More old Hesstons part woes

[lastcowboy32]

Well...I replaced the conditioner bearing on my 1070, without the little press-on shield.

My guess is that the shield was designed for a certain brand of bearing that maybe isn't available any more.

I knew it was too tight as purchased, so I chucked the shield up in my wood lathe and took a few thousands out of the center...until I was able to get it started with my one inch screw press kit (for pulling wheel bearings)... then ... drive up to my brother's place to finish on the press, because you have to press the shield far enough to stay, close enough to keep our grass, but not touching the outer race.

I finished the press alright.

Lesson here is...next time my son-in-law offers to take it to work and use a micrometer and a metal lathe, I'll take him up on it.

This post was edited by lastcowboy32 on 08/21/2023 at 08:14 am.

 

[lastcowboy32]

I guess I post so much about our two Hesston haybines, because I feel that maybe there is somebody else out there thinking they are good enough to keep running.

We have two, and the only problems that I've found is issues with parts changing since any of the manuals and parts lists were updated.

These machines were designed to be maintained forever, steel conditioning rolls...standard bearings...no expensive "wobble drive" box... just a swaybar mechanism with a bunch of standard bearings in it.

BUT...some things, like these shields, depend on dimensions (such as the outside diameter of the inner race) that aren't controlled from one manufacturer to the other.

I'm considering just finding a bushing with a diameter that's close and tac welding it on with our little MIG. Then I can just use any spherical bearing/lock collar combination. I seems that I can still buy standard spherical bearings, flanges, lock collars and such.

 

[rrlund]

I never saw a wrap shield like that. The only ones I've ever seen were like a flange for a sealed bearing but were
large enough to go around the roll. It kept the hay from getting all the way to the end of the roll and down over
the end.

 

[lastcowboy32]

(quoted from post at 09:34:16 08/21/23) I never saw a wrap shield like that. The only ones I've ever seen were like a flange for a sealed bearing but were
large enough to go around the roll. It kept the hay from getting all the way to the end of the roll and down over
the end.

There are "end shields" in the haybine. They are really subtle, funky-shaped strips about 1-1/2" wide on both sides of the header that try to block hay from going between the ends of the conditioning rolls and the walls of the header.

My first 1070 lost one of those strips, and I didn't even know it. During about 10,000 bales' worth of haying, I replaced about 4 of these bearings.

Then, a few years back, I bought the second 1070. It was being scrapped, so it took some refurbishment. In the process, I noticed that it had two of the strips mentioned above... I looked at the haybine that I was using and noticed it was missing one.

At that point, I scavenged a strip from the second haybine onto the first. And I haven't replaced a conditioner bearing on it since.

In the mean time, we refurbished the second one to even better condition than the first...including a home-made replacement strip (that was an exercise in metal bending, involving a form, a vice, a ring roller... a few cuss words... so I made two, to have a spare...) The second haybine has been our main unit for a while now, probably doing about another 10,000 bales' worth of cutting on its own. It was still running on the conditioner bearings that I bought it with, when this one burned out.

Long story short... I had to make the replacement shield strips for the header, because Fry's machinery didn't have them on their Hesstons. So the strips may be a re-design, afterthought as well.

Given the luck I've had by maintaining the strips... these little press collars may be a moot point.

????

In the end, the bearing replacement itself wasn't the bear on this job. It was the sprocket. This was the first time that I've done a conditioning roll bearing on the side with the roll drive sprockets on either haybine. Getting that #60 sprocket off the end of the shaft was... a bear.

Trying to press that shield on was... a bear.


The bearing itself was the easy part.