One of the worst nightmares a farmer can experience is having a flat tire on their combine in the middle of harvest. We noticed a flat tire on one of the combine tires yesterday. Dang it! But at least we can fix it before disaster strikes.

Changing Tires on Farm Machinery

Both of the back tires on the combine are the same age. Odds are the second tire would explode when combining this fall. Odds are the combine would be completely loaded with grain. And odds are the combine would be stuck in a field so far from a road, it would take many precious hours to deal with the disaster of a blown tire in the middle of harvest.

So, we changed both tires. You can’t just change a tire on a combine like you would on a car or truck. The tires were ordered from a tire service thirty-five miles away. Yep, a seventy-mile round trip to change two tires!

The Cost of Tires and Mounting

These tires are large. They are forty-six inches tall and it cost around $1,000 to have the tire service come out and change both tires. The tires were $370 each, but the tire service had to make that seventy-mile round trip, take the old tires off and mount the new tires on the combine rims. This has to be done correctly, or bad things can happen. The old tires were taken away and recycled.

The big tires in the front of the combine are sixty-six inches tall and would cost well over $3,000 to have the tire service come out and replace both. They are still in good shape, so we will keep these original tires on the combine until we see an issue. All of the tires on this 9410 John Deere Combine built in 1998 were original. (I know! This combine is old enough to be legal to drink!) When this combine was new, it was over $100,000. Now it’s worth about $50,000. And we are considered behind the times… By twenty-one years… Don’t care!

For fun, we went out after dinner and counted all of the tires on things for the farm. Guess how many tires we counted? 141! (Including a wheelbarrow.) Every tire represents a cost to farm. We maintain our machinery carefully, along with our tires. Our machinery is kept in machine sheds and never left in the sun or weather. These assets (though very old) are important to our farm operation.

In a few months, this combine will be out in the field, taking in the crop. We are hoping our proactive move now will save us precious time during harvest.

Be Blessed!

Baked Zucchini Casserole

Today’s recipe is Baked Zucchini Casserole. I don’t know about you, but when I was young, you couldn’t pay me to eat zucchini. Now, I can eat it with every meal!

I recommend you bake this in a 9X13 glass-baking dish. If you use a small and deep baking dish, you’ll need to add additional baking time.

This 1960’s recipe is super-simple and has very few ingredients. So give it a try! Wear your tie-dyed t-shirt when you sit down at the dinner table! In case you’re still feeling the ’60’s groove, you could also try Chicken Rice Roger, another great recipe from that decade.

Baked Zucchini Casserole

Tools You’ll Need:

• Knife or mandolin to cut vegetables
• 9X13 Pyrex baking dish

Ingredients:

• 3 medium zucchini
• 2 tomatoes
• 1 small onion
• ¼ – ½ C Parmesan cheese
• Salt, pepper & butter

Grease baking dish. Alternate layers of zucchini and sliced tomatoes. Place several slices of onion on each layer. Also, sprinkle with salt, pepper and dot with butter on each layer. Repeat. Top with Parmesan cheese.

Bake at 350 for 45-60 minutes. You can cover with foil, depending on if you want crunchy or well-baked zucchini.