Gav836

My mate at work ringing me to say the McConnel topper was juddering so much that the whole tractor was shaking............got beneath it when he got it back to the yard to find oil running out of the bottom of both gearboxes and that the bearings had gone in both of them. Now I know this isn't from the 5 minutes he used it as its had a slight oil leak for a while and a mild vibration when the stockman went to use it back in April, I now know full well that it must have been like this when he finished with it and he hadn't told anyone :

In my case I have at least two of every size of metric spanner as its not always possible to get an adjustable in somewhere, in the case of Britool they do a standard length, long length and extra long length of spanner, the latter is very handy for tight nuts or ones buried in chassis rails. If I take a basic tool kit on a machine it consists of: combination pliers side cutters 8-24mm spanners (varies as to which ones I take with the machine in question) 12" adjustable spanner screw drivers punch chisel hammer wire brush One thing you will find is that the bigger the tool chest you buy, the quicker you seem to fill it and need to upgrade it!!

Having to leave Buster at the vets to be sedated for a scan and needle test on a lump I found on his neck :( Hoping that its just a foriegn object causing it as he does and will eat anything, particularly wood

95% of my tools are Britool, all have been got through ebay over the past 10 years. I do have a few Halfords Professional ones but they aren't really up to heavy usage (as my twisted breaker bar will testify to!!) and a couple of Elora ones that I've picked up over the years. I only have one set of cheapo spanners and they are an oversize set of 33mm, 36mm, 41mm, 46mm and 50mm that tend not to get a lot of use, the same goes for a 24" adjustable and 36" stilsons other than those few I stick to Britool as I've never broken, bent or damaged any of them other than a 2mm pin punch and 3mm 1/4" drive hex bit, the latter when giving a grub screw in a bearing the "biggun" ;D

The builders merchants sending the wrong gravel out to me this morning, I ordered pea shingle and instead a bag of 20mm gravel turned up meaning I couldn't get on until they came out and changed it at 3pm. All done now though and looking much better

No I didn't Chris as I'd have needed to remove every bit of existing gravel first and the cost would have been quite high to do it that way.

Mine arrived as well today, think I may have to get the rest of the Britains Case International tractors now to go with it though

Doing some more landscaping in the garden. I "aquired" nearly three tons of pea shingle last week which has managed to recover my large front path and some of the back gardens original gravel area into which I've now inset some paving slabs as stepping stones that have been laying about the garden since I moved in. Unfortunately I'm about a ton short of what I need so I've ordered that today for delivery tomorrow and been laying the remaining four slabs that will be in that area along with raking off the remaining large gravel to redistribute elsewhere. I'm not a big fan of gravel (especially as Buster eats it!!) but as its such a large garden its better that it remains graveled in that part between the house and out buildings

The New Holland CR9090 is due out at around the end of October with an RRP of £98

Our neighbour had a chap in leveling his tracks off so my boss asked if he could do our two worst ones as well while he was in the area. The 7480 is on a 12 plate, the trailed grader is made from the business end of an old Aveling Barford grader. He also has a vibrating roller but the low loader its on blew a hose as he went to leave the neighbors so I don't have any pictures of that.

The Polish guys from Omnivent finished the inside off at lunchtime today as well. There's still some green sheeting to go above the plywood on the centre partition yet. The air intake fans in the tunnel at the back of the shed

Well the sheeting boys have finally finished the exterior of the shed for now, there's still a few ducts to be fitted but they aren't on site yet.

A second hand display cabinet off ebay for the grand sum of £25, only 12 miles down the road so already got it and filled it!!

Two tickets to the Cereals show next week, need to get some more NROSO points

Britains Ford 6600 and 7600 from Udimore, no dribble stains on the boxes from him either, he must be getting better ;D

That one was listed first thing in the morning on the day after you sent me the message mate, think I got it more or less as soon as it was listed

Definately Polish Niels, nothing Dutch about them other than the name on the van. They got told that they couldn't use any of their power tools on site as they were 240v and not 110v so had to go shopping They wouldn't have bothered moving it if it wasn't for the new barn though. We've been told that £16k is cheap for what they are doing too.

Managed to aquire a few Salmon/Armer/Armer Salmon brochures this week off ebay.......Sean got to the above one before I could

UK Power Networks have also been out today installing a new transformer and housing along with installing underground cabling as the main feed for 3 villages passes across the front of the new shad so they want to move it and the transformer and poles we have in the yard at the moment, it is costing us £16k though.

A few more updates on the new store now. The cladding boys have been here all week sheeting it in again, they just have the front to finish now along with all the flashings, trim and guttering. The venting company, Omnivent, also started work today, all Polish guys, not an Englishman amongst them

Well this afternoon I've been doing a job that I have to say is one of my least favourite tractor related tasks and one I've managed to escape for the past two years , I've had the tractor hoe out in the sugarbeet cutting out the over-drilling on the headlands where they join the field work and a patch of weedy beet in one of the fields. One of those jobs where you can't take your eyes of the task for more than a few seconds or a lot of damage can be done. 6810 and Stanhay Rowcleaner Not much room for error here!!

No we don't, the ridges are deeper than they look from the tractor seat but the seed potatoes themselves are planted 5 - 7 inches deep depending on seed size and there is as much loose destoned soil beneath them as there is on top of them if not more in the shallower depth as we destone at 12 - 14 inches deep giving them plenty of loose soil to grow into.

Just a quick update on the new potato store, we've had various workmen in the yard today, some digging trenches (and hitting the water main) for the electric supply, some laying a concrete plinth for a new transformer to go in and some starting to sheet in the sides of the store. Got a couple of pictures of the first side they've been working on, the spaces at the top are for fan ductings and the ones at the back for personel access doors to the tunnel.

We finally finished planting on Monday as I mentioned elsewhere on here so I've been washing the destoner down and getting the beet hoe ready for use. As the weathers been nice today with very little wind I've put 174kg/ha of nitrogen on the Russet Burbank potatos and 260kg/ha on the Saturna that have emerged, that just leaves the potatoes that we planted in the past week to top dress once they are through. For those who are interested these are the Russet Burbanks planted on March 22 on light land Russet Burbanks planted on March 28 on heavy land Saturna planted on March 31 on medium-heavy land

Finally finished potato planting today, glad to be finished. Typical that the weather is now set to be warm and dry this week now we've done, could have done with that to dry the soil out, especially on the headlands, what the destoner kicked out resembled cobbles, not clods and stones!!