Good morning!!!!

[buckeyefarmer]

View attachment 604414
My neighbor came down this morning and helped me tow the tractor up to the garage where it could be worked on. He drove the Kubota side-by-side while I steered and braked the tractor. It took several attempts to find a slope shallow enough for the little Kubota to pull the bigger one up, but once on the concrete, we did just fine. He stuck around long enough to get the thing up on jack stands and help remove the wheel. It pulled right off without removing any fasteners or clips, with a foot long piece of axle still attached. I'm very fortunate it didn't decide to come off during yesterday's mowing, or during the trip backing/coasting down the driveway.

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The gear case came loose with a couple whacks of a dead blow hammer and come careful prying with a putty knife. Another quart or so of fluid came out the joint, that was in addition to the four or so gallons I'd already drained from the main transmission case. Sadly, I'd just replaced the fluid less than 50 hours previously. Peeking through the center of the big reduction gear is the stub end of the axle.

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The wheel flange/axle and the stub and bearing. These are not small parts.

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The smooth nature of the shear faces tells me that this is a fatigue fracture that had been propagating for a long time. It started at the bottom of a groove machined into the axle causing a stress raiser that focused the twisting forces at the notch. The notch was probably put there to provide a place for the cutting tool when the threads were cut on a lathe. It's a common practice to use such a notch, but hopefully the bottom of the notch is "U" shaped, not the square corners that Kubota used on this axle. This is a design and/or manufacturing defect that very nearly resulted in severe bodily injury or death.

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It took 15 years and 2193 hours for this axle to break. But that's assuming this is the first time it happened. The gear case shows signs of having been removed before, and if it was to replace the axle, I'm wondering what shape the one on the left side is in. It's definitely time to find a new home for this tractor before it has a chance to take another shot at me. And find a tougher machine that can take the abuse of the hills, rocks, and trees here, probably a tracked skid steer.

Wow, I thought it was bad when i snapped a 1" axle on my riding mower last yr.

I snapped a back axle on a dump truck years ago.

 

[mostly_gas]

Good evening all. 54F this morning, clear, calm wind. Light wind today, sky stayed clear, high temp got up to 76F. Chapel to start the day, made breakfast for wife, then went into energy conservation mode. Did walk the dog tonight.
Happy mothers day to all the wives and mothers still with us. :drink:
Buckeye hope you make home safely, congrats on a new graduate!!
David hope you get past yur blockage with no concrete cutting.
RNG hope you get your tractor repaired and replaced with minimal difficulties.
prayers for all.

 

[RoyJackson]

2019-05-13, 0331

43 right now...high in the mid-50's today...another week of rain ahead of us...

 

[Eric Salop]

Good morning. It looks like another clear day for us with only a light wind. Time to strap on a knapsack and spot spray weeds in the hay fields.

I left an old piece of steel channel soaking in citric acid last night to remove rust. It was too long to fit in a plastic tank and too wide to fit in the 4" drain pipe I often use, so I made up a temporary bath with pieces of timber and 2 layers of plastic sheet (One layer to contain the acid, second layer for insurance).
This morning the bath is dry :confused3: Concrete around is pretty clean though

 

[Eric Salop]

Drew, not sure which robotics company you were reading about. The one most relevant to this forum is a startup with an ambition to make many tractors obsolete, replacing them with smaller autonomous robots for most of the crop protection field work. Only at the prototype stage, but they or others could revolutionise what we think of as a tractor, in the same way that Harry Ferguson did.

There are others who are building up businesses on drones for surveying crops. Big electronic's firms like Omron are already making devices specifically for agriculture, allowing inspection of leaves at infra red wavelengths that we can't see but reveal more information about the health of a leaf. Some drones are already available for aerial spraying too. Wonder how long it will be before Mohammed needs to add a new section to TBN for all this stuff.


RNG, please get that low centre of gravity tracked machine (bulldozer !) asap, or you're not going to live long enough to play with all these new toys.

 

[Looking4new]

38 °F and going to high of 50. Wind SE 5 mph. 40% chance of showers.

We've got a road washed out somewhere in the back roads. I hardly ever go out that way, so I am not sure where it is exactly.
One woman almost got into it as it was going, but had the presence of mind to cram it into reverse and get out of there. She is the one that called the cops. They (the cops) closed the road.

I got another 10 lbs of high nitrogen fertilizer yesterday. 34-0-0

Years ago I had chickens and in the pen where I kept them was a huge stump that was cut off close to the ground. The hens had pecked that stump clean of all the grubs and whatever was in, on and around the stump.
That stump was one of the reasons I opted for a BH. I got the hoe last year about this time and figured I would remove the stump. I set up and just barely touched the stump with the bucket and it ( the stump) disintegrated. Now I know that chicken leavings are high in nitrogen and since I can't get potassium nitrate (salt peter) anymore without jumping through a bunch of federal goobermint hoops, high nitrogen fertilizer will have to do. I guess the feds don't want us to have the where with all to make bombs and blow their sorry azzes to kingdom come.

My full system backup was finished at 11:30 last night. Now I can get on with the win 10 install. After my teckie comes back from North Bay.

I still have the ride on mower to service and blades to sharpen. I may get at that today. But don't hold your breath.


Have a good day all

 

[Buppies]

54 high of68 raining now about 1/4in so far showers all day

RNG hope you get it fixed

Sodamo sounds frustrating

Prayers for all

 

[ronjhall]

Poured first cup of coffee. 43° with rain this morning. Heading to 51° with rain ending by lunch. Wife decided it was to cold to go out for dinner. So we had spaghetti sent to us by our son. Better than any restaurant meal. Since we did not got out I decided to work on a project for pond vac. While cutting a piece of HDPE with miter saw a piece flew off and hit my middle finger. Nasty cut. Took all day to stop bleeding. Need to stop taking Aspirin. Maybe I should have gone to Urgent Care. Will see what it looks like today when I take bandage off. Not sure what my plans are for today.
Had a coyote set off one of the camera this morning. Sure wish it would get after raccoon that keeps tripping camera's every night.

RNG, glad you are safe. Sorry your tractor is broken. Repairs, then tractor shopping.

David, hope you find other end of pipe at LP tank without cutting drive.

Looking, good luck with 7 to 10 upgrade. I am very happy with my new 10 computer.

Good Morning All.

 

[daugen]

ouch, sorry you got hurt Ron. Bet that throbs plus it keeps you from doing other things. Heal quickly.

smaller autonomous robots for most of the crop protection field work. that was the one I read Eric, thank you. I'd be watching your local fields for some interesting
contraptions out there. I can see you looking out and seeing one of them chasing a lamb around.

time to do some food shopping, then back to water trees with water wagon. Almost all the expected rain went somewhere else.
Drip irrigation lines on bottom half of garden on a timer sure make that job easy. Top half I do by hand and it takes about an hour plus.
Very relaxing time while watering, though often interrupted by bending over to snag a big weed.
Or now, to move a getaway cuke or squash plant runner; oh no no no
you aren't going that way. Cukes should be coming in soon.

Bill, I used that fertilizer on my collards and what it didn't kill, about ten percent, grew like mad. I wasn't careful enough about keeping the particles off the plant,
lot stronger than other fertilizers.

72 going up to 79 with showers after lunch.

 

[Thomas]

45F cloud here and there mid 50's for high rain arriving tonight.

Squirrels turkeys enjoying breakfast and fox sitting side field watching traffic go by.
Plans for today...quick trip to town.feed of fiddle head ferns,figure out straighten up 7' retaining wall with out doing lot of hand digging.

Enjoy the day all.