John Patterson, equipment manager at Atlanta Athletic Club in Johns Creek, GA, rebuilt his first engine with his dad at eight years old and never wanted to be anything other than a mechanic. Fed up with Chicago winters, John headed south with plans to become a marine mechanic in southwest Florida. When every boat mechanic he met told him to do something else, John answered an ad at a golf course and after passing the “righty tighty, lefty loosey” test, the rest is history. From fabricating a sand silo and method for filing divot mix more efficiently to a better designed front roller bracket on the John Deere, listeners will find John’s reputation as one of the most brilliant in the business is well-earned. In his free time John enjoys his hot-rod Miata, tinkering on his 1975 BMW 750 and teaching his son to drive. As a founding member and past president of the International Golf Course Equipment Managers Association (IGCEMA), John is rewarded to see his vision come to life in the form of the Certified Turf Equipment Manager (CTEM) program launched this year.
Transcript
Trent Manning:
welcome to the reel turf techs podcast for the technician that wants to get reel follow along. As we talk to industry professionals and address hot topics that we all face along the way we’ll learn tips and tricks. I’m your host, Trent. Manning let’s have some Welcome to the real turf tax podcast, episode 63 today, we’re talking to John Patterson. Uh, equipment manager at Atlanta athletic club. And John’s Creek Georgia. Atlanta athletic club as a high end private club. With two 18 hole championship courses. Plus a nine hole par three. On approximately 550 acres. John has two assistants working with him in the shop. Jimmy samples and Alan Payne. He has mostly John Deere. Mowing equipment. With a couple Toro, rough mowers. That’s a Toro air fires. And he has a mix of tractors. He has a total of 322 pieces of equipment. With a replacement value of 4.2 million. Pretty impressive set up. Let’s talk to John. Welcome John to the real turf text podcast. How you doing? Did
John Patterson:
I’m doing great. How about yourself?
Trent Manning:
good. Thank you. Thank you so much for coming on. It’s going to be a lot of fun. It always is.
John Patterson:
Heck yeah, my pleasure,
Trent Manning:
Tell us how you got into the turf industry.
John Patterson:
By accident,
Trent Manning:
Like most of us.
John Patterson:
exactly, lifelong mechanic grew up in a garage, got fed up, doing what I was doing in Chicago. Really got fed up with Chicago winters and decided to move to Florida to work on boats. And I had every intention of being a Marine mechanic and. I had a couple of months salary saved up then. So it was taking my time going around to a couple of different marinas down in Southwest Florida, down around Benita, Fort Myers, that area, and every single Marine mechanic that I talked to said, find something else to do. This is no fun. So I was kinda hanging out at my apartment thinking what the heck I was gonna do. And just, uh, almost as a Lark, I answered an ad for the system mechanic at the forest country club in Fort Myers, Florida. This was in 1993 and, go in and fill out the application. And, basically they said, oh, you have a pulse. and you know, righty, tighty lefty loosey.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Nice.
John Patterson:
I had never worked on a real mower and, really was fortunate to have a couple of guys take me under their wing and show me the ropes. And the rest is history.
Trent Manning:
That’s awesome. That’s so cool. So had you ever played golf or any interest in golf? Nothing.
John Patterson:
You know, it’s funny. I really don’t like the game of golf. I tried playing a couple of times and made it through, nine holes once and it’s just not, for me, it’s just not my game. And I’m colorblind. So, you know, it’s one of those deals where I really don’t care if the grass is green, um, No really I do. But, I run all on contrast. When I look out at, after cut appearance, a lot of things will show up just based on contrast when you’re not distracted by the color. And I found that that’s really an asset when I go up and I look at after cut appearance, quality of cut issues and things like that.
Trent Manning:
that’s interesting. I’ve never even thought about it.
John Patterson:
Yeah. So, uh, Yeah. no interest in golf, grew up in a garage. you know, I tell the story of rebuilt my first engine when I was eight years old, working with dad in the garage. Well, Briggs and Stratton, and, just never wanted to do anything other than mechanics work and. Work with them. The garage built a couple of race cars. Dad was a frustrated engineer type who actually worked in the insurance industry and, was gone traveling quite a bit. He would give me a checklist to do on the race car during the week. And I would work on the race car after school and he’d come home on Thursday night or Friday morning, and then we’d work together over the weekend and that, and then we, we went, we raced formula viz and Midwestern council, grew up in central Illinois, Bloomington, normal Illinois. So he taught me a lot about, just the logic behind the way things worked. One of my first jobs in the shop was, checking rocker, arm ratios. And we had a, Volkswagen long block put together, uh, hanging off of the bench. And I would bolt together a set of rockers and set up the dial indicator and run it through and check for maximum lift and that real, restrictive class. So you had to use stock parts. So dad would come home with bushel baskets, full of rocker, arms and, and connecting rods and stuff that he’d pick up here and there. And we can measure all the best stuff and put all the best stuff into our engines. And we were getting about little over 50 horsepower out of those old 40 horse, Volkswagens. So had a lot of fun.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Yeah, no, that’s really cool. That’s really cool. the guy, I talk about a lot of top tabbing hall. That’s a blacksmith now he kind of similar to you grew up racing and he was in Pennsylvania and they’d done a lot of hill climbs and that kind of stuff. But anyway, I got to spend a winter working with him and the blacksmith shop and he, we also had, and me and you have talked about this, I think, but, another mutual friend raced, uh, ITB for in SCCA and he had a little Ford Mustang or whatever. So that was Tom. He loves building engines. And that was the first time I ever got to a degree. I cam I never, I never knew what that was, but, um, it was really interesting process. And that just brought back all those memories. You talking about Lyft and the duration and, and all that stuff. If you could only make them square be perfect, right?
John Patterson:
Exactly exactly.
Trent Manning:
Yup. Do you release grand?
John Patterson:
Oh yeah.
Trent Manning:
Oh Yeah.
John Patterson:
And it’s funny for years, I was one of these guys who said, well, it’s the front side of the real blade that does all the work, who cares what’s behind that. And, I finally had a chance to, test it for myself and run a set of fairway, cutting units with relief and a set was zero relief. And the difference is really dramatic and, friction reduction, where reduction and, there’s just no way that I could provide the product that I do without relief, grinding. You know, there’s only three of us here in the shop and, expectations are high. So, you know, we need to maintain that quality of cut and we need to be able to turn things around, in short order. So I would say just off the cuff, we’re realizing about, uh, almost a 30% reduction in where, overall, just from the friction reduction on our fairway units, we maintain quality, you know, 30% while. And then when it comes time to spend, you don’t have to remove that much material. So the spin process is that much quicker. I, I re refresh my relief Grimes, when the land width gets to about 50% of the overall blade width. And then I take, I take the, um, the relief right down to, you know, a 15 thousands land width when I do relieve grime and really have seen tremendous benefits.
