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A New Holland 717 followed me home today.

rockyridgefarm

rockyridgefarm

Well-known Member
I saw a New Holland 717 chopper on the Madison craigslist today and thought the price was a misprint. Turns out it wasn't. I think it'll be just the ticket for getting rid of the 25 year old moldy hay in the old dairy barn. There's about 1000 bales of straw, hay, and soybean fodder bales and the newest is 25 years old.

There's a dirt ramp into the barn, but the barn itself is pretty bad. I was gonna drop some 2 by 12s and drive the tractor and chopper into the barn on them. Of course, I still want the lightest tractor possible. I'm hoping the 40 hp Deere 2040 will do it, but could also use the 40 hp Deere 60. I really don't want to drive my 4010 in there.

What do you think?
 
I would not chop that hay in the barn, there are all kinds of pathogens and mold in that hay. I learned that the hard way this spring cleaning out just that kind of mess in my barn. Ended up with viral pneumonia and inflammation of the lining of my intestines. After that experience I would work around that hay only with a respirator type mask on and I wouldn't feed to my animals. Get it out and burn it.
 
besides the dust/mold/breathing issues, i would not want a tractor running a chopper inside the barn. all it would take is one hot carbon ember out of the muffler, and you would be losing the barn and anything in it. once an old barn starts on fire, there is no way to stop it.
 
Just burn that old musty/moldy hay. If can make you and your livestock very sick. I have seen guys have cattle/goats die from the old moldy stuff.
 

I don't plan on feeding this hay. I'm gonna chop it up into a spreader and haul it onto my fields. I have and older Knight 716 slinger that doesn't handle bedding well, so chopping it up is necessary. Chopping it up will also speed up it's breaking down into the soil. The barn is a poorly built 56 cow barn from the 50's that has to be torn down. I cannot burn it because my feed room is built onto it and my grain bin is 6 feet from it.

I plan on using a mask while doing the job. Even if I don't chop it, it still has to come out of the barn, which will require handling it. I would use a skid steer and grapple, but do not trust the floor enough to be running around with a skid steer in there.

Once the hay is out, I can start tearing it down, trying to save as much good lumber as possible. The rest will be burned and buried.

Any ideas?
 
back in 73 Dad had a wild hair about chopping baled straw for bedding.
He backed the old Case 800 with a 300 chopper up into the barn and chopped a big old pile every few days. Dusty as heck wore a mask and goggles.
Never burned the place down though.
Your experience may differ.....
A smaller tractor should be fine since you aren't dragging the chopper and a box around.
 

Hey sammy,

I agree that there sure is no fun way to do this. The chopper will be aimed out the door into a spreader, so that should help keep the dust down. I'll also have to mind the wind. The door is to the north, so days with south winds will be best.

My other thought was to try to do some sort of reverse hay hook or dump rake on a long rope with pulleys - roll the rake in by hand, hook it to a tractor outside, and pull the hay out that way. No matter what, I'm gonna be in a poor condition barn in moldy hay. Well, it's not THAT moldy. I haven't yet seen a moldy bale, but there are holes in the roof the length of the barn, so there's gotta be moldy hay below the stuff on top.
 
Find some way to first get that hay out of the barn. Perhaps a small 2 wheel trailer with a 25' long toung put in so you can just back the trailer in and keep the tractor outside, load the bales and take out to a field and lay in a row to pick up with the choper. And plan on using the big tractor to run the chopper as they are or at least the one my uncle had and that I ran was a power hog, at least the 3020 had a load just chopping bad hay back on the ground.
 
Just to ad a bit more. After I used his we had an older style New Holland flywheel cutter head type and it would do the same job as the 3020 did on the 717 with the power of a late B John Deere with 1/2 the power rating, also same on the older Cockshutt chopper we had before. Only used his one time after the Cockshutt whent to pieces with no repair avaible. So that is why I say they are a power hog, Uncle had a larger 4 wheel drive that he normally ran the chopper with.
 
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