This story was originally published in May 2024.
There are at least seven ways to use a bicycle on your homestead.
It could power a grain thresher, a seed sorter or even a log splitter — tools you can create using free designs and specifications from the open-source farm tool website FarmHack. If you think of an eighth, you can upload the material list and plans yourself for anyone to use.
The library expanded and updated in 2024 with Liz Braumhoff, a former fluid mechanics engineer and a vegetable farm worker, at the helm. She works through a fellowship for the Pembroke-based nonprofit Greenhorns, which aims to recruit and educate farming’s next generation.
Many of the 300 tools in Farm Hack’s library don’t exist as commercial products, Braumhoff said. Even if they do, their prices reflect the cost of engineering something to be perfect, when for many farmers and homesteaders, good enough is good enough.
“There’s a lot more flexibility to do some Yankee engineering,” she said of open source designs. “Farmers don’t need perfect most of the time. They just need something that’s functional.”
The tool library began about 15 years ago and, after a quiet period, started the revival process in 2024. Educational events in Maine and beyond are in the works for market farmers, hobbyists and even community gardens.
Braumhoff also intends to get involved with university engineering and agriculture programs to fine-tune or revise the library’s designs.
Teaching resources for basic skills are also part of the outreach process. Many of the people interested in the designs don’t have a background in construction or tool use. Education on the basic principles of creating tools — how to see a problem and learn to fix it — is crucial.
Another part of the work involves laying out why farmers having the resources to design and use their own tools matters, Braumhoff said.
Small farmers and home-scale operations aren’t the focus of many engineering and design resources. A few companies provide tools for small farms, but those options often are too expensive, don’t do exactly what a farmer needs or aren’t the right size.
More small farm tools are available from Europe, but are designed with different size standards and metrics, according to Braumhoff.
“There’s a longstanding tradition of farmers making their own tools that they need and sharing those designs with each other,” she said. From community barn-raising to field clearings, farmers have historically collaborated.
The library includes projects for traditional needs from a hardy pig watering stand, an irrigation drip tape winder and cleaner and a livestock weigh scale to a vermicomposter and underground rainwater storage.
Using open source materials can make the simple things easier, but they can expand into automation on the farm.
Some of Braumhoff’s favorite collaborative designs use open-source sensor technology Arduino, which farmers can code to automate processes like rolling up the sides of a greenhouse when it gets too warm or starting a fan.
Because the software is open source, they can be created without a need to learn coding or electrical work from scratch, after a bit of a learning curve, she said.
Bike-powered grain threshing and root vegetable washing projects are also standouts. The grain thresher, for example, could promote eating more local grains and legumes that can be processed on one’s own.
“Farm Hack is about open source designs, but in my opinion it’s a little bigger than that,” Braumhoff said. “How do we become a more self-reliant society? To do that, we need to know how to do things for ourselves.”