Flax Still Haunts Me

Although this is the second year in a row that I have not grown any flax, it has come back to haunt me. The latest damage flax straw has done showed up on my swather this week. While getting it ready to swath this year's canola I looked into fixing the oil leak from the "wobble box" knife drive that had kept me busy adding oil every day last harvest. On disassembly we found a tightly wrapped band of flax straw around the drive shaft against the oil seal which had damaged the seal causing it to leak. Almost unbelievable but it is just another episode in the trail of destruction caused by trying to harvest flax.
Just off the top of my head there was the time straw wrapped around the drive shaft of the tractor almost starting a fire. The time it wrapped around the truck drive shaft to the point that it tore off the hydraulic hoses for the lift. The time it wrapped around the return drive shaft of the John Deere combine causing a small fire we were lucky to catch in time. The time it wrapped on the rear beater shaft of the John Deere damaging the beater and the body of the combine. Not to mention the hours of torture I spent laying on the straw walkers sawing straw off the beater (Twice!). The straw chopper wraps that burned the drive belt. And thats just the John Deere, the one that I bought to replace the International that absolutely could not handle flax straw. The countless hours we spent cutting flax straw off the International I could not even guess at. The modifications tried in a vain effort to improve straw handling.
Yes, any fool can grow a crop but harvesting it is a whole new ball game and I'm out.