[AT] EPA to require farmers be half as dusty

[Cecil Bearden]

Farmer
I hope your horse pasture rent works out better than mine did.  I ended up 
with $1500 in hay expenses owed, and 3 horses.  Now there is 4 since one had 
a colt.  Long story short, I was boarding 10, but she took out 7 without my 
knowledge and never paid a dime in feed or pasture.  Her husband was going 
to work for me to pay it off, but she divorced him and now he is not so 
interested in p;aying off his ex's debts.

Cecil in OKla
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Indiana Robinson" <robinson46176 at gmail.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 7:28 AM
Subject: Re: [AT] EPA to require farmers be half as dusty


> But how the heck you could even remove 5% of the dust a combine in
>> soybeans makes is beyond me.
> ==================================================
>
>
>
> Hi John:
> Actually it is fairly easy and fairly cheap... This is a problem that
> I have looked at for some time and it was really impressed on me
> Tuesday evening when we made a trip to Anderson IN (a couple of
> counties north of me) to pick up a couple of Case VAC items. The
> fellow I bought one from had found that he still had A decal set and a
> Case clock and called me saying that I could have them. Soybean field
> after field was being ran and a large number of them had two huge
> combines running. One field had three. I never saw a single "older"
> combine in the field... That surprised me a little.
> The current problem was obvious. The whole area for most of the trip
> was one huge dustbowl looking cloud. This area is so dry right now
> that you could leave a trail of dust crossing a swimming pool. Driving
> was difficult in many areas and frankly I don't see how people with
> respiratory problems could even stay in their homes in that whole
> area.
> As a long time woodworker and shoe cobbler (and farmer) both of which
> require very good dust / fume collection I am not new to the processes
> (or dust).
> Many combines here now use a blower to suck the dust from the
> header/feeder-house area and blow it to the back and out into the air
> using a large duct down the side.
> The first step in cutting particulates is that you (all of us,
> especially bigger farmers) must develop a mind set that involves
> giving a damn about more than what you can do for yourself... You have
> to be able to say that this is a problem and we need to try to steer
> in a better direction. Most farmers do care including the fellow that
> now farms my crop land. I can think of several locally though who just
> don't care what problems they might cause others... Those guys
> compound the problem for everybody. Much of the problem is that most
> of the burden will fall to the farmer. The manufacturers don't really
> care. They want to sell you a $100,000 plus plus plus machine and they
> don't even care enough to grind off the sharp corners of most of the
> parts. :-)  The food prices will not go up because there is no way for
> the farmer to pass his cost on... He doesn't get to walk in the grain
> elevator and say that his cost is up so he must have more money... He
> just has to pretty much helplessly say "How much will you give me?".
> Now back to the dust reduction... All it really requires is collecting
> the dust with a centrifugal cleaner for a time and then dropping it on
> the ground now and then with as little disturbance as possible.
> Filters will not handle it.  Serious suction at both the front and
> rear of the combine could feed into an un-powered separator much like
> a "much larger" version of a small cyclone unit called a "Dust Deputy"
> that is very rapidly gaining a lot of favor in woodworking circles. I
> know of several guys who have bought them and they say it does does
> even better than the demo.
> Video:
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4feGBoTU3c
> Their website:
> http://www.oneida-air.com/
> The whole process could work much like pneumatic grain handling
> systems but could use much less power since it would be handling dust
> rather than heavy grain. The rotary air-lock concept would handle
> dropping the collected dust on the ground from an outlet near the
> ground.
> Pneumatic grain handling:
> www.ag.ndsu.nodak.edu/abeng/pdffiles/ae850.pdf
> .
> 100% ? Of course not but possibly a 60% + reduction. 60% of "a lot" is
> still "a lot". :-)
> .
> I'm trying to do my part... I'm planting grass. :-)
> It has to be making my farmer a little nervous seeing 14 horses
> wandering around eating grass... We are renting pasture based on 1
> acre per horse and I am about full. I will hold back another 2.5 acres
> this year just so I can make some existing areas work out better. I
> don't want this thing to get too big but I might need to hold back a
> chunk more after next summer. I may add about a dozen more customer
> horses. It is a good thing that I am retired. :-) The set up is a lot
> of work but once set up the labor is quite minimal. I make about 6
> times off of an acre of horse pasture than I do from rented grain
> land. If son Scott suddenly takes an interest in the horse enterprise
> the grain farmer could be in trouble. :-)
> It is not without minor problems but what is. One problem it does not
> have is a lot of dust. :-)
>
>
>
> -- 
>
>
> Be tolerant of almost everything but intolerance...
>
> Francis Robinson
> aka "farmer"
> Central Indiana USA
> robinson46176 at gmail.com
> https://sites.google.com/site/robinsonsprucecreekfarms/
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