Our current wheelbarrow is heavy and tedious to use.

Other than a bobcat or other big machinery ( Yes Jon, I mean you ), what do the rest of you use? Any pictures?

A side note: There is absolutely nowhere in the whole United State, except for one place, where I could drive by, see steam, and say "That's where Jon Hughes lives" =:) =:)

Yeah Babyyyy =:)

Lowe's has a kind of neat thing that my friend gave me for my birthday last year. I just bought one for my sister-in-law's birthday last week, and a second one for myself. It's a plastic barrel shape, with a scooped front, on wheels. $25 It's nice for trucking smaller amounts than the average wheelbarrow holds. I've moved large plant pots with it and I fill it with potting soil and bring it in the house when it's time for seed planting. It's also how I moved my outboard around last year. It's quite rugged. I really like it. It would be ideal for someone who finds a wheelbarrow unwieldy.

Do not throw your shovel in it, though, from ten feet away. My first one now has a crack in the bottom and will no longer hold water.

AnnPat, what kind of shredder do you have?

I have the usual steel construction wheelbarrow. Very heavy, very unweildy. However, I have been blessed with a very healthy, very strong 16 year old son. The boy can squat over 300 pounds. Even fully loaded that wheelbarrow is nothing for him. He helps me and I feed him. It's a win/win deal. The wheelbarrow is nothing special but I could post a picture of the kid.

~CA

Curt#

AnnPat, that's a beauty. Are you happy with it?

Now, I suppose, no one will play lawn darts with me?
I'm getting railroaded.

C'mon Ann, fess up, show the pics.

Lloyd

P.S. And just to keep it slightly on topic, my 'barrow, leaning up against the shed, far right hand side.

I've gotta say---your wheelbarrow is not what I expected from you. I'd have bet a thousand bucks that your wheelbarrow had 18 wheels, ran on diesel, and was self-loading. It seem so inadequate from what we've come to expect. (It is a nice color, though.)

What is that tin can---a birdhouse?

I use the 'barrow a lot for all sorts of things. Spotting bags of 'post when I'm topdressing and hauling around the yard when I don't need a tractor, etc etc.

Yup, that's a birdhouse. I was bored one day so I tried making a birdhouse out of a coffee can. It was doable but the can/birdhouse has to be in the shade. That was just an experiment and I left it hanging on the hook (we make those hooks) and never did get it place. Hard to tell in the picture, but there is even an awning over the entrance to keep the rain out!

The chimes were found in a bag of yard trimmings with the wooden disk on it broken in half. Put a large hose clamp around it and voila, chimes by the tumblers. Kinda Zen like around my 'posting area.

Lloyd

I think the regular style wheelbarrows come in many sizes/weights so if you like that style you'll just have to try them out to see what suits you. My DH has been forced to 'collect' wheelbarrows because I am always filling them with various garden amendments (compost, soil, wood shavings, etc.) as well as weeds so he won't have one when he needs it if there are not several around here. I think we currently have only 4. Probably another coming this Saturday if he finds one at a yard sale as he knows that one of the last ones he bot me will become a planter soon as it's very nicely shabby and I forbade him to paint it! They don't cost a lot ($10. or less usually) but he only buys the ones with good wheels.

The style I like the least are the plastic/vinyl square things - they hold a lot but don't wheel well over rough ground. That style would work fine on a nicely smoothly flat landscaped property but that's not what we have. I usually fill it with weeds and DH dumps them in the ATV trailer. I also have 2 large children's wagons, one a Radio Flyer that was in like new condition he bot me at a YS for only $10. The other one is in not as good condition (needs painting) and was also $10. I use them when weeding or hauling potted plants around and they are very useful. Not large enough to haul compost tho.

Love your chipper Annpat! What model is it, and what is the max. size branches you can chip? I may have to ask Santa for one of those.

You're a clever guy, Lloyd.

We made a couple of hundred of those hooks, a whack of singles and some wall hooks as well. Painted them all sorts of colours including metallic blue and green, people loved them.

Lloyd

the chipper is a WW Grinder, which I think is now called something else. It's an 8 hp and can handle a 3 inch branch. I primarily use it once a year in the fall---all day long---for leaf shredding. I bought it to comfort me after my divorce in the early 90s---one day chipping leaves---I was all better.

(Just kidding, I liked my ex-husband....but...I gotta say...I love my chipper!)

Your description sounds a lot like the stories from "old farts" like yourself who had to walk miles into town every day for school, no matter what the weather was, all of course after milking the cows and slopping the pigs, etc.

I personally walked 4 times a day to school, rain, snow, shine, 1-1/2 miles each way. I've also shovelled and wheelbarrowed more dirt, compost, sand, crusher dust, bricks, trees, sod, than anyone I know, without any help from any power other than my own. I think I've earned a new wheelbarrow.

Be careful who you call wimps =:) =:)

as the story usually goes....

170 feet uphill...both ways ;-)

I also have chipper envy and an ex that would fit nicely. Just kidding.

I prefer to think of this as a tangent rather than a hijacking. I have long been envious of Jon's compost bins. Now the first picture I've seen of Lloyd's makes tears well up in my eyes. I have to admit, I barely noticed Lloyd's barrow the first time. I had to open the picture again to look at the barrow. I have a serious case of compost bin envy.

