cypressfarms
Well-known member
Well it's time I come into the new age with my hay feeding. I've already fed more than 1/2 of my hay and the winter isn't even going good yet. I've been just putting bales on the ground, and I'm losing a ton (more than literal here) on the ground to waste. I saw a post on CT about elevated hay holders and some very helpful CT members even sent me pics and pm to help (Thanks a lot you guys/gals). So I finally got started. I'm a manager at a plant and supervise several departments, one of which is Maintenance. One of the Maintenance guys is a very good welder, so I got him to do the welding. From my woodworking I knew what I wanted, but I had to get the welder to create it. I know NOTHING about welding, but I can design some wicked stuff.
For those that care, the following is a sequence of pics from beginning to end with this build up. It took one full day to make the first "sled". We're already working on a second. I figure that I'll save at least 20% of the hay, if not more. Here goes:
Started out with feed store bought new galvanized rings - $175:
Then made a sled for the whole thing to be built on. By doing this I could drag it around with my tractor:
This is the two legs of the sled coming together:
Sled base with supports from two angles; starting to take shape:
Once we got the base tacked, we ran beams across the top of the supports and started tacking the rings:
The last of the rings going on:
The finished rack with bracing and supports. It also has a large pipe welded to the front so I can drag it with the tractor, but I think I'll need to drag it empty. Maybe this spring I'll paint it make it last longer:
Cows trying to figure out what the heck this thing is:
Leave it to "Big Red" my trusty lead cow to figure it out. She's striking a pose with a brangus that figured it out pretty quick also:
Don't know if this helped anyone, but for $150 labor and $175 for the new rings I have a very stout hay feeder. The other metal was leftovers from work - most are from racking uprights, so it's fairly thick. I figure I'll save the cost in the first year alone. The second one will be smaller and and simpler.
For those that care, the following is a sequence of pics from beginning to end with this build up. It took one full day to make the first "sled". We're already working on a second. I figure that I'll save at least 20% of the hay, if not more. Here goes:
Started out with feed store bought new galvanized rings - $175:
Then made a sled for the whole thing to be built on. By doing this I could drag it around with my tractor:
This is the two legs of the sled coming together:
Sled base with supports from two angles; starting to take shape:
Once we got the base tacked, we ran beams across the top of the supports and started tacking the rings:
The last of the rings going on:
The finished rack with bracing and supports. It also has a large pipe welded to the front so I can drag it with the tractor, but I think I'll need to drag it empty. Maybe this spring I'll paint it make it last longer:
Cows trying to figure out what the heck this thing is:
Leave it to "Big Red" my trusty lead cow to figure it out. She's striking a pose with a brangus that figured it out pretty quick also:
Don't know if this helped anyone, but for $150 labor and $175 for the new rings I have a very stout hay feeder. The other metal was leftovers from work - most are from racking uprights, so it's fairly thick. I figure I'll save the cost in the first year alone. The second one will be smaller and and simpler.
