Thursday, August 31, 2017

Yesterday, Brandon, John, and I traveled to Decatur, IL for the 2017 Farm Progress Show.  We arrived there about 830 am local time, and stayed until just after 3 pm.  We toured the exhibit field exclusively, and we were not able to get out to the field demonstrations of corn harvest or tillage operations.  Still, it was a very helpful trip.  We saw many interesting things, and made some new contacts.  We were mostly checking out new grain elevator legs, because we are considering replacing our original leg that was erected in 1973–this will make the 45th crop to be run through it.  It would be hard to estimate exactly how many bushels have been carried by this leg, (probably several million) but it appears that it is getting to the end of its serviceable life.

We looked over other stuff too.

Here’s a IH Farmall 560, similar to what I learned to drive as a kid. This belongs to Max Armstrong, the famous farm broadcaster. It was originally sold to Max’s dad from the dealer, Adams & Morrow, at Princeton, Indiana.

Another trip down memory lane (besides the 560) was this JD 730 tractor. It made me recall the days when we had those 2-cylinder JDs putt-putting around here.

We can’t resist checking out a new Ford pickup

This was our introduction to a “Tribine” harvester, which is sort of a combine and grain cart combo.

This huge 500 hp Challenger tractor was simply massive.

We saw the new S700 series combines on display here.

One of the many elevator leg exhibits we visited was this one at Brock. Interestingly, this Riley brand leg is manufactured right here at Vincennes, Indiana–12 miles away!

We checked out many 4wd tractors, too.  CIH-Steiger 500 STX

New Holland on tracks.

Claas Xerion 4wd

This tire was interesting, too. 1400mm (55 inches) wide

We had a terrific day at the show.  We took a little detour on the way home in order to have supper at the Beef House at Covington, IN.  Yum yum.

Later today, we are expecting a visitor to our farm from Australia.  We are looking forward to meeting Craig Hinck, and learning more about him and his family and his farm.

We are still thinking harvest beginning sometime the week of September 11.