Need some farmer expertise

[bilmac]

Can the cylinder of a combine be removed, or is it a part of the framework of the combine? I am going to be growing dry beans and lentils and field corn and maybe other stuff like that just in case the Democrats ruin the country so bad that mom and I will have to feed ourselves. The question is how to thresh small quantities of seed crops. I'm thinking that if I could get a cylinder from an old combine and maybe spin it with a Briggs and Stratton motor, it would be a great labor saver.

[DCT]

You can remove just the cylinder, but you will need more than just the cylinder to seperate the crop. Do you have a tractor salvage yard in your area? If so go and look at an older model combine and look at the cylinder assembley and you will see what I mean. The 400 series john deere has a small cylinder assembley in it.

[mrbigtexan]

what exactly are you calling a cylinder on a combine?

[FourBee]

mrbigtexan  : what exactly are you calling a cylinder on a combine?

That would be the Threshing Cylinder and not a hydrolic cylinder.   Around here sometimes they remove the large ones to transport their combines down roadways.

bilmac; if you decide to do that, show us a pic of your set-up. It would be interesting to see.

[hunt-m-up]

Look for an old Allis Chalmers pull-type combine, they excell at threshing small grains. It wouldn't take much power to drive one, especially if you only need it for threshing and not cutting the crop. Some of them were fitted with Wisconsin engines for power in the past, versus driving off PTO's. There are probably some old JD and IH pull-types out there as well, but the AC's were better known for small grains.
You'll have quite a bit of iron if you intend to use parts from a self-propelled combine, even some of the older ones.

[naedlaen]

How much are you growing.  (Volume)  You can beat the items you talked about with a flail, tread on them on a hard surface or any other such a manner.  A threshing cylinder is a round housing with four to six bars on a slightly smaller cylinder inside that beats the crop to remove the seed.  A threshing machine also has separators and a fan to clean the grain from the straw and chaff.  So, a simple thresing cylinder or other method and a fanning mill may do what you need. 

A combine cuts, threshes and separates the grain (hence the term combine)  The idea to get an old small pull combine and driving it with a small engine in a stationary position eliminates some of the maintenance (cutter bar).  The crop still needs to be cut and brought to the threshing area.  You might as well buy a tractor and pull it to save time cutting and gathering. 
 
Removing the cylinder by itself would involve the outer housing and the moving part.  You would still need to separate and clean the grain.

Neal
a dumb farm boy and engineer

[torpedoman]

heres a hard thought : If they ruin the country to were you have to grow your own food what are you going to use for fuel?? maybe a horse drawn would be a better idea.

[hillbill]

i also would go with a old pull type combine. yu might even possibly be able to rig it up as a stationary thresher useing a small gas engine rigged to drive the pto. or even with enuf ingenuity yu might rig it up to turn by horse power useing some kind of transmission  to overdrive a circular motion provided by your horse or mule pulling a pole in a circular motion the same as a old time cane mill.

[Cornbelt]

If you aren't talking a whole lot of grain, it might be simpler just to get in kahoots with a farmer and dump your stuff in his combine. The old machines, like the Allis-Chalmers did such a better job on small seeds that farmers would combine stuff like clover before plowing it under for green manure, but that type pre-dated the kind with a threshing cylinder. They just had straw walkers all the way back. They worked fine if you weren't in a hurry. And you didn't have to adjust the gap in the cylinder for each type grain. Klauss had the same design in the 80's.   Another thing you might look for is a seed cleaner. They worked the same way and were small enough to carry in a pick-up. They could be cranked, but people usually put an electric motor on to save their arm. Still see them around occassionally. But they require the grain to be brought to it. All the chaff blows out the back and it's just a miniture threshing machine.

[Hairtrigger]

you guys scare me

[Empty Quiver]

Seed corn co.s have tiny little combines they use at the research level. I really don't know much more than that about them. Some research on what they are doing would yield some small size equipment and techniques. Local universities may well be able to direct you as well if they are doing much small scale yield trials.

[mannyrock]

  Hmmm,

  I believe that I would go straight to the Foxfire Books (1 through 6?) and find out what rig they describe for simple threshing.

  In India, and parts of Southeast Asia, they just lay cloth out in a big square on a hard flat surface (such as a concrete floor), and hold the base of the stalks in their hands, and "beat" the stalks (as if whipping the floor) with the heads of the stalks.   This works fine. The grain comes out and lands in the cloth.  They do large amounts of grain this way.

  Then, they have people hold the four corners of the cloth, and go outside, and toss the grain and chaff gently up and down in the air, in a rythm, and let the wind blow the chaff away.  Then, they gather the cloth full of grain, and pour it in a bag.  Before they cook it, they pour the grain in a bucket of water, and the remaining chaff rises to the top (with the grain sinking to the bottom). They then skim off the chaff.

  For the money you will spend trying to build the rig you are describing, you could probably buy and permanently store a couple thousand pounds of wheat, or even whole wheat flour.

 

[Empty Quiver]

For Pete's sake Mannyrock logic and economics have no place here. Man wants a project to keep him outta the house this winter. Nothing like hand forging a threshing system to keep a fella off the streets for a while.

[bilmac]

Thanks guys . I knew I could get all the expertise there was available at this place. There are some huge used equipment yards at Bridgeport Ne. and we will be going by when we go to visit the kids for Thanksgiving. I will see if they have any pull machines. I think I will be doing mostly legumes, but I will be playing with everything from amaranth to corn.

My dad played with a fanning mill when I was a kid. It was really complicated. I figure if I can get the grain threshed without breaking it up which beans may tend to do, then there will be a plenty of Wyo wind to help me winnow it.

What I will be doing for the next few seasons is experimenting with heirloom crops so I will probably have lots of tiny plots all over the place so trying to use a working combine of any kind would be more trouble than worth.

I maybe could run the cylinder with wind power if gas gets too expensive, just block a large part of it off and feed it very slowly. That still seems like a better way than dragging a threshing sledge around. I can see maybe beating the seed out of amaranth, but hand shelling any quantity of corn seems a little daunting to me.

[Cornbelt]

Don't know if combine demolition derbys are popular in your area, but they always sell cheap afterwards.

[BeanMan]

The cylinder isn't any good without the concave. There are many small plot threshers that those of us in the seed and research business use.  A vogel thresher would meet your large grain needs much better than trying to cobble up some old combine parts, I'll get a picture of one next Monday when I go back to the farm if you like, here's a link to the company that makes them.  Ours is about 40 years old and still runs well, plus it uses a small gas motor to run it and is a bumper pull model for portability. http://www.billswelding.com/index.html

Seedburo used to stock vogels, here at least is a picture of one since the have been discontinued.  Bill's Welding will still make you one though if you want one.
http://www.seedburo.com/online_cat/categ10/slvpt.asp

Alamaco makes fine electric and gas threshers  which would suit most folks trying to supply their own grain.
http://www.almaco.com/products/products.cfm?ProductCategoryID=3

Hege makes a small plot combine  but I can personally attest to the huge amount of maintenance time.  I've grown to hate mine despite it's utility.

[bilmac]

Thanks bean man, I knew there were tiny machines out there, they use them in our part of the world to harvest native grass seed for reclamation projects.

[BeanMan]

bilmac,

I should have added that there are used machines out there if you look for them.  The new ones are very expensive.

Bean

[bilmac]

I don't plan on spending any big money, I just bought the place and have lots of prioities