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Round Bale Man Great Traffic Stopper
Drivers passing by this field of wheat stubble near Regent, N. Dak., couldn't believe their eyes last year when they saw this "bale man" holding a 900-lb. round straw bale up over his head.
"Hundreds of people stopped to take photos of it," says Alan Honeyman. "Some stood in front of the bale man to block him out
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Round Bale Man Great Traffic Stopper HAY & FORAGE HARVESTING Bale Handling (5) 18-1-17 Drivers passing by this field of wheat stubble near Regent, N. Dak., couldn't believe their eyes last year when they saw this "bale man" holding a 900-lb. round straw bale up over his head.
"Hundreds of people stopped to take photos of it," says Alan Honeyman. "Some stood in front of the bale man to block him out, making it look like they were holding the bale. I thought that could be dangerous so I put up a sign saying that I wasn't responsible for accidents. I got calls from as far away as Florida asking how I made it. A lot of people were surprised to find out that the entire frame sets on top of the ground. They assumed that I had dug a hole in the ground to support it."
Honeyman welded a pair of 8-ft. long, 4-in. wide pieces of steel tubing at right angles to each other to build the base. He used 4-in. dia. steel pipe for the legs, welding them onto the base. He used two pieces of 3-in. dia. curved steel pipe (off an old Deere loader) for the arms and welded them onto the "body". An 18-in. long, 1-in. dia. pointed steel shaft is welded to the end of each arm. Another pointed steel shaft comes up from the back side of the head to stick into the bale. The head is mounted slightly behind the arms so the bale's weight is evenly distributed. Each leg is supported by a 10-in. long brace in back, and extra bracing runs from the back of the shoulders down to the base.
After he had made the frame, Honeyman split a pair of blue jeans and a shirt and mounted them over the steel frame, then used safety pins and a pair of suspenders to hold the clothes together.
"I tried eight different bales before I was able to get one to stay on without tipping the bale man over," says Honeyman. "The problem was that some bales were lopsided. The bale has to be perfectly balanced."
Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Alan Honeyman, Rt. 1, Box 22, Regent, N. Dak. 58650 (ph 701563-4447).
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