Letting the metal cool between them so she did not warp the drum.
She ground the bead smooth.
The repair cost almost nothing.
Brushes were harder.
She measured the steel cores.
Diameter.
Length.
Spacing.
Two days later, she drove to La Crosse.
At a farm supply warehouse, she found stiff nylon brush material used for cleaning grain equipment.
Eleven dollars.
She bought enough for four rollers.
The clerk asked what machine they were for.
"Root washer."
He looked at the brush stock.
"That's not root washer material."
"It will be."
He shrugged.
Della brought it home.
Cut.
Fitted.
Fastened.
The drum seal had deteriorated.
She found a folded strip of old conveyor belting beneath Raymond's bench.
It had been lying there long enough to hold the shape of the concrete floor.
She cleaned it.
Measured.
Cut with heavy shears.
Drilled bolt holes.
Installed it.
The original discharge chute created another problem.
It dropped carrots straight down.
That worked if a crate sat beneath it.
Della wanted fifty-pound burlap bags.
Holding the bag while cranking the washer was inefficient.
So she fabricated a new chute.
A piece of eighteen-gauge sheet steel leaned against the shop wall.
Leftover grain-bin material.
She marked it with soapstone.
Cut.
Bent.
Welded.
The new chute directed carrots into a bag held open by a simple wooden frame.
One person could feed the washer.
Crank.
And fill bags.
By the end of the week, the machine worked.
Not beautifully.
The drum carried a visible weld.
The brush stock was not original.
The discharge chute looked homemade because it was.
But it washed carrots.
Della opened the ledger.
Auction lot: $60.
Brush stock: $11.
Welding rod and shop consumables: $4.
Hardware: $2.
Fuel to La Crosse and other trips.
Total initial equipment cost:
$77 plus fuel.
She had priced a small commercial washer.
More than four hundred dollars.
Too large.
Power-driven.
Built for a different operation.
She closed the ledger.
Seventy-seven dollars was better.
Then came the crates.
Twenty-two were usable.
Della repaired loose slats.
Added nails.
Reinforced corners.
The remaining twenty-five she dismantled.
Good boards went into a lumber stack.
Bad ones into kindling.
Over the following winter, pieces of those rejected crates became shelves, dividers, a chicken-house repair, and one replacement drawer bottom.
Della wasted very little.
Harvest began in October.
The Holmgren back six belonged to the auction buyer only for the remaining crop. Della had no interest in damaging the ground.
Gene borrowed a two-row digger from a neighbor.
The early fall rain had softened the black Vernon County loam.
The machine loosened rows.
Workers followed.