Trent Manning:
How many times. I mean, I know that all this varies, but how many times do you think you can grind in between relief grounds? If you’re going 15,000 to whatever, probably 125.
John Patterson:
Yeah, probably probably an eighth of an inch lamb. At least half a dozen
Trent Manning:
Okay.
John Patterson:
good. Cause I’m only taken off, you know, four to 6,000 on a spin grind. And that’s one of my, one of my things. I had a visitor in the shop one time who said I was going over all of the things that I do to prepare cutting units for tournament. And he made the comment. He said, well, that’s Okay. for you because cutting units are your shtick. And that really, that comment really stuck with me because I feel like it’s, well, it is,
Trent Manning:
Yeah, that’s
John Patterson:
It’s the thing that I put the most emphasis on in the shop and I feel very strongly that everybody should, And, you know, put the resources towards cutting unit maintenance because that’s, it’s the visible component of what we do. And it has a tremendous impact on turf health, which I didn’t realize until much later in my career, disease, stress, water usage, everything is affected by how healthy that plant is. And if you’re going out and totally stressing out that plant just by, you know, the cutting process, you know, it has to use that plant has to use so much energy to, just to recover from being cut. And
Trent Manning:
sure.
John Patterson:
so anyway, it’s a. You know, we’re, we’re pulling our cutting units. We’re, we’re inspecting our cutting units after you choose. And if it doesn’t pass inspection, that gets pulled just plain and simple. We don’t try to crank it down, and get it through another Mo we’ve ed. I don’t care if they’re throwing sand. I don’t care what’s going on on the golf course, really. but it it’s just, if it doesn’t pass inspection, it gets pulled and we put a fresh set on I’ve over the years I’ve lobbied for and been able to justify getting swap-out sets maintenance sets of cutting units for not only greens mowers, but also fairway, you know, And been able to prove to management, the benefits and efficiency and, and the product that we get out on the golf course.
Trent Manning:
Yeah,
John Patterson:
it’s, it’s all about the product. It’s all about what our members see and experience out on the golf course. And I think that some folks tend to get kind of wrapped up what they’ve got going on in the shop and tend to lose sight of that. Maybe a little bit that, we’re here to provide a product. And if the demands of the product are, are very high, then you know, it comes back to the old hot rodders adage, you know, speed, cost money. How fast do you want to go?
Trent Manning:
true.
John Patterson:
you know, if you want. Tournament conditions, 300 days out of the year, then you know that this is what it’s going to cost.
Trent Manning:
Right. Yeah.
John Patterson:
So, fortunately we we’ve been able to, to achieve that
Trent Manning:
That’s awesome. That’s so good. So since I got you, I’m going to ask some of my questions, that I won’t answered. How many cut that you think you get on Georgia fairways and
John Patterson:
I’ll get 36 holes out of a fairway mower.
Trent Manning:
Okay.
John Patterson:
So we’ll send two units out to Mo and so each mower will then cut nine holes. And so four mowings basically.
Trent Manning:
Yep.
John Patterson:
and then they get a fresh, maybe more, but I’m not counting on that in the shop.
Trent Manning:
Hmm.
John Patterson:
And that comes back to my whole philosophy of, I would rather work on a cutting unit more often, rather than push it and push it and push it because when you’re doing high-frequency maintenance, the cutting unit tears down and goes back together so much easier. you know, just the fasteners coming out and going back in, it goes so much easier and you’re taking off so much less material off of your cutting edges, that your Florida floor time is drastically less. So. Really overall, you’re spending less time. And, I’ve been there before. It’s like, oh, well, we’ll try to get one more out of it. And then if you’re spending a half an hour on trying to get back to something that you know, that you
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Trying to yeah. Tweak it enough to send it one more time,
John Patterson:
right? Which is, Um, frankly easier to do with a Toro DPA where you’re running light contact anyway. And you’ve got the, that give in the knife pivot bushing, to put up with a little bit more contact, but I’m running all John Deere hard, hard pivot, Clearance, you know, we’re using a thousand feeler gauge on everything. So
Trent Manning:
yeah. Why not something while we’re on filler gauges? When I think it was the. Well, I’ve listened to your presentation twice, once in Tampa and once in Georgia, thank you for doing it here. And something I picked up on from you. You’ve been doing this a really long time
John Patterson:
yeah, since 93.
Trent Manning:
right. Okay. So that’s a long time. but one thing that, that really hit me and I took to heart is you said you still use a filler gauge and you can remind me, cause I don’t remember, but I don’t think you always used a filler gauge, but now you do.
John Patterson:
Yeah. You know, I kinda looked at the, using a feeler gauge is kind of a crutch and it was kind of a pride thing. Oh, I can dial in a cutting unit just by feel and sound. And I found out that I was, you know, two or 3000 south here or there, and it makes a difference it’s and when you’re used to using it, it’s again, it’s faster. you come down until you hear contact back off a few clicks on each side and then dial in with a feeler gauge. And it’s, it’s just more repeatable. That’s another thing. That I really focus on in the shop is standardizing on these procedures. Right? Because my feel might be different than Jimmy’s field might be different than Al’s feel. And, the feeling age doesn’t lie, it’s, it’s there. It’s not, are you pinching the gauge? Are you not?
Trent Manning:
We get it down to like a go no-go fit on the filler guy.
John Patterson:
Light drag.
Trent Manning:
Just lie drag. Okay. Well you were saying,
John Patterson:
can. Now, when I, when I’ve got a, a thousands feel gauge working, when I’m done, you will hear the real one, it stands. but you know, I know that it’s right there.
Trent Manning:
Round one. I’m glad you explained that better than what I was going to try to explain that. But anyway, so I go back to the shop after I listened to you and I’ve been doing this long enough, I think I’m pretty good. You know, so I’m set up a cutting unit as good as anybody with paper. And I found, I learned the same thing. I’m not, I’m not as good as a filler gauge.
John Patterson:
Well it’s, and it’s, it’s something that, it’s a standard right.
Trent Manning:
yeah, for sure. So since then, I’ve been trying to get my guys that work in the shop. Do you use the filler gauge? Because I guess it’s all in the same ballpark.
John Patterson:
There you go.
Trent Manning:
And so on a Toro DPA, if you said it was a two thousands filler gauges, how many clicks would you go after that lot contact?
