Haybine, raking, baling

Some progress made today.

When I woke up I remembered I have a backup swather/haybine.  I never used it.  I got it 15-20 years ago before I got a tractor.  This link has a photo and video of the haybine.

https://tallpinesranch.blogspot.com/2018/09/omc-haybine.html

I checked its u-joint this morning.  It doesn't fit my New Holland haybine.  I remembered it had a flat tire.  I checked.  Not only flat, but a tire coming apart.  And somehow the tire goes against the frame of the machinery.

I checked to see if I could swap its wheel with my New Holland haybine.  Nope.  The OMC wheel has 5 bolts/nuts and the New Holland has 6 bolts/nuts.

Donna thought I wasted my time looking at the OMC haybine and I should scrap it.  I agreed... but looking at the video... I'm not sure what I will do with it.

Here is my broken universal u-joint.

Also this morning I fixed a fence panel on the loading corral's runway.  The cattle had pushed it in for some reason.

This afternoon I raked my cut hay rows.  I raked 27 rows into 13 rows.  Less rows for me to go around with the baler. 

Before and after...

After using the rake I walked the four corners and under the one power tower and used a pitchfork to move the hay evenly in a row, and to move the hay from out under the one power tower.

Then this evening I started to bale my hay.  In the beginning of haying season, baling was my concern.  This is because of the breakdown with the baler and tractor last year during the second hay cut.   Today was my first attempt to bale hay since then.

It was a slow start.  The first bale wasn't net wrapped.  I tried about four times and had to make adjustments after each failure.  Finally it worked.  To make sure the bale was net wrapped I manually over-rode the control and did a second netwrap in case the first one was only a partial.  Success.

The second netwrap went well.   Each time I would check the bale before I unloaded it from the baler. I could kind-of see and touch the bale and the netwrap between the belts.  Still, the third bale was a failure.  It appears it was only partially netwrapped, and when unloaded from the baler the bale partially unrolled.  I had to re-bale that hay.

I changed the control and increased it from from 2.4 to 2.6.  The rest of the times the bales were netwrapped.  I did have two bales where the netwrap on the edge of the bale caught on the belt when it unloaded.  A half a foot and a foot tear.   No problem.  The bale still holds together.

I baled four rows and made 15 bales.  I consider this part a success.  Now to finish the baling tomorrow and also take my u-joint in to be fixed so I can cut the rest of the field.