I'm messing around with an old 268 baler and believe it or not this NH 268 baler plunger scoop has about the same dimensions as my A&A 7" Grump Lump scoop. These balers were made '64 to '68 in New Holland PA, not far from a little shop in Malvern so I'm beginning to wonder if old Bill got an idea from when those balers being shipped out. Trim some from the bottom or flange it to get the correct height and lower the top back portion 1/3 down a little bit and it will be close. The side edges around the perimeter of the scoop are not as rounded as the A&A. The metal is very thick (maybe 2-3 times the thickness of regular automotive sheetmetal and would be easy to work with. A local baler salvage yard had 8-10 of these balers in stock last time I looked if they had not been scrapped. Buy some Hayliner 268 decals(still available) from the local New Holland farm dealer and..well never mind.....
Same here. Baled probably 2500-3000 bales per summer in the 70's with my uncles 268-on the back of the wagon of course. Never had the easy job of driving the tractor. Hated it back then because all my friends were out having fun-dead of summer. Now I'm restoring a 268 and would give my eye teeth to go back to those carefree days....
I hear ya friend. Two of my neighbors had balers and we basically followed them around. Hard dusty work but cash at the end of the day and lots of sandwiches provided by the farmers at lunch made it all worthwhile! And being on the rack beat being in the barn, IMHO!
Some of the young kids in my old neighborhood worked summers on a local farm. They would come buy my garage to see what I was working on and hang out. They were always the best behaved,polite and solid kids around. I think the hard work built some character in them.
Well.... quite a few guys have home made metal grump lump scoops on their gassers on this site that don't look near as good as this one in it's native state...
Maybe not thousands a summer, but a lot when I was early teens. That, plus the other general labor I did I think helped shape my character. I remember my Dad commenting one time when I was in college that when we were younger, my younger brother and I were the ones always helping out, while my older brother always had an imprortant (basket-, foot-, base-) ball game to lay on the couch and watch. When he went to work for my Dad in the hardware store and had to move a ton of rock salt by himself, he would spend the next 3 days complaining how his back hurt. A little hard work never killed a youngin'.
I'll be damned. I never put the two together. yup, I also spent too many hours at the hind end of one of these. We made BIG bales that had to be pulled from the baler and stacked on a wagon. We stacked them six high. Then, we unloaded the wagons onto a bale conveyor and re-stacked them in the hay barn. Damn, what a bunch of hard labor! Over 20k bales each summer to feed the dairy cows. I JUST got in a 67 Nova that needs a Grump Lump scoop. In honor of the callouses and blisters, I am going to seek out a baler hood and make it work.
Ive got a 268 and a 273 square bailers. Im old now so I only cut and bale a hundred bales at any one time. Working on and diagnosing the bailers complicated system of knotters needles and timing is good for any up and coming mechanic. I spent a day one time chopping off the needles with the plunger and welding them back together retiming the system only break them again. Only to eventually find out the brake out on the end of the knotter drive was slipping. Young kids can learn something about really profound cussing Donald Duck fits and wrench throwing watching a old fart having bailer problems. OldWolf
Oldwolf...you hit the nail on the head. as a teenager, I did most of the repairs on our dairy. My father really was a poor mechanic, but loved his cows. the biggest challenge was the knotter on the baler. It took some thinking, studying and head-scratching to get it figured out. Certainly reading the owner's manual was necessary. I knew the result of failure would be catastophy. And we were an hour from the nearest parts. as I reflect, the knotter on the old baler is likely responsible for giving me the confidence to tackle the unknown mechanical challenge. now if you want a REAL challenge, try operating and maintaining one of the new big square balers. Wow! They are really complex.
I think that'll make a great scoop. I was always baffled by the baler at grandpa's...quite complex. I probably would have figured it out, but bales don't stack themselves....
Great, now I'm gonna have nightmares about the G-D knotters on the crap that passed for farm equipment around my uncle's place...
Most likely the most FAMOUS ... Jenkins Camaro ( 1969 ) Check out the price $$$ What would it be worth today ??
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