Lawn Mower Fixed

I've always prided myself on being self-sufficient, being able to fix anything that comes up, growing my own food, etc.  That's the way I was raised and it just seems normal.  So when our lawn tractor died, I did what only felt right.  Instead of throwing it away or scraping it and getting another one, I took it upon myself to not only fix it, but to improve it.

The trouble with our tractor started the first summer we had it.  It has always thrown belts, ALWAYS.  Then my wife hit a piece of concrete and ruining the bearings in the middle spindle.  Over the course of 5 years, I've kept the bad spindle packed with grease and have kept the tractor mowing at least decently.  Then 3 weeks ago, I hit a very large stone which shattered the left spindle. 

I found a 2 pack of spindles on Amazon.com for 1/2 the price of one spindle elsewhere.  3 new OEM blades, 2 spindles, 1 belt, and 45 minutes later I was ready to mow.  We mowed our grass once without issue.  Then the next attempt the tractor stopped running and would only run on choke.  So I tore the carburetor off, checked everything, cleaned it up and we were ready to mow again.  However this time, it just kept throwing the belt every 50 feet.

The belt on our tractor is 147.75 inches, so I went to get a belt that was 147 inches, taking out any play.  Unable to find a belt that size, I decided to get an OEM belt and replace the tension spring on the deck. I bought a heavier spring at Tractor Supply, quite a bit heavier.  With everything in place I was finally ready to mow.  Finally, the tractor mowed as good, and actually better than when we first got it, no more thrown belts, no more lines where the blades missed pieces, but finally a good looking lawn.

So for a total of $157 we had working tractor that mowed better than when it was new.  Thinking about not only saving our tractor, but making it better is quite a satisfying feeling.  And for anyone thinking about being a homesteader or living a more self-sufficient life, more important than growing a garden or raising some animals, is being able to look at anything and say, "Yeah, I can fix that."  Once you can do that, you are ready to make your move.

Garlic Yield

I had counted on a yield of close to 10x when I started this venture last spring.  After harvesting all of our garlic, our average yield for year 1 was 4x.  Since we are planning on planting 25 pounds of each variety ourselves, we were left with only 30-40 pounds to sell.  So, we wound up making enough to make one tractor payment and replace the fluids in the tractor, but was so far off the mark, that it is really depressing.

1/2 the garlic hung to dry

After a few days, much thought, and discussing it with the family, I've come to the conclusion that this is just like any other business.  There are start-up costs, learning curves, and you can't be successful right out of the gate.  So, things are in motion for year 2.  We have a bigger plot, with better soil that is growing the second round of buckwheat right now.  We have 100 pounds of quality garlic to plant.  We have found several avenues to sell our garlic next year.  And we are excited to try some new things.

We will definitely be mulching the garlic for weed control.  We will attempt to use a potato plow to harvest the garlic much faster.  We will try washing the garlic with water before hanging to cut down on the time it takes to clean the garlic for sale.  Hopefully we can get our yield up, harvest faster, clean faster, and make a profit next year.  I need to figure out a faster way to bunch/hang the garlic, but I have 10 months to figure that out.

Some other things that we will be doing next year is growing a pumpkin patch for friends and family.  We want to have a fall gathering, take everyone on a hayride around the country roads, and send all the kids home with pumpkins to carve.  We are also in the planning stages of growing a large plot of corn. We haven't decided if we will grow field corn to feed our chickens or sweet corn to feed our families.  And we are looking into growing pigs instead of meat chickens in the spring.

Needless to say, there will be plenty of activity next year.  Now we start shifting gears and thinking about firewood again.