powerrabbit

The only person that I know of that did this model in this scale was Malcs Models. Wheather he's still going or no I'm not sure. Several of his builds do turn up at the ToyTrac fairs Wincanton racecourse in October.

Went to the regular Sunday car boot in Exeter market this morning and picked up a few bits and bobs, 2 wind up wrist watches to add to my collection, a nice solid silver 'twizzle' stick, a quantity of old clock keys and others and a brand new still sealed in the box 7" 1/2 screen portable digital TV and a couple of Poole pottery items.

We came out of winter very dry and mild,

not like the previous two, cold and wild.

Early spring came dry and hot,

would this continue?, I thought not!

Summer?, what summer?, it's been a bit of a bummer.

If into the records we delve we're told it's been the wettest since 1912.

No other baler manufacturer could produce anything similar as David Brown pattented it and when these balers were produced, 1960 to 1962, this concept of this idea would have not have even entered the heads of others. Once again David Brown was ahead of the rest and nothing similar has ever been produced since.

Yes, they did make a device that turnrd the bale 90 degrees to drop it into a bale accumulator/sledge, this device was a curved tubular arm with rails to guide the bale around and it attached on the drawbar and was supported midway from the bale chamber. The baler was nicknamed 'the hill-sider', the sideways on bale chamber and cross-wise ram was ideal for baling on steep fields as the cross action of the ram eliminated the 'push' of the ram on the tractor so there was no ram 'surge'. It is said that David Brown got the idea of this baler from the paper recycling plant where they got rid of all their unwanted packaging, at this plant they had a paper/cardboard baler that ejected the bales out the side. The D.B. baler only has a pickup reel about 3 feet wide but will take a wider swath as the side guides are flared, as you can probably see in one of the pictures. The baler at its widest point, wheel to wheel, is 8 feet 3 inches and from the rear of the string box to the front crop guard on the pickup is 4 feet 6 inches and 9 feet 3 inches to the front of the drawbar clevice. The jack on the drawbar has 2 functions, firstly to raise and lower the drawbar to the height of the tractor drawbar for hitching up, secondly, when it's hitched to the tractor you wind the jack handle to raise and lower the pickup, this is acheived as the drawbar has a horizontal pivot pin on which the whole baler pivots on the wheel stub axles to raise and lower as described without actually moving the front section of the drawbar attached to the tractor. A very clever bit of engineering when you study it. These balers are now quite rare. As you can see, the bale chamber folds up for transport and you use the bale tensioner winding handle and springs to lock it in place for transport, you just have to re-position the link rods and springs each time between transport and working position. Tyre size is 9.00x10

Here's a few more after sympathetic restoration making sure that it would bale ok. A big bale of hay was torn apart and put through it and it worked perfectly.

Here's a picture of the baler in my shed before I took it up to my nephew at Hniton.

Here's another with it on the trailer before unloading it up at the shed where my nephew worked on it a bit to get it going again ready for the rally.

I took my camera but there was nothing much left to photograph and the only thing 'working' was the steam rack saw bench, the D.B. baler was sheeted down but I do have lots of pictures of the baler so I will post a few up dreckly.

Did you see the D.B. 880 and David Brown baler working? The baler is mine and my nephew has been doing a bit of work on it, I loaded it up on my trailer and took it up to him a month ago after it being stood in one of my sheds for nearly 15 years. He baled 30 bales with it and it never missed a bale until he baled a bit of the wetter straw near the hedge and broke the shearbolt in the flywheel. He was awarded the trophy this afternoon for the best working exhibit in the class, I think it was more the novelty that no-one has ever seen a David Brown baler in that area before.

Went to Honiton Hill rally this morning, wish I stayed at home, all the trade stalls but 3 had gone, nothing moving except for tractors with chains, ropes and strops hooked up to everything else on wheels in order to pull them out, it's like a bog in the fields. Should have went there yesterday as it was dry and they did manage some combining and baling straw.

These spoons come in a variety of sizes and styles, some are very plain, others quite ornate and decorated with the terminal of the handle having designs on them and the bowls taking the form of a scallop 'shell' and such like 'embossing' designs. I would say that if you took the quaishes with you when on the hunt for a pair of spoons then you could better match them to near enough the design on the quaishes, this would also help you to find spoons of the right size proprtionate to the quaishes as well. Here are 2 types of spoon that I have, the little one is not silver, just silver plate and would have been with a mustard pot from a condament set, a mustard pot with a hinged lid and glass liner. The larger one would be of the type you would be looking for. I've just for interest taken a close-up of the hallmarks on this one, the initials of W.S. are the maker (W. Sobey), next is the Kings head, William 4th, and the Monarchs head shows that the Duty on the item had been paid. Next is the Lion 'Passant', denoting English silver. (Which is always 9.25 purity). The next mark is the Assay Office mark, in this instance it is Exeter (believed to have started around 1570 and the office closed in 1882). The last mark is the date letter, which is a q (Q) which denotes the year off Assay as 1832.