When I'm turning my piles by pitch fork this weekend (uphill, both ways) I will be thinking of you guys and your fancy schmancy compost bins.

Lloyds composting is second to none... we are minions to the master composter...

I hope it works as well as its write-up says it will. It's only $85.00 though, I think, so I'm a little skeptical. It's from Home Hardware, and Mark Cullen's pick.

I sure didn't get many "show me your wheelbarrows" pictures, but all the other posts were interesting and amusing =:) I love the frozen snowblower LOL.

Hey Jon, if those are keys hanging inside the skidsteer, I might just have to take a little trip down to Oregon. What size trailer would a guy need to transport that puppy? Just asking.

;-)

Lloyd

http://www.homesteadingtoday.com/showthread.php?t=342651

I don't mess with a wheel barrow. I have two old Garden Way carts, a small and a large, that I bought at auctions. Wouldn't part with them on a bet!

Figure A. Handle (proving that any bent tube can be called a handle)
Figure B. Legs (and any bent tube can be called legs)
Figure C. Cross brace (with a bent tab, unlabelled, but you will figure it out without our help. Eventually.)
Figure D. Little bags of unlabelled parts, except for the unique and obvious ones (haha. Isn’t this fun?)

1. Attach the handle (figure A) to the legs (figure B), using the 2.5" bolts, ensuring that the nut is attached to the bolt with the plastic side facing inward.

2. Next, overlap the cradle with the leg/handle assembly and connect the "front" to the cradle using the pre-installed 2.5" bolts. What the hell is the "front"? Where the "handle" is or where your "neighbour" will be standing when he points out to you that the cross brace is installed backwards and upside down? It’s always useful to define your terms, and what are all these "quote" marks for anyway? (You may be uneasy at this point: "Good")

3. Read the "Special Instructions" before continuing.

Special Instructions

Don’t expect that because this cart has only a few parts, that it will be quick and easy to assemble. In the interests of ensuring that you remain humble and clearly aware of how much your week as a wage slave really took out of you, the parts are labeled rather vaguely. On second thought, not labeled.

The original instructions were typed up by someone who was expressly recruited, in order to show you the value of punctuation and formatting, by leaving it out. Remember hearing about the old radio joke in which the young woman fends off the bad man making unwanted advances ("Don’t! Don’t! Stop!! Don’t! Oh, don’t stop!")
Yeah, well, ha ha.

The person who wrote the instructions has also clearly assembled thousands of these "smart" carts and thinks the person who is having trouble understanding the instructions is an idiot (I know, I can see him rolling his eyes RIGHT NOW, you probably can too and he looks exactly like the math teacher you had in grade 10 who couldn’t explain anything because HE already understood it. Only you are less cowed by his arrogance now than you were back then (even if you have been beaten down by life, and who hasn’t? You never thought that assembling a $350 wheelbarrow would be your ultimate breaking point, did you?).

Note that there is no picture of the assembled cart included in the instructions or in the packaging. That would be cheating. Don’t bother looking for the Lee Valley catalogue: you gave it to the neighbour and they’re away this weekend.

Remind yourself that you are not dyslexic and that it is unseemly for a fifty year old professional with a postgraduate degree to yell Olde English expletives in the backyard on a beautiful sunny afternoon. Besides, the next step is hysterics, drinking and falling asleep on the couch and then the next week will begin and the cart will still be in pieces on the patio and the crow (don’t ask) or the raccoon (ditto) will steal the unlabelled parts and take them away forever. All will then be lost. On his return, the neighbour will laugh at you (not at all kindly) because after borrowing many garden tools you were finally in a position to confidently offer to lend him something and had offered it to him next week when he’s back and *** knows you can’t take the ******* week off to assemble the cart. Not to mention the fact that when he asked you if you had to assemble it yourself, he said, "****, hope you have all weekend!" to which you (poor innocent) replied, "oh, no problem, it’s not like it was manufactured in CHINA and you both laughed in mock horror at the thought. But that was another time, the good time.

While you are practicing your good yoga teacher’s calming breath exercise, notice, suddenly that your husband/wife is no longer speaking the words of Despaire and Gloome that are their normal coping device in such situations (while you hyperventilate, not calm at all, because like Proust with the madeleines, you are filled with the horror of Bicycles That Came in Boxes. And, IKEA.) But, Calming Breath. Could this silence be the eerie calm before the storm?

But wait. There is a curious peaceful quality to this silence. Do not, I repeat, do not, say a word while you become aware that your husband/wife, normally not the Assembler in the family, apparently recognizing your imminent mental Breakdown, begins to quietly and effectively identify what parts go where and assemble
them into something. like. the shape of. a wheelbarrow.

I'm not going to even attempt to find my Lee Valley Catalogue, just in case I happen to see the wheelbarrow you've described.

Thanks for the entertainment =:)

I'm guessing I enjoyed that a lot more than you did, gatineauhills.

That was a lot of fun to read about.

yeah Baby!!

Lloyd

Sure wish I had a small version of Bob T Cat. The picture is too dark, though. What's the attachment??

It's a grapple attached to an old bucket.

Lloyd

My son & hubby prefer the cart heaped high for less trips. They like it that it's easy to dump. I'm amazed at how long this old cart is lasted.

I prefer the buckets, so it's not too heavy & I can carry the compost on paths & right into the garden to mulch plants. The cart has drop down sides that comes in handy sometimes.