Easy-To-Build Weigh Wagon

Easy-To-Build Weigh Wagon WAGONS/TRAILERS New Wagons 21-6-6 FARM SHOW readers might recall Kenneth Von Muenster of Anamosa, Iowa, as the man we featured last year after he came up with a weigh scale system to fit his Deere 750 no-till drill. The system makes it easy to set planting populations by weighing seed in the drill hopper. (His drill scale is now on the market.) To make that system, Muenster used four load cells mounted underneath the hopper. Now Muenster has applied the same principle to construction of a weigh wagon for handling grain. He says it's accurate to 99.5%. "I used a 450 bu. wagon that you can use to monitor hybrids, check different fertilizer and chemical programs, and different tillage methods. It also helps in splitting landlord and tennant shares of crops or weighing bulk fertilizer. If you put scales on all your grain wagons, you can weigh your entire crop and eliminate the need for a permanent platform scale," says Von Muenster. The idea is to suspend the wagon box on electronic load cells above the running gear of the wagon. The cells send the weight to a digital read-out. The four cells Von Muenster used have a capacity of 40,000 lbs. He installed the load cells by making two middle brackets with "sockets" on each end to hold the load cells. He used 23-in. long pieces of 4-in. sq. steel tubing to make the weigh brackets, which weld to the running gear. He inserted four pieces of flat steel into each end of the brackets to make a 2 1/8-in. sq. socket for each load cell to fit into. The protruding ends of the load cells then attach directly to the wagon box. Four 10-in. bolts attach the wagon to the load cells and four 2-in. bolts hold the load cells to the middle brackets. Von Muenster used angle iron to beef up the running gear under the weigh brackets. Von Muenster expects to have the system on the market as a kit early in 1998. It's expected to sell for about $1,700. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Kenneth von Muenster, 16027 Hwy 64, Anamosa, Iowa 52205 (ph 319 462-2344).

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