After a restful weekend visiting family in Oklahoma and Arkansas, we’re back at it. We have to get the first hoop house up as soon as possible so that we can get the straw out of the farmer’s barn. To that end, we met with an excavating company last week and discovered that having the pad leveled for the greenhouse would cost us $1500. Ouch. So we’re going to take a run at it ourselves again.
Our plan is to use the plow that came with the tractor to break up the soil a layer at a time on the high side of the site. Then we’ll use the box blade to move the loosened soil over to the low side. It will take several passes to get the site leveled, but we think it’s do-able.
In order to make that happen, we have to get the plow in good working order and finish the tune-up of the tractor. This means changing out some very rusted hardware on the plow (and maybe the tractor), changing the oil in the tractor (a 2 day process) and figuring out how to use the plow. With a little luck and some work, that will all get finished before the weekend. Then we’ll camp out at the farm this weekend again and get the site leveled. If that miraculously goes well (fat chance, but good to dream), then we’ll start laying out where the poles go early next week.
The first step in this process happened yesterday. Unfortunately, Jeremy didn’t have the camera with him, so no pictures. Sorry. The oil that drained out of the tractor was a lovely shade of pitch black and had the stuff in it you would expect from oil and hydraulic fluid that had been in an engine for at least 25 years. We flushed the hydraulic system out and it is now draining overnight to be sure we get all the fluid out before putting the new oil in. Interestingly enough, hydraulic fluid used on this tractor is not standard hydraulic fluid. It is actually 90 weight mineral oil! We were surprised to learn that. Sometime today, Jeremy will re-fill the fluid and the engine oil and we’ll see if the tractor will start back up again.
As a bonus, we discovered that there is some kind of short in the electrical system which has already fried the battery we purchased last week. *sad* We’ll be trouble shooting that this week also. Until we find the short, we’re back to jumping the tractor every time we want to use it.
Assuming we get all the maintenance done and the pad leveled this weekend, there will be a hoop-house raising party on Saturday June 30th. If we don’t get the pad leveled this weekend, then the hoop house raising will be delayed for some period of time while we figure out plan B. So, if you are someone or know someone who would be interested in helping to erect a hoop house, please check back or email us (jajlehrman *at* yahoo.com) to find out if it’s a go or not. We should know by Monday one way or the other. Until then, we’ll be spending quality time with the tractor…
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