[TheForge] (no subject)

Thu Oct 31 20:41:01 2002

TOP TALK

Get un-bent

Here is an Agriculture Online� success story. "We tried what Hagan and some others had recommended about heating and cooling the auger and it pulled it almost back perfectly," reports Mobile from southern Illinois. He had posted his dilemma just a few days earlier in Machinery Talk. "We bent the table auger in our 1063 head. We managed to bend it back enough to keep it from rubbing but would like to have it fixed." The advice Hagan posted was, "Roll the auger to where the bend is up. Heat the top half red hot in a diamond shape and then take several cold wet towels and lay them on the hot diamond and it will shrink the metal shorter and straighten it right up." Ham agrees that the heating method is gentler than using violence. His added touch is to "put a block of metal between the auger and the floor of the table that is the right gap. As you heat the top, the auger will sink toward the floor, and if you don't have something there to stop it you can easily go too far." Othe!
rs point out that sometimes the auger is bad enough that part or all of it needs to be replaced. Inspect it to be sure it's not rusted inside and uneconomical to repair before you spend time and money on it.

http://email.agriculture.com/cgi-bin1/flo?y=eYm60DVlUh0TM0FQMT0A2 

ALL AROUND THE FARM

Save time and drill bits

A Kansas farmer writes, "My drill press ran too fast for large bits and too slow for small ones. I didn't always take the time to change belts and, as a result, would ruin bits. So I used the hydrostat from a lawn tractor to power my drill. Now I can go from 0 to 450 rpm by simply moving a lever." See an illustration of the variable-speed drill press and get more great ideas from All Around the Farm:

http://email.agriculture.com/cgi-bin1/flo?y=eYm60DVlUh0TM0FPfD0AB 