John Patterson:
There’s another thing, with the DPA’s, I found out that I was one of the Toro engineers told me I wasn’t running them tight enough. this was when I was down at PGA national Palm beach gardens, Florida. They came in, we were chasing after cut appearance issues on, oversee. And for saying, you know, here’s my freshly relief ground cutting units. I’m all proud is, you know, new Papa here. You know, look at my cutting units, come inspect him. Guy gives him a, a swish and he says, that’s not tight enough. I can tell you right now. I says, are you kidding me? I sat, everything was a one thousands feeling age. I don’t even bother with the two thousands anymore. But I’ll go even with, with a 1000 feeler gauge and then go to clicks. And if so, if you’re setting with a 2000, so I would imagine that would be three clicks because I think that the Toro DPA is seven tenths of a thousands per click. but it was explained to me that the dynamic action of the real pulling the grass through that junction tends to spread the knife tends to push the knife away from the real. And that’s partly because you’ve got the flex and the pivot bushings. That’s a relive, it’s a 90 durometer rubber bushing in the pivot bowl. And, so you got a little give there. And so if you, if you’ve got a little preload on that junction, then once that grass is moving through there, it’ll tend to reduce that pressure. But again, that’s where your relief grinding really is a benefit.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. I mean, that totally makes sense. And I think Jim Ned and he does, and his presentation about, I forget exactly what he calls it, but I think it’s grass and gestation, you know, when is eating the grass. and you’re really packing a lot of grass in there and all that stuff starts moving and yeah, it spreads out. So they really make sense to me because the bigger your land would be. The more surface area. You got to push those two pieces apart.
John Patterson:
Exactly.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. So I love it. This is a good, it’s a good, good stuff. And, uh, Mike Rollins, he’s going to get really excited when he listened to this book. I know. Tell us something you fabricated lately.
John Patterson:
Well, this winter, my big project was a sand silo for the cart barn. I fabricated a, basically a it’s about a three foot square. Sam bin and put it up on legs and fabricated a dispenser valve on the bottle on the bottom. And that’s what the cart barn crew uses to fill divot bottles with. They were having a hard time, uh, spending a lot of time taking apart the divot bottles and that, and, uh, the, um, golf pro asked if I could do something about that. So that’s a project that really worked out well for us and load bags of, of a divot mix in the, in the top. And they, you know, they get a couple of those big college boys up there and load the bin up and now, and then, you know, anybody can just put, uh, a divot bottle under the spout and pull the lever and get that filled up. So that was, uh, that was a cool thing to do. Um, A lot of practice with the TIG welder, which, uh, I’m a more of a Maywell guy myself, but, that was fun. Getting to run some beads with TIG welder.
Trent Manning:
Why’d you choose to tigweld it.
John Patterson:
just Because I could,
Trent Manning:
Because you had a TIG welder.
John Patterson:
yeah, it. justified the purchase more, more or less. And, it was 11 gauge sheet and, uh, I didn’t want to run a lot of distortion, so I kind of stitched it together, tack it together. I’ll, you know, every few inches and then was able to run beads all over the place and keep the heat localized. I didn’t want, I was really concerned, you know? Got about a half, a ton of sand sitting there. And I was really concerned about maybe splitting a welder or something like that, having a heat affected zone crack or, or something like that. So I wanted to control how much heat I was putting in there.
Trent Manning:
That’s awesome. That’s so cool. I’m going to go to my director and tell him we need one of those and I’m going to need a TIG welder tape.
John Patterson:
There you go. That’s perfect justification.
Trent Manning:
I love it.
John Patterson:
Actually, I I was able to justify that take welder when I was developing the, height, the bracket modification that I did, the wound up working out. All right. -+And then, I also, came up with the height, the cut bushings, Whittled away, a couple of sticks of three quarter inch cold roll to make high-ticket bushings for all my, Toro rough mowers, because I was tired of those powdered metal bushings split. And so, and I found the, since I got a, quite a response on Twitter, when I posted that, up on Twitter, I found a, CNC shop up north of us that, I’m waiting on bids back, but it. looks like I’ll be able to, get those made at a reasonable cost and get them zinc plated. And I don’t know, maybe I’ll sell them through Steven’s site or some turf addict or something that.
Trent Manning:
Okay. Yeah, that’d be awesome. And then what about your, uh, your brackets, your how to cut brackets for the John Deere? You know, go a little more in depth on that, please.
John Patterson:
Okay,
Trent Manning:
Yeah.
John Patterson:
these guys,
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Those are out there.
John Patterson:
I started off by machining my own, bottom part or foot, the, on the factory, John Deere, high-ticket brackets front roller brackets, mainly because I was just really disappointed in that design of the eccentric. And, had a case where one of those actually came loose on a green space. And it wasn’t pretty. And I said, I’m going to fix this. And that was three years ago. and that’s where I that’s how long I’ve had the takeover. I went to Lucas and I said, my boss and said, I think I can fix this, but I need to spend some money to do it. And he said, okay, I’ll trust you get it done. So I cut the bottom off of the stock height, roller bracket and machine my own, foot that goes on the bottom of it and use an eccentric bushing. that’s held rigid. so that any failure in the part won’t allow the cutting unit to drop lower than your target height to cut. So, My original idea was to actually I made the jig and everything to, you know, modify those brackets. Tigweld my parts that I make, here in the shop. I’m very fortunate in this shop that I do have a manual middle and a lave. so I made these parts. I made the eccentric bushings on the lave and I made the parts on the mill and my original idea was, Hey, I could just, you know, cut all these up and weld them. And then it’s, it’s a long time. It takes a long time to do that. So I looked at maybe getting them, made CNC, make the, my own brackets, basically start to finish. So I went out and I bought, um, fusion 360, which is a 3d CAD program and bought a subscription to that and taught myself how to use it and drew up the parts and located a CNC house, not too far from here, and had a run of a maid and they work beautifully. We’ve had zero issues. Nothing comes apart, nothing drifts. you, I can’t remember the last time I’ve adjusted an eccentric because they don’t change. They don’t move. And, I haven’t had one come loose, so it turns out that the CNC house that I found close to me is, Real high end stuff for like space X and stuff like that. So their prices are pretty, pretty high. Well, I found this other CNC house, like I’ve mentioned before north, and I’ve got, um, I’ve got the drawings off to them and we’ll see if I’d like to offer them for out on the market. I think that there. is a market for them, if nothing else than for green sets. But if it winds up being, you know, we’ve got the only one’s made them that’s, that’s fine too. I can sleep good at night knowing that my greens heads aren’t going to drop the low height to cut ever.
Trent Manning:
yeah, I think that would be a lot of people that would be interested, especially for greens cotton units,
John Patterson:
yeah,
Trent Manning:
because
John Patterson:
it gets frustrating.
Trent Manning:
that could get kind of pricey, but.
John Patterson:
Yeah. well, you know, even if I could get them made for, you know, as much or a little less than the stock brackets, folks that are wanting to put them on TriFlex is you’re talking about almost a thousand dollars and that’s, that’s a tough sell for something. That’s a nice to have somebody who already has something that works, you know, and I’m just offering something that works better. Uh, so I’m trying to get them made for as reasonable as possible and, and see if we can’t get them out there.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. And we can get the thing of the John Deere distributor just to go ahead and put them all in from the factory.
