I thought I'd start a new thread about getting my corn picker home, in hopes it might help some others. Last week I found a corn picker for a good price on Craigslist, the only problem was it was about 75 miles away by interstate. I had looked long enough to know it was a decent picker for a really good price. I started by driving my car to check it out, it looked usable so we struck a deal and in that,was I could leave the picker for a few weeks if necessary to get a way to move it lined up. I'm a public school teacher, and part time farmer, so paying a buisiness to haul the thing home wasn't really in the cards. I didn't mind the idea of spending  a little money to get it home, I just thought for about what it would cost, I could end up with a better, more mobile picker, if I spent the money on machine improvement, instead of a one and done, pay a hauler.

I took pictures of the tire size and tread, condition of the tires, and wheel bolt pattern. I also measured the outside to outside tire measurement. After looking at the pictures of the tires, I decided one was really not good and the other was questionable. Now these tires would probably have picked corn fine for several years, but going 35mph for 80 + miles was probably not going to happen. 

I called about 20 tire shops to find a somewhat reasonable priced set of 7.50 x 20 farm tires in stock. I waited till yesterday to do this, that was my first mistake, it's not a common implement tire size, so in the future, I would try to order a week ahead of time. The next thing I would do differently is I should have taken a jack, blocks and a lug wrench with me when I went to check it out and assessed the tires there, and then took them off to bring home with me. This ended up being ok, I found a tire shop a few miles from the picker and made an appointment. Make sure you tell them the size, and make sure they will do ag tires with tubes, the area I bought the picker was pretty urban and only 1 of the five shops I called would do a 20 inch farm implement tire. At home all the shops do them, was just lucky I asked. Also check and make sure it's ok to bring your own tires, 90% chance they won't have that size anyway, but some shops will only mount the tires they sell. If I would have brought them home on trip one, I could have avoided all that. After I located an bought the tires, the man at the counter realized he didn't have tubes for that size tire. So another 20 calls to every shop I could find and I locate 2 tubes an hour away and it's 3:30pm. Drive the round trip an get the tubes. Luckily my car gets about 30 mpg. So anyhow, trust me when I say just order the tires and tubes from a good local shop that does ag tires and have the rims from your scouting, buying trip, it will save you lots of time and trouble. The tires I got were American Farmer tri rib 7.50 x30, BKT makes a tire that size that's more like a multi rib implement tire and they would have been a little cheaper, but we're going to take several days to get, and I had everything set for going today.

I talked a buddy of mine, that has a newer f250, into towing it for me for McDonald's breakfast, diesal fuel, and a few rolls of hay. We met up at 6 am and headed out with tires tubes, grease gun and tools. We hitched up the picker towed it about 3-4 miles slowly to the tire shop and ate at McDonald's while they were getting the tires on. The trip home went really well. We towed on non interstates at about 35-40 mph stopped about halfway and re-greased the bearings. My final suggestions are bring an extra tube of grease, luckily I had one because we needed it, these things tow pretty good but be aware it's going to stick out significantly past the passenger side of the vehicle. Lastly an offset receiver tube or hitch would be the cats pajama, then you could trail it right behind you.

I guess my final thoughts are ; sometimes pre-planning actually works, nail down a good non interstate route ahead of time, and that with some leg work it's very doable. We got home today about 2:30 pm, that was taking it really easy, getting the tire work done, and stopping for lunch. If you made it this far I hope maybe this helps somebody avoid a few of the mistakes I made, and maybe some of the things I did that worked well will help out too. All in all I'm happy I got the picker home in one piece, I got a reliable set of tires, and now I feel like it won't be a big deal to take it up to my brothers and help him pick his few acres also. He only lives about 45 mins away, which feels like no big deal after today, all of that cost me less than hiring a guy with a deck over trailer or wide roll back to haul it. I'd love to hear other hauling methods, tips and tricks or just shared picker towing / hauling adventures.