"All-Purpose" Portable Barn

"All-Purpose" Portable Barn LIVESTOCK Buildings 29-1-17 Here's a good idea for hay growers - and anyone else who'd like to have a bit more flexibility when putting up new buildings around the farm. Robert Barnett, Burlington, Okla., designed a new all-purpose portable barn that's easy to set up for use as a bale shelter, machinery shed, calf shelter, etc. The 33 by 50-ft. open-sided metal barn mounts on wheels that make it easy to move around. According to Barnett, the barn pulls down the road easier than pulling a 28-ft. stock trailer loaded with cattle. The building is made of 2 by 1/8-in. sq. tubing on the main frame and 1 1/2-in. tubing on the rafters. The building folds in half lengthwise to 16 1/2 by 50 ft., making it narrow enough to be pulled behind a 1/2-ton pickup down rural roads and over bridges. One half has a tongue and two wheels attached to it, which are removed for set-up. Six hinged legs - three on each side - give the barn a 10-ft. eave height. The legs, made from 4-in. sq. tubing, fold up for transport to reduce the building's overall height. Additional height can be gained by bolting on 2 or 4-ft. extensions. Each leg rests on top of a portable 3-ft. sq. concrete pad. The half of the roof that folds over the other half is built in two sections that are hinged at the ridge. A front-end loader fitted with a boom and chain is used to pull half of the roof over at a time. Once the roof is in place, a loader fitted with a bale fork is used to raise up one end of the building so that each of the legs on that end can be unfolded and bolted together. Then the process is repeated at the other end of the building. Finally, the wheels are removed. A flexible vinyl cap is used to cover the ridgeline. "It works great for storing big square bales. It holds about 90 big square bales. And it should have some value when it's no longer needed or when the buyer retires, unlike permanent barns that are often neglected and fall apart," says Barnett. "I came up with the idea because I used to be a custom hay grower on land that I leased. I had to get out of the hay growing business after I had an accident. I had built two permanent barns and wished that I could have sold them, so I decided to build a portable barn. This way I can move the barn to wherever the renter wants it. Most renters don't want to spend money on a barn for hay storage. With a portable barn, if you ever lose the lease you can just move the barn. "It sells for about $3,000 more than a permanent barn of comparable size. But you can resell it without having to sell the family land. So far I've built two buildings. I sell them for about $17,000 apiece. "It works a lot better than using tarps which require a lot of labor to put up. If the wind is blowing too hard the tarp can tear. Also, tarps generally don't last more than three years or so. It's less time consuming to haul hay to a barn in the field, rather than to tarp the bales at the side of the field, or to transport the hay to an off-site barn. Another advantage is that hay stored inside a barn is generally worth about $20 per ton more than hay that has been tarped. Considering this difference, a farmer could pay for my portable barn in only about three years." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Robert Barnett, RR 1, Box 165, Burlington, Okla. 73722 (ph 580 431-2270).

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