2012

With the new haying forum I thought it would be good to post some pictures of how my family and I made some hay this summer. We do not need a whole lot of hay as we only have one sheep and 16 chickens and raise two pigs a year.
The photos are not in order but I started with mowing with the sickle bar mower and then hand tedded the hay for a couple of days. I then hand raked it into a windrow before the family helped me pick it up. We then ran the hay through the manual hay baler that I built off plans from the internet. As you can see even my wifes dog was helping with the process. After the seeing that the baling process worked well I upgraded to a small two basket kuhn hay tedder and put a hydraulic cylinder on the baler. If any one is interested I can take some pictures of my upgrades. We still need to bale up our third cut as it is sitting on my trailer in loose form right now.

greasemonkeyok · Sep 6, 2012

Your pics make it look like fun.

MIKE R · Sep 6, 2012

Looks like fun. Thank you for the pictures. The baler utilizes the same principle as the first balers and hay presses.

Soundguy · Sep 7, 2012

neat.. mind if i ask where you found the plans?

i'd like to do something similar, small scale.. etc..

NH-Rob · Sep 7, 2012

here is the link to the manual hay baler: http://www.tillersinternational.org/farming/resources_techguides/ThemiTillersManualHayBalerPlans.pdf I did stray from the plans some as I was using used lumber that we had laying around and had to adjust the dimensions some.

flusher · Sep 7, 2012

Neat stuff. How many acres of hay do you think you baled this time?

NH-Rob · Sep 7, 2012

flusher said:
Neat stuff. How many acres of hay do you think you baled this time?

Not sure I could put it into acres. I mow spots around the dairy farm that are between the barns and around manure piles. On my secound cut I mowed 5 different sections and I made 23 bales. First cut we got more bales but they were not compacted as tight. I expect to get another 15 or so when I get around to baling up the hay on my trailer.

zzvyb6 · Sep 7, 2012

Interesting and good use of materials via creativity. YouTube shows a similar apparatus in use. However, the bale case is mounted vertcally and the plunger lever is horizontal so that a person uses their weight to compact the hay via a lever ratio of about 3 - 4:1. They got some decent looking bales from it.

Soundguy · Sep 7, 2012

NH-Rob said:
here is the link to the manual hay baler: http://www.tillersinternational.org/farming/resources_techguides/ThemiTillersManualHayBalerPlans.pdf I did stray from the plans some as I was using used lumber that we had laying around and had to adjust the dimensions some.

thanks!

schmism · Sep 7, 2012

so build it as an attachment to the end of your wood splitter and take the work out of the compression stroke

NH-Rob · Sep 8, 2012

schmism said:
so build it as an attachment to the end of your wood splitter and take the work out of the compression stroke

That is basically what I did. I found a used cyl and mounted it in place of the lever. I then barrowed the valve bank off of my splitter. It works real well and the detent on the valve lets me go get more hay while the plunger is returning to the open position.

Ductape · Sep 8, 2012

Two thoughts....

We have run my neighbor's baler with a Massey 135 in a pinch..... so if you ever came across a cheap baler you may be able to make bales with your Kubota . We re-bale broken bales from the barn stationary.... feeding the baler with hay forks.

You might want to think about making a mini version of your baler. I see places selling tiny bales in the fall as decorations for $8 each !

reggiejr · Sep 8, 2012

very cool!!
I would love to try this method myself someday.
We use about 35-40 bales a year for or animals this method would be perfect for us too i think.
How much do you think you have invested in your setup?

NH-Rob · Sep 8, 2012

Ductape said:
Two thoughts....

We have run my neighbor's baler with a Massey 135 in a pinch..... so if you ever came across a cheap baler you may be able to make bales with your Kubota if you came across a cheap one. We re-bale broken bales from the barn stationary.... feeding the baler with hay forks.

You might want to think about making a mini version of your baler. I see places selling tiny bales in the fall as decorations for $8 each

Ductape
I came real close to buying a international 37 baler for $300. It was parked up the road from my house and I had to look at it every morning as I went to gas station to get a coffee. It drove my wife so nutty she told me to call the guy and find out about it. I offered him $200 but he did not go for it. If money had not of been so tight this summer I would have taken a chance on it. He FINALY did move it to a new location.

NH-Rob · Sep 8, 2012

reggiejr said:
very cool!!
I would love to try this method myself someday.
We use about 35-40 bales a year for or animals this method would be perfect for us too i think.
How much do you think you have invested in your setup?

I did not invest much in the baler itself. I already had the wood and the only thing I bought was screws and some threaded rod. I do however have way too much invested in my mower. I should have bought something else but i am cominted to this one now. The tedder was $100. I hope to find a small rake this winter for cheap money. For the amount of hay you are looking at this would work just fine.