John Patterson:
Well,
Trent Manning:
be even better.
John Patterson:
That would be nice. That would be nice kind of the way they, they set up the golf cold roller package. Now I’m on a lot of them coming out of a distributors offer, you know, that as an option coming out for, for any breeze heads coming out, it’s easier with a roller package though, because, cutting units, aren’t specked with rollers because there’s so many options, but every cutting unit does come with roller brackets. So it’s an added cost of over and above, but if I can get them made for a reasonable enough, we’ll see, we’ll see where that goes from here. I’m not holding my breath, but we’ll see. It’ll be a nice, nice thing. If I can get it to take off.
Trent Manning:
Well, tell us what your favorite two lists
John Patterson:
Hi, Dave,
Trent Manning:
love it. That’s a good one.
John Patterson:
gotta be, it’s actually kind of a toss up between the phytate and the. I’ve got a dial caliper in my hand, almost every day in the shop, whether I’m checking, knives, as they’re coming off of the grinder. cause I always check front to back now to manage my cutline. or is it, uh, you know, a bushing, a shaft, if you, you can check depth with them, uh, you can be almost as accurate as a micrometer if you handle it gently and take your time with it. So it’s a real versatile measuring tool, but, Yeah. for sure really helps me and I can. you know, what, what real is is the cleanup real and what direction they were gone,
Trent Manning:
Oh,
John Patterson:
where they going clockwise or counter-clockwise. I can tell that by my phytate
Trent Manning:
Really?
John Patterson:
Before I even look at the knife that came off of that real, you can see it.
Trent Manning:
It’ll wear more on.
John Patterson:
It wears more on the, on. the edge, right up against the, the collar. Cause that’s where all the you’re running. All the sand.
Trent Manning:
Yup. Have you ever noticed the helix of the blade affective?
John Patterson:
Yeah. Yeah. and there’s two points of view on that. If you’re going through heavy debris, like right after aerification, for example, the leading end of the helix will tend to take more. but if you are not going through heavy debris, if you’re quote normal, where, not a lot of debris going through mainly brass flippings, the helix will tend to screw the, the debris down towards the trailing end. And so you’ll see more trailing it where then on, on a cutting unit, that’s just going out, regular use.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Yep. I don’t know. It’s interesting.
John Patterson:
Yeah. Yeah. That’s why I Toro, not only for Africa, but for where they came up with the veins on the, on the shields to, to stream out the throw coming out because we watch anybody. Else’s the John Deere of the Jakes they’re throwing because of the patent. Of course they don’t have the veins. So they’re throwing everything towards the trailing end of the reel. And so that trailing end is mowing over that debris more times than the leading end.
Trent Manning:
so yeah, you’re far right. Cutting unit would get less where then all the rest of it.
John Patterson:
Yup.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Crazy. Crazy cool stuff though. What do you do to relax or find your balance?
John Patterson:
work on stuff. I’m always wrenching on something.
Trent Manning:
Yeah.
John Patterson:
I’ve got, uh, my little hot rod Miata that I, I like to, take up into the north Georgia mountains and take it to the track every once in a while. Back when dad and I were building the race cars in the garage, I got my, my competition license back as soon as I turned 16. So I’ve been into high-performance driving and motor sports overall, my, my whole adult life, for sure. I do that. I just recently, got interested in motorcycles. I picked up an old 1975 BMW, seven 50, and I’ve been tinkering with that and it’s fun to work on something old, you know, and it doesn’t have all the latest technology and stuff, but, My hot rod, Miata has all the electronic fuel injection and, and this and that and the other, but it’s nice to take around something bold and
Trent Manning:
Uh,
John Patterson:
yeah, yeah, Yeah. Two carburetors that you got to synchronize and all that fun stuff. and, been hanging out a lot with my son. He’s learning how to drive he’s 16. And so been teaching him a lot of the tips and tricks that my dad taught me, growing up. I’m not teaching them how to set, points and timing and all that kind of stuff, but they, he doesn’t have any interest in that end of it. But, the driving aspect of it. And just chill out. I I’ve got like 160 different subscriptions on YouTube and
Trent Manning:
Okay.
John Patterson:
I’ll tell the different channels that I’ve subscribed to a lot of, you know, this old Tony and, and, Avon machinists guys, and, things like that. Racing, follow motor sports a lot.
Trent Manning:
yeah, that’s cool. Yeah. The last time I was over at your shop, you turned me on to, is it fireball? Fireball tools? Yeah. I’ve watched
John Patterson:
great shop tools for, for welding and fabrication. Yep.
Trent Manning:
and watch some more. There they’re videos that guide us guys. Some cool stuff
John Patterson:
Yeah.
Trent Manning:
like candy land. If he had a shot, he is amazing. Whatever. That’d be nice. What’s the, one of the strangest things you’ve seen at work.
John Patterson:
I carry, I still carry it in my pocket. we had a guy down in Florida who is a real, athletic guy, real macho guy. And they had him out on weed eating lake banks, and he saw a snake and he freaked out and, and he screamed and threw the weed eater into the pond. There was an old Maruyama weed eater, and of course it took a loan full of, water and it shortened up the connecting rod. And the funny thing is. It shortened it up straight where it didn’t cock the wrist pin in the bore at all. I’m digging these keys on their pockets show you, but this connecting
Trent Manning:
Oh, wow.
John Patterson:
is about, I don’t know, two or three millimeters short. but the pins are exactly in line and I mean the thing’s still turned over. It was one of the toughest things to diagnose because it still had a little bit of compression. but, yeah, so that was, that was one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen.
Trent Manning:
You’re going to have to take a picture of that and put it on Twitter.
John Patterson:
yeah, I’ve had. Lots of stuff going on lakes. working at the resorts down in Florida, I was down at Doral in Miami for six years, and then PJ and national for six years. you know, both 90 whole resorts. And it seemed like every week we golf car and the lake or something going on, I’ve seen tractors, hung up on, retaining walls and all those kinds of things. Fortunately, I haven’t seen or witnessed, any major accidents, any personal injury, accidents had a real close call. One time a kid was riding may. TriFlex and went off the backside of an elevated T into a canal. And the steering arm had his neck pinned. And fortunately the water level was low enough that his face was sticking out of the water, but he couldn’t get out and nobody knew he was there. And finally somebody driving by her, him yelling for help. And then we, you know, we got him out of there, but that was the closest call I’ve ever I’ve ever witnessed.
Trent Manning:
And that’s scary for
John Patterson:
Yeah. Yeah. He could have been a goner with, I mean, if it had rained the night before that, that, that, canal is normally pretty fast flowing.
