Senile Texas Aggie - comic relief for the rest of you

Senile_Texas_Aggie

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Are you going to have to stock the quail habitat or are there plenty of wild ones to move in?

As far as we know, we will not have to stock the quail habitat, but sadly there are not many wild bobwhite around. We heard one bobwhite calling sometime in the spring and have not heard any since. The habitat will also be for butterflies, so we are hoping the quail and the butterflies will show up on their own.

Nice shop!!!

A drag woulda put the grass fire right out. For that matter, for that, you could have back drug your fel bucket on it and extinguished it

Nice work there TxAggie! Field looks good in the pics. Agree with GB's comment... NICE shop! Glad the fire didn't spread.

Regarding the shop, thanks. I like it quite a bit as well. It is larger than the house (3000 sf versus 2400). It was one of the appealing things about the place. I have room to park the tractor and any implements that need to stay out of the weather, like the shredder.

Regarding putting out the grass fire, had the wet blanket not have worked, I was prepared to drive the tractor with the shredder over it if needed, and our garden house would reach. Of course, the water pressure might have been quite low. :(

Yeah I think we need a redo on that!

See if this is better:
20180922_082110.jpg

I need more info about this quail habitat!

The state of Arkansas offers assistance in providing habitat for dwindling species like bobwhite quail. They will pay for most or all of the costs for converting pasture into quail habitat, which also will supply food for butterflies. So we set aside 5 acres (the minimum acceptable) as an experiment, to see how it worked out.

Now I have another stupid question for you folks knowledgeable about tractors. While mowing the 5 acres for the quail habitat, whenever I got into really tall, thick grass, the mow would slow down and sometimes stop completely. I would stop the tractor and sometimes even raise up the mower so that it could spin back up again. My question is this: is there something wrong with the PTO clutch, or is there something that allows the mower to slow down when under strain, such as with thick grass?

Senile Texas Aggie
 

greybeard

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I'm not familiar with the PTO clutch and setup on your tractor, but I suspect it has a hydraulic pto ' wet clutch' and you will get some slippage under extreme pto loads.
Some tractors nowadays do not have a mechanical link between engine and PTO shaft. They use hyd HPfrom the general hyd system to drive a hydraulic motor that drives the PTO shaft.
It is not unusual tho, for a mower to stall in high heavy grass. My mower will do it no matter which tractor I use. A mower develops a lot of it's HP thru the rotating mass of the hub, stubs and blades in the form of inertia.
1. Make sure you keep your PTO rpms close to but not over 540. Slower rpms means you are trying to push the blades thru the grass instead of slinging them thru. There is probably a digital readout on your dash somewhere that tells what PTO rpms are.
2. Slow your forward travel speed down to compensate for the heavy grass...this might involve changing gears or switching to a lower range if it's a hydrostatic drive.
3. Call and discuss this with your dealer...it's under warranty. IF there is a problem, you want to catch it early.
 
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frustratedearthmother

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Now I have another stupid question for you folks knowledgeable about tractors. While mowing the 5 acres for the quail habitat, whenever I got into really tall, thick grass, the mow would slow down and sometimes stop completely. I would stop the tractor and sometimes even raise up the mower so that it could spin back up again. My question is this: is there something wrong with the PTO clutch, or is there something that allows the mower to slow down when under strain, such as with thick grass?
Greybeard explains it so well. I was just gonna say ….gear down and throttle up, lol. 'Course I'm not a tractor expert...:hide
 
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