Kyler Greer standing and giving an interview appears. Text on the bottom left reads, "Kyler Greer, Power, structural, Technical SAE. Lubbock Cooper FFA, Texas."
My name is Kyler Greer. I’m a student here at Lubbock Cooper in Texas.
John Deere planters appear, followed by Kyler standing near the planter placed in an exhibition. Later, Kyler holds a file and stands near the planter. John Deere planters reappear.
My SAE was a refurbishment, I guess you could call it. I refurbished two 1972 John Deere planters. We had them on the farm. We use them to plant cotton. And they’d been sitting in a barn for several years, and I pulled them out, dusted them off, and painted them up. I took off every single nut and bolt that was on the thing. The thing was completely bare. And I did a full ground-up restoration of the thing. It took right at three months exactly. I’m very proud of what I did; it took a lot of time and effort.
Kyler stands in between two planters. Later, he does some welding work.
What I like best about this SAE is that--is more--instead of having to build something from the ground up where you have to do every single design, and you have to--because when you build something and draw it start, I guarantee at the end it’s not going to be anything like what you started.
Kyler measures the length and width of a rod using a measuring tape. Later, a machine appears, followed by a powder coating oven and another metallic machine, one after the other.
But with the refurbishment, you have every single part there. You just got to remember exactly where it goes.
So, my eighth-grade year, they had an exhibit up here at our school, projects that juniors and seniors had built. And I was coming up here, and some of these projects are actually here in the shop. You can go around and see. Anyway, I saw that, and I was like, “man, that’s pretty cool.” Looking and having the exhibit is how I found out and knew about the whole ag. mechanics side.
Kyler Greer standing and giving an interview reappears. Later, he stands near a metallic table in a shop.
I’ve done different SAE projects. I’ve stuck with the same SAE, which, the ag. mechanics side, but I built my freshman year headache racks, and then my sophomore year, I built a shop table, which I then--you could use for the rest of my life to build my future projects.
A person does some welding work followed by a pig with an ear tag inside a cage.
I’d say that not all SAEs are alike. Because like I said, there’s different sectors, like you have the ag. mechanic side, and you have the animal side, which you try to build the ag. mechanic project and take care of an animal.
A person drills on a piece of wood followed by which a machine does some welding work.
There’s a lot of people around here that have no ties to agriculture at all in their family. But they just thought, “oh, maybe showing pigs or building something would be quite cool.” And I think that’s the unique part about SAEs is that anybody can do it. You don’t have to have a real tie to agriculture.
Kyler stands near a planter placed in a manufacturing unit. Kyler Greer standing and giving an interview reappears.
I believe the most important thing I’ve learned in my ag. class is just be disciplined in yourself. And just keep on, don’t get discouraged when you mess up something, or you do something bad. Just be like, “alright, I can’t do that.” And then you fix it. And you just keep on going.