Trent Manning:
It was nuts. Yeah. All in all I know there’s accidents that happen and they are fatal, but we’re pretty lucky at the golf course. Cause we have a lot of major accidents and people walk away.
John Patterson:
Yeah. And that’s, you know, that’s one of those things where, the operator training, is key. Anything with a roll bar has operating seatbelts and you are to use them. And if you, because the safest place for you to be on any thing with a roll bars in the seat, and even, uh, people think that they’re Superman and I can jump away from this machine or whatever. Well, there’s plenty of people had their necks broken or whatever, from a roll bar coming down on top of them. You hear about these things all the time. but yes, safety is paramount,
Trent Manning:
What’s one of your pet peeves around the shop
John Patterson:
hiding, broken stuff.
Trent Manning:
that doesn’t happen over there. Does it?
John Patterson:
it? happens everywhere. Oh my goodness. I just, Yeah. if you were distracted or whatever, and you ran into something or you thought you were going forward, but you were really in reverse, whatever the case, I don’t care about fess up to it. Come tell me that you messed up and I’ll tell you that you messed up and please don’t do it again and we’ll fix it and we’ll make it right. But if you are a jerk, I don’t care if you’re male or female, whatever, if you’re going to be a jerk and go try to hide this thing, then I’m going to do whatever I can to get you off of the crew and out of here, because we just there’s just no place for it.
Trent Manning:
no, we have plenty enough to do, we don’t have time to play games or chase people around. Yeah. Just tell you. Yeah.
John Patterson:
Yeah, And that’s what I, you know, I try as much as I can to have an upbeat, positive relationship with the crew. you know, all the new crew members come through the shop and they see, how we keep the shop organized and clean and how we impress upon them, how valuable everything is and how valuable they are to the operation. And that we really want them to have the best tools and to make their job as easy as it can be, because we know it’s tough work sometimes, but, you know, if they take care of the equipment and we take care of the equipment, then they’re going to have a better time. And generally speaking, that that goes over well. And we, you know, we try to laugh and joke as much as appropriate but when it’s time to go, it’s time to work
Trent Manning:
Yeah, yeah. Right. For sure.
John Patterson:
no.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. I had that happen actually today. So we have one of the turbo blades on a line tremor take off the lawn tremor, put on the turbo blade and they use it for edge and bunkers. And they brought in last week because the throttle cable had slipped out of the carburetor. So I’ll put it back in. I didn’t think about how did this happen. so I put it all back in. It was a little loose, so I tied it up thinking, okay, it’s not going to come out again. Well, it comes back today. Same thing, throttle, cables out. So this time the throttle is sticking because it’s the bunker Gator, which is full of bunker sand. And they liked to haul the tremor in the sand.
John Patterson:
Mm,
Trent Manning:
So anyway, yeah, it was binding up the throttle shaft, like, okay, I guess we’ll have to buy some racks or her some, there’s gotta be a better way. Do you have a mentor in the industry?
John Patterson:
not really. I have over my career I’ve, I’ve worked with some really cracker Jack mechanics. And Dennis Marvel was the first guy that took me under his wing at the forest country club. And we got to where we could break down and set up a pool frame, start to finish in one day, seven gang pole frame grind, the reels grind, the knives back together, you know, ready to go. And that’s a hustle in south Florida in the summertime. I’ll tell ya.
Trent Manning:
Yeah.
John Patterson:
but, you know, he’s dead and gone now. a lot of people have touched me in, in various ways. I don’t look up to any one person in the industry. My boss, Lucas Harvey, and I we’ve been together off and on in some form or fashion since 2001. you know, we first met each other back at the, uh, at Calusa Pines and Naples, and it was a spray tech and I was the equipment manager back then. So I was technically over him that didn’t last long. So, and he reminds me of that. but I really admire his business sense and his he’s got an incredible gift for remembering. People and names and that, and I just don’t, I can sit and talk to somebody for a half an hour and forget their name. And it’s just not, you know, it’s not that I don’t care about the person. It’s just, I’m not wired that way. You know,
Trent Manning:
Yeah.
John Patterson:
so, but I appreciate, you know, different things about different people and different people in the industry have, have really influenced, you know, I have very few original ideas. you know, you walk around my shop and I can point out, oh, this came from Terry and this came from Joe and this came from bill and all these different ideas just melded into one. I I’ve been extremely fortunate in my career to work with some real, what I call cracker Jack mechanics and just real, sharp individually.
Trent Manning:
I think, you know, and obviously I hadn’t worked in, uh, any other industry, but I do think we’re fortunate in this industry to have some of the most talented people. There’s some really, truly smart, amazing people that are equipment managers.
John Patterson:
Definitely.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. And when you get to talking to them and find out their backgrounds and you know, this or that or whatever, and yeah, you can do some really cool, really cool things. And it’s really, uh, endless. And I think that’s what makes this end to the story. So great is you can really do anything you want to do.
John Patterson:
Exactly.
Trent Manning:
And if you get to a facility that has plenty of resources, you can be running the mill machine. And I mean all that, stuff’s not out of the ordinary. And I know a lot of people, well, I shouldn’t say a lot, but I know several guys that have their own lay, then milling machine at their shop, you know, so the club didn’t buy it. They did.
John Patterson:
Oh yeah, yeah,
Trent Manning:
And so that that’s possible too.
John Patterson:
Right,
Trent Manning:
And there’s not many bosses. That’s going to say, no, you can’t have that that,
John Patterson:
right.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Because they know the clubs are going to benefit from it. So bring it on in here.
John Patterson:
Definitely. Yeah. And that’s the thing about resources, as the resources go up, the excuses go down. Um, so, you know, yes, I can have my, my vintage motorcycle, off to the side and I’ve been, you know, tinkering with here and there. But that’s the only after everything is else’s done and there are no excuses around anywhere. So
Trent Manning:
Yeah. I guess with resources comes responsibility,
John Patterson:
yeah,
Trent Manning:
but that’s okay. Give me the resources. I’ll take the responsibility.
