Grain cart repair ideas

We have what someone replied to a previous post as being a Wetmore brand grain cart, and I'm looking at ways to greatly improve it besides trading it, as that's not an option. The auger system in it leaves a tremendous amount to be desired. What I had considered is to go in the bottom center of the cart, and create a new sump, that in turn would directly dump into a good salvaged combine swing auger, which would be a straight shot directly into the trucks. With 1 gearbox at the bottom of the single auger coupled with a trap door above
the auger to control the grain flow, I would think this would eliminate many of the headaches accompanied with these carts. Will this work ? Has anyone done a conversion on these carts to improve all of their short comings ?

The troubles I foresee with your proposal is number one your cart is a V bottom design with a horizontal auger in the bottom to pull the grain forward to the dump auger. I am not sure how you would remedy that unless you are going to weld some angled sheets to funnel it to your center dump which will greatly reduce your carts capacity. You could run an horizontal auger with reversed flighting on the front half to move the front half of the commodity to the center dump. Secondly, ground clearance under the gear box will likely be an issue. May not be a huge issue considering carts are usually used in open fields, mud and ruts may be a concern if you ever deal with that during your harvest. You could run a roller chain forward to a box mount a little higher but the bearing setup in the bottom of the auger will need to be robust enough to withstand the side pull of the chain. Lastly, I do not believe there are many combine augers that will be long enough to reach any kind of height of a modern truck side. Remember the bottom of most combine bins are 6 to 8 foot off the ground so that is their start point height wise. So you would need to put a joint in the auger or seek a different source.

What are the short comings of those carts you mention. If the chain is not heavy enough go to heavier chain and sprockets . If the gearbox is the weak point then heavier there too. Not just sure what you are looking for,for an answer. I believe if you move you auger closer to center you will be sadly unhappy with the handling and performance. Handling will be the top heavy problem with the grain higher in the cart tank as you block off the ends so they will flow to the auger. As for the single auger that's not all it's cracked up to be, from what I've seen with ours. It is a Brent 600 bushel with the single auger center drain and if it plugs you need a tarp and open the trap to drain to get it going again. we used an auger under ours with a tarp tied up to the frame for it to flow on while we put it in a truck to get it empty. A new gear box and chain is cheaper than another cart and if you look on auction time there are carts for some fairly reasonable prices in off season. I would not want to buy one theis late in the year for this falls harvest. Back to your cart. What all do you think it needs? Flighting can be bought and welded on in sections or as a whole flight. there are also sleeves for the tubes in them. What is your time frame for this cart just this fall or for more years. To put an auger in your different than it has you will have to go through the side up at the top of the slope. Only way to keep the ground clearance and keep the frame integrity. A combine auger is to short vertically to clear truck side and will not run as easy as the set up you have with the extra gearbox in the corner of the auger.

The shortcomings I'm trying to correct are somewhat numerous. We've had this cart for a good while and have put up with it like the previous owner has it now. The 1st problem is there is not a gearbox anywhere to tie the current pto driven floor auger to the hydraulic driven vertical auger, which carries the grain up to the truck. This setup doesn't take anything to plug it, as the hydraulic motor stalls very easily even on a CIH 7120, with the hyd set wide open. The vertical auger is too short to unload into a 18 wheeler hopper bottom, and the tractor cannot have any duals attached or there isn't any room left to unload even onto a 2 ton truck. It is also always ran on a 2wd tractor so duals are nearly a necessity. There is also a triangular cover in the floor that covers the floor auger. It's purpose is to regulate the out flow of grain. It tends to get cadywompused to no avail while unloading the combine on the go. Being the complete original auger system is worn,thin and aggravating, the idea was to completely remove it and replace it with the 1 combine auger idea. The rest of the cart is solid. The best way I can describe it would be to invision a 18 wheeler hopper bottom with an pto gearbox driven auger attached under 1 of the hopper trap doors. There is plenty of clearance underneath of the cart for this.

I think I would leave the hydraulic auger idea in it. What I would do is find a longer auger and set it at less of an angle. maybe even have the top 4-6 ft fold back for transport(with hyd cylinder of course) by less angle it would take less power but longer would make it the same as now. I would also look at a faster hyd motor to spin that auger faster so it would not have as much in it and that would make it need less power. By making it longer you could have duals on tractor. You could ad a gear box and sprocket in front there and drive the side auger from there. doesn't matter what you do it will take some manufacturing to get it correct.

Sounds like your main problem is you're tying to work with worn out junk.

As far as anyone else doing the exact modification that you are proposing, probably not. You'll be on your own.

Right now doesn't seem to be the best time to start cutting into your grain cart, though. Seems like the first of November would be a more appropriate time because there will inevitably be snags in the design and build process, and it's going to take a LOT longer than you are thinking. That's assuming it would work perfectly the first time out when you finished with it.

I think you should go look at how a Kinze is put together and you will see that it is probably your best easiest option. Then you cna decide what you want on the auger condition. To change the angle of the vertical auger would depend on how it is fastened to the front of the cart. If the auger is a basic complete separate units then you could so to speak just cut it loose and turn it down some then reconnect. If an integral part of the front of the cart it will be much more work. Then if there is significant wear on the flighting you have to either replace the whole auger or put new flighting on it. I can get you a couple places to get flighting from. Or most auger places could hook you up there too. If I had to do much with that vertical auger I would probably replace the tube with a larger diameter one and longer to get the reach you need and faster unload time. IF you look at the Kinze look inside at the shutoff for the grain flow. It works well with little problem. I'm sure they get to leaking over time with the flow of grain over the gate plate. that can be fixed with a weld bead and grinder though. they work on Milo and wheat both are smaller seeds.

How about leaving the original bottom of the cart intact and building a sump the front, within the tongue? It would be way easier to modify the tongue to fit the sump than it would be to make a diamond-shaped bottom in the tank itself. That way you would not have to engineer a new regulator system, just fix what you have. Im sure lack of grain control is part of the problem with the vertical auger jamming. Even though youre going to eliminate the current auger, you still need some kind of regulating system until you know for sure how far you can push it.