What you want Bill is a pair of matching silver 'mustard spoons', you'll probably be able to find a pair at your local silversmith/goldsmiths or jewelers shops, if not go along to a local antiques fair when there's one on in your area, you usually see numerous mustard spoons at these fairs and pretty cheap.

Your tractors are looking well Tim. I assume they are original an have not been resprayed

The 880 Bill has been sprayed, when I bought it around 12 years ago it was being used as a yard tractor and had a front trip loader on it but it wasn't heavy enough to handle big bales of silage that's why the previous owner wanted to sell it. Condition was not very good, the bonnet had been well battered so I had to source a good replacement. Mechanically it was very good so had to do nothing engine, clutch or gearbox wise. I sold the loader for what I paid for the tractor so spent very little money on the tractor apart from a set of new tyres and more recently a new seat, I kept the original mudguards as they were perfect and retained the roll-bar, although I hate it, so that others can drive it. I know no history about the 880 but you can't have everything. The 780 on the other hand is totally original, original in that mechanically it has never been touched since new from 1968, all the tin work is original, it had a little surface rust on the back end so I had to re-spray the rear wheels, front wheels and the mudguards and seat but the bonnet is as I bought it in 1998 at the farm retirement sale, it was new to this farm so I have the complete history, including the original invoice. I did put a new set of rear tyres and one front tyre on it, new steering joints and seat cushions, gave it a good service and that was it really. The engine as I said is totally original, dynamo, water pump, starter motor and everything else, it's even still on the original clutch, all quite remarkable concidering that it's done 12272 hours to date, yes, that is 12 thousand 272 hours. This tractor is very well known around the area here because of the history of the farm and the family it came from, but that's another lengthy story.

The evening went well, overcast but dry and warm, quite a crowd of spectators and a rough total of 49 entries including floats and walking entries. Only 3 entries in the vintage class, my 2 tractors pulling floats and a 1/2 size steamer. Here's my tractors and the steam engine.

800 litres of kerosene heating oil and 700 litres DERV.

Wiping over 2 of my tractors and checking them over in preparation to pull a couple of floats in the local carnaval early this evening. Will be taking some photos.

The Britains MF drill was a grain drill really, the early Norsden drill they produced would have been more like the type of direct drill being discussed as the topic title.

The one in the picture on the right in the link is the exact one my mate uses. He's looking to get a slightly bigger one for his local work but keep the one he has as it fits easily on an Ifor Williams trailer for work he has drilling further away.

Not sure about the model front but a friend of mine does a lot of direct drilling of grass seed. I have no pictures of the drill he uses or know the make of it but it is quite a small machine that slot-seeds directly into the soil and has a row of heavy link steel chains that drag over the ground behind the drill. The drill itself is quite small, not much wider than the tractor. The old pasture needs to be burnt off before rdrilling.

Going back to the subject of tools, here's quite an unusual tyre pressure gague, the Dunlop Number 5. It's unusual in the respect that it is specifically made for tractor tyre pressure reading being graduated between 2psi to a maximum of 20psi. I was given this by a retired farmer. Nice that it's still in its original green leather pouch although the gold embossed lettering on it is rather worn.

Here's another keyring from the past, forgot I had it untill I re-discovered it again today whilst looking for something else.

I have several agricultural related keyrings, I'm sure otheres have a few as well, I think a new topic is on the cards.

More than one fungus are fungi. Someone will probably be along shortly to identify the white ones.

This is a good one, click on 'materials', next page 'metal'. http://hobby.uk.com/

You'll most likekley obtain it from a good model shop, sheet, tube, angle, wire etc. Alternatively, do a Google search for model and hobby suplies.

Regarding Norton, you've said it all Sean! My Brother had unidentified problems with his computer, kept shutting itself down, would not open programmes, internet would not open, pages would freeze, all sorts of issues. His PC expert came out to look it over and said that it was full of viruses and had a couple of trojans in there somewhere, I told him to uninstall the Norton and see what happened, Norton uninstalled, problem solved. The majority of new computers have a 30 day trial Norton pre-installed, if you buy a new computer, let it run for the 30 day period and then install a different anti-virus programme.