John Patterson:
you go. I really liked this industry for the fact that every day is anything can happen day. It usually does. And the variety of it is, is something that I can’t stress enough to young people who are maybe thinking about this career. it is not in any way, shape or form assembly line work. yes, there are things when you, when you’re in your 15th cutting unit of the day or whatever, yeah, things do get a little monotonous one day, but generally speaking, the next day, you’re going to be on something totally different, or something we’ll we’ll come up. We had, you know, this morning I ground a half a dozen, greens cutting units that didn’t make it through the weekend. They didn’t pass inspection. So they had those to do first thing this morning, got those out of the way. Then I’ve got a hydraulic issue with a rental piece of equipment. Got that straightened out. Then I’m off to, you know, working on a backhoe loader. then I’m off to looking at an electrical issue. Then I’m back onto some cutting units. I ground the ground up a set of fairway, treading units this afternoon, then, um, onto my paperwork. And, you know, it’s just. You’re in and out of so many different things. when you look at the certificate program for crying out loud, we’ve got, you know, two-stroke Forrester or gas, diesel, electrical, hydraulic, and that’s also one of the reasons why I advocate so strongly for the professionalism in This business and the professional certification. because analogy, you know, with you go into an automotive shop, you might have an ASC certified drive line specialist. Who’s going to take out that transmission or work on that rear end or, or maybe he’s got a couple of certificates. he’s also, qualified on the breaks and things like that. What it’s very rare, really. when you look at most shops to have that ASE certified master who’s whose client, climate control, electronics, drive line, drivability, all these things, all these disciplines at an early age. and you know, now. Basically what we’re looking for as an equipment managers that ASE certified master, who is you know, and they don’t have the hydraulics really and automotive, they don’t have cutting units in automotive. They don’t have sprayers in the automotive, so can you come in, can you check calibration on a sprayer? Can you, you know, just to confirm that your, your pump on your valves are working correctly, can you do a nozzle check on it on a sprayer? Can you do a flow test on a, on a hydraulic pump? Can you, check a valve, electric over hydraulic manifold valve and check its operation? So, we can justify, the, the professional. if we focus on, attaining those, those, certificates, and I can’t wait for the sort of patient I’m on level one, level two, like I can’t wait for the certification.
Trent Manning:
This is right around the corner. So I don’t know the exact release date, but it’s coming.
John Patterson:
That’s good. That’s
Trent Manning:
we’re just finalizing the last few details on GCSF Hayes end, and then it will be rolling out. So,
John Patterson:
yeah. This is something since 2005, I’ve been really chomping at the bit for, you know, I was founding member of IGC. I’m a past president. I was actually the president of GC. And when we went out to, to Lawrence had that meeting said, okay, we’re going to merge with GCSA, but we have to move forward with. equipment manager certification. And here we are years later and I can’t I’m chomping at the bit
Trent Manning:
yeah.
John Patterson:
just chomping at the bit.
Trent Manning:
back to your point about the variety. Some I was thinking about while you’re talking about that, if you’re in the automotive industry and so you’re the engine guy. And Ford has I’m picking on four, cause I’m not a Ford guy, but for Ford has their certain side of engine problems. So you’re going to do 2,500 of those problems over and over and over and over again. You know what I mean?
John Patterson:
Yeah.
Trent Manning:
Because they know they have an issue. Maybe it’s warranty. Maybe it’s not, it depends on when it happens to you and how lucky you are. But we’ll just, I know a friend, I got a friend that works at a Ford dealership and I don’t remember the exact details, but he’s had to do in the last two years, probably 50 engine swaps and F150.
John Patterson:
Yeah.
Trent Manning:
I would think that would get pretty monotonous,
John Patterson:
Oh Yeah. Tab a and slot B all they long. That’s not for me
Trent Manning:
No, no. So yeah, this is great. This industry and the variety of. I love it. What would be your dream job? Her opportunity.
John Patterson:
Probably it will stay in my dreams, but someday I would like to have a well-equipped small. Where I can just tinker I’m hot rods and motorcycles and just do engine swaps and no real interest in getting into bodywork or anything, but, you know, suspension, fabrication and that kind of thing. really automotive has always been kind of my first love. And, I got out of automotive at a very early age when they were trying to get me to upsell service that cars didn’t need and stuff. And I was like, no, this isn’t for me. And, Then the industrial mechanics and then, you know, boats obviously didn’t work out. So here I am. but no, I think that’d be cool someday. You know, when I retire out of, out of here, we’ll say tomorrow’s my 59th birthday. So I’ve got
Trent Manning:
happy birthday.
John Patterson:
I’ve got a ways to go before retirement. so we’ll see maybe another 10 or 15 years.
Trent Manning:
Okay, awesome.
John Patterson:
We’ll see if I can make that happen.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Yeah. What technician would you like to work with for a day?
John Patterson:
You know, I think that I would like to fly to Melbourne Australia work with Luke spar Tallis at the Royal Melbourne flow for a day. When we were working with IGC and we had the forums going and stuff, he was posting some of the projects that he was doing and he shot, he was one of the first shops that I saw with a full blown machine shop. Basically. Uh, they have a full blown machine shop. They’re not just, a small hobby, lathe and a mill, and all the welding equipment and with the health and safety regulations that they have, everything has to be done just right. And, and it is, and I was just always taken aback with that and always kept that in mind. And I really liked the idea of going to Australia
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Hey, why not? Yeah. Why not? We’re dreaming here. So go far.
John Patterson:
You know, like take a what, a 16 hour flight to go spend a day and
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Yeah.
John Patterson:
out.
Trent Manning:
Well, I had a Matthew Cain on and he’s in Barbados and he built a machine shop inside his maintenance shop just because availability apart.
John Patterson:
Yup.
Trent Manning:
And when, when he orders parts, he has to order 50,000 at a time enough to load a container.
John Patterson:
that’s, that’s ridiculous of what those guys, they have to pay duty and all that. And just the taxes on things are incredible. What they have to do just to get there. The replacement parts. Yeah.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. Nuts. What do you know now? You wish you’d known on day one.
John Patterson:
I had no idea for a long time, what the, facing of the knives was doing to my cutting units and why one would look different than the other one. They were both, you know, fresh off the grinder matching real diameters and, uh, keep them bed night faces the same relative positions of the pivot, bolts and things like that. That’s, that’s something that the now, I mean, just in the past, few years really I’ve really gotten down to brass tacks and figured out. Not just how to do it for like tournaments and special occasions, but how to maintain at a higher level all the time. It just comes down to paying attention. I’m just measuring stuff all the time and not knowing now how that, that correlates. you know, now our rule of thumb in the shop, we always maintain real diameters within 25,000, you know, within sets or applications, whatever, all the Highlands course, greens reels for example, are within 25 thousands diameter. All the bed nights are. Now within about 20 thousands of reach from the pivot bolt for forward, any time a knife comes off of the knife grinder, I measure front to back and write it down on that knife. And we’re always using the longest knives as our swap outs, and we’re not letting them get mismatched. So now I know that I can put any two green smallness out on my main putting green, they’re going to look this. I’m not going to have difference in clipping yield. I’m not going to have a difference in look. you know, I can put any two out there. I don’t have to worry about Otay, take, you know, number three, it’s, you know, it’s fresh or whatever. it’s how we maintain them. And just, just keeping track, just paying attention to that stuff. It only takes, you know, five, 10 seconds to measure that knife and jot down the number on the, on the knife. So it really doesn’t cost you. It’s just paying attention all the time to what’s what’s going through and managing that cut line is, is king to the African appearance, the uniform after cut appearance. that we’re, that we’re after. So,
Trent Manning:
I don’t. How many, how many people do you think, or, or do you know anybody else that is managing cutline like you are, do you know of anybody else?
John Patterson:
No. I haven’t seen it.
Trent Manning:
No, I, I think you’re setting
John Patterson:
there, there probably is. I mean,
Trent Manning:
I mean, there
John Patterson:
think I’m terminally unique, but, but, I haven’t heard of it and it just occurred to me because, in shopping knives really, COVID for years and years I was a JRM guy and I’m still am, I’m still a fan of their products, but I couldn’t get them. I couldn’t get. And, I had to have inventory, green size are not something you can run out of in this business. I can’t, you know, I can’t justify that, you know, sorry we got a shaggy cut on the putting green because I didn’t get nice. No. So I got with deer and, I don’t know if it’s a new knife, but it’s a, um, I brought it up in that, in that presentation that you saw, but it’s a UC number. I don’t have it off the top of my head. Like I said, I’m getting old, but, I measured it up and it was within about 15,000. So the JRM knife is softer and it’s not as consistently straight. but it’s the best factory knife that I’ve found. That I’ve experienced. it seems like about every, I dunno, 10th one or so is a reject. it’s just too far out to grind straight, but they’re getting better. I think that they were getting kind of beat up rightfully so for, just how loose the tolerances are. yes, it does cost money to tighten up your tolerances, but not that much money. like I said, it doesn’t, it doesn’t cost anything to pay attention, to just measure the stuff that’s going out the door. I found out that these knives Are you know, within about 10,000 or 15,000, Front face to pivot bolt front to back, measurement. And so I been running with the deer knives, for the past couple of years now and learning to live with them, got to grind them a little bit more often, but don’t have to take any more off of them when I do grab them.
Trent Manning:
you thinking about going back to JRM?
John Patterson:
possibly, you know, we’ll see, this is, I like running my business where I take care of the people who take care of me. And it’s tough for me to go back to John Deere and ask for a favor if I’m buying my parts, any place possible, except for John Deere. You know what I mean?
Trent Manning:
Yeah.
John Patterson:
So I would, and they’re not out of line price. Really, you know, they’re right there with the JRM. Now I did get sticker shock when I bought my heart and, fairway names this last time, the price increases just outrageous. I remember when I was buying the, was it TCU? 5 31, the harden fairway knives from John Deere. I remember when I got upset when they went over a hundred dollars a piece, and now we’re almost $200 a piece
Trent Manning:
Wow.
John Patterson:
for those, uh, heart and insert knives, but running Zoysia, I’ve got to have them, you know, and I don’t know any place else that has anything comparable.
Trent Manning:
yeah. And parts across the board really
John Patterson:
Oh man.
Trent Manning:
new equipment. And honestly, I don’t know what we’re going to do,
John Patterson:
Yeah, we, we,
Trent Manning:
continues on at this rate.
John Patterson:
Yeah, we just started our fiscal year, April 1st and Lucas and I were in budget meetings and I said, all I can offer is a wild ass. Guess
Trent Manning:
yeah,
John Patterson:
you’ve seen the way fuel has gone up and down
Trent Manning:
yeah.
John Patterson:
we’re just got to take it as it comes, but we know that we have those fixed costs of oil filters, fuel filters, bed knives, bed knives, screws, tires, you know, rubber goods, belts tire. Those kinds of things, but we just got to get through it. And the membership has to know that we’re being as responsible as we can be. And we do host a walk-throughs, I’m expecting a walk through of our new finance committee, here pretty soon. And, you know, I, put everything out there. I’ve got everything on limbal up on the big screen in the shop and I showed them, you know, we’re keeping track of where all their money is going, so they can have confidence knowing that we aren’t just buying chrome-plated widgets or whatever.
Trent Manning:
yeah.
John Patterson:
I tried going just in time delivery on, things like my, filter stock and things like that. Shipping costs started beating me up. So I just, you know, I just go ahead and buy case quantities now look for sales. So,
Trent Manning:
Yeah, mostly OEM
John Patterson:
yup.
Trent Manning:
filters and that kind of
John Patterson:
Yup. Again, getting back to that, you know, you know, and the hope is that the Morrison loss act or whatever, you can put any filter on it, and not void your warranty. but like having them see that. Yeah. all these filters. Yeah. I did go out the door and, uh, I like to think it helps with my, residual value of my fleet when it comes time to turn over the lease, where they have high confidence that the, all the maintenance was done, because they sold us. They, they, you know, they, they saw it go out the door.
Trent Manning:
Yeah. And for the most part, when it comes to filters and barons and that kind of stuff, they’re usually pretty though. OEM is usually pretty competitive
John Patterson:
Yeah. Yeah. It’s just not worth it. Like I say, you know, like if there’s ever a time when I, I call up and I really need something from, I’ve been giving them the business and, you know, they’re more inclined to stay late or whatever that. doesn’t happen very often. But if it ever does, I like to know that, we’ve got that relationship, right.
Trent Manning:
For sure. What’s some of the latest tips and tricks you wanna share with us,
John Patterson:
About two years ago, we, upgraded our, lubrication, handling. we got the bulk oil tanks and we got a couple of nice roll around drains and stuff. Where prior to that, they’ve been keeping the, all the oils and 55 gallon drums and carrying buckets of oil around and stuff. So we got really, really efficient with putting the oil in to equipment with the digital readout, handles and that, and that’s been such a time saver for us. And one of the, I saw this tip a long time ago and I, I don’t know, I don’t remember where it was posted. I, I think it might’ve been on turf test. Somebody took a shop vac and rigged up an old hydraulic cap, on the end of a shop vac hose. And actually it sucked too hard. So he actually had to drill like a half inch hole in the side of the, of the nozzle to, to help event. But when he put that vacuum on the top of the hydraulic tank, he could change that hydraulic filter without lugging out a bunch of hydraulic oil off the bottom. Well, we got these new roll around drains and hearing. I got one that has a fluid evacuator built in. So I’ve got a vacuum supply there and it turns out if you use a, they’ve got the, it’s a silicone plug that you put in, tubing, to back purge with Oregon. But there’s a couple of those sizes that fit the top of our hydraulic tanks. Really good. So I hooked that up to a fluid evacuator and applied vacuum to the hydraulic tank. So that way,
Trent Manning:
Okay.
John Patterson:
and, uh, and that it just works slick as can be you hardly lose a drop when you crack that filter’s loose. You actually hear it. Sucking a little air. You do want to make sure that you clean off the area around. So you don’t suck you in any third. Uh, that’s a pretty cool, trick. It keeps from making such a big mess. I did get one of those big humongous roll around, drains that we use underneath the tractors and stuff. And I like using that
Trent Manning:
Hm.
John Patterson:
under anything. That’s going to be messy because it’s got a big enough surface area that it’s kind of, it’s going to, catch whatever you drop and it’s got a screen on it. So I kind of lose something forever down in
Trent Manning:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well then, so when you had the LPGA tournament, I came by and, uh, Mike was over there too, but I took one picture while I was over at your shop and it was of the fluid evacuator and I bought, and I bought one in February and I love that. It is so awesome.
John Patterson:
It is so cool. It is so cool. I do like to still crack the drain plug every once in a while, just in case there’s any sludge or anything built up on the bottom of the case, but nine times out of 10, that’s going to do it for you. And there’s so many uses for it. You know, somebody makes a mistake and puts the wrong fuel in something. If we can catch them at the pump and go out and evacuate the stuff out of the tank and no harm, no foul, but you know, as soon as they fire it up and it’s all it’s all over for.
Trent Manning:
Yeah.
John Patterson:
But yeah, there’s so many uses for those fluid evacuators.
Trent Manning:
Yes. It’s super handy. Well, I had the Mati back before, you know, you gotta pump it. Um, you know, it works. Okay. But this is the Cadillac now we’re dealing with. Yes. All right. What else do you want to talk about?
John Patterson:
Oh, I don’t know. Cutting. It means,
Trent Manning:
Let’s do it. Let’s do it.
John Patterson:
oh man. Oh, I just, I just feel very strongly and I know that now we’re getting, and thank you so much, Trent, for what you’re doing with this podcast. I know that we’re getting a lot of crossover now. A lot of superintendents are listening to the podcast and, it’s open and you know, the communication both ways more. And I just, I can’t emphasize enough how, focusing on the most important things in the shop, which I believe are the cutting units next to the chemicals. because I have seen that, sheer panic, cold sweats of a superintendent when they’re, they’re facing a really wicked disease outbreak. And then that relief when they get a curate about, with, uh, with a sprayer. So, but when it comes to, the things that we do every day and things that the membership sees every day, it’s cutting it maintenance. So the results of cutting it at maintenance. And whenever I have groups come through the shop, I have board members come for tours and, and like I say, golf committee members, finance committee, I make the point that we are a cutting unit maintenance facility and we also do preventive maintenance on turf equipment. but I show that about 75% of our labor is spent on cutting units in some form or fashion. And that’s where I believe it should be. it has the most positive impact on turf health playability, aesthetics, on and on. And the benefits are huge. And I’ve seen so many shops where it seems like cutting unit maintenance is this dreaded thing. This thing that, you know, the grinders look atrocious, nobody’s cleaning. Anything forever when it’s you you’re grinding equipment is the most important. I don’t care what color it is underneath all that junk. it’s the most important machine in the shop, and keep it up and put money into the program. over my career, I’ve had the best luck and the most impact, putting the most energy into the things I do most often, or that have the highest value. So if I have, you know, X, Y, Z tasks to do well, let’s focus on that and let’s see how we can streamline it, streamline the procedures and things like that. That’s where the modification to the, mow and go trailers. Cutting the top off of the, of the side hooks and tilting those mowers back the mowers never come off. deck, unless they are outmoded, they don’t come off with a trailer in the shop at all. And, we’re much more efficient with our checkouts. you know, we can check out a full run for us, which is, you know, six walking mowers, greens mowers on each course. Of course, we’ve got one course down right now for, uh, rebuilding, the Riverside course, but we’ll run six walk mowers out on each set of greens, for walking Timor’s, 1, 2, 3, 4 specialty mowers, the collar mowers, par three Walker, things like that. So you can get through all those in about, an hour, hour and a half on the checkouts, and they’re all done and fueled up and ready to go for the next day. And then you can concentrate and if something doesn’t pass inspection, then you’re swapping out a cutting unit and keeping your stop rotated. so you’re
Trent Manning:
Swap it out on the trailer.
John Patterson:
yep. Yep. You can use the, uh, the sip roll around lift and just come up, hook up the I’ve got a hitching post where I hook up the trailer and then you just come up in front and take the weight off of the cuttings. And this is two 20 EAs. the Toro set up would be a little bit of a trick, on the trans pro. but with a John Deere, two 20 on the back on a, uh, on a and go, it’s just really slick. You’re never lifting cutting unit and you can swap one out and five minutes. So,
Trent Manning:
That’s awesome.
John Patterson:
yeah. So, but yeah, That’s just what I would tell anybody who will listen is to review your cutting unit maintenance operation, and strongly consider putting more resources into that operation, whether it is, swap out sets of cutting units, whether it is, just. The room necessary to do the job. and just focus on the things that you do most often, which is inspecting your cutting units after every use cutting unit, a swap outs, grinding knives, grinding, grinding rails.
Trent Manning:
Hmm.
John Patterson:
so.
Trent Manning:
I did see one thing. And in my travels here recently that I should already told you about, so I apologize ahead of time, but it’s on. And I think these are, I don’t remember if they were the flex, had the ears or the fixed head, but it shouldn’t matter. They had, um, made a little bar that attached the bale to the traction. So to engage it, all you had to do was mashed the bail and then to release it, you release the bail.
John Patterson:
Hm.
Trent Manning:
And I thought that was pretty, pretty slick set up. and I don’t think I took a picture of it, but I could get you a picture. I know, I know
John Patterson:
That’s interesting,
Trent Manning:
Yeah. If you’re interested in doing something like that, and I think the main reason they did it is their operators were used to operate and Jake walked behind and that’s why the Jaguar,
John Patterson:
Yeah. They’ve got the variable speed on the bail. No,
Trent Manning:
so anyway, something to think about, you ready for some rapid fire?
John Patterson:
sure. Lay it. on me.
Trent Manning:
What’s your favorite movie?
John Patterson:
Blazing saddles
Trent Manning:
Classic. It’s a classic. Yeah. What would be your last meal?
John Patterson:
New York strip. Medium rare. Loaded baked potato green beans and strawberry shortcake for dessert.
Trent Manning:
Love it. What are you most proud of?
John Patterson:
Oh my sanity.
Trent Manning:
Okay. That’s fair enough. Are you still fine?
John Patterson:
Um, relative my relative sanity, there was, I went through a period of my life back in my, late twenties, early thirties, where I wasn’t really sure if I was going to see 40 or not. and just keep putting one foot in front of another and keep on keeping on. And here we are,
Trent Manning:
Turn into the next day, tomorrow
John Patterson:
59.
Trent Manning:
59.
John Patterson:
Dope don’t pile on now. Don’t pile on. But no, it’s, uh, of course, of course I’m proud of my, my wife and my son and, my career and the people that are near and dear to me and you know who you are. but I’m really proud of keeping my perspective, my, even keel most of the time and my positive outlook. it’s a great day today. It’s more than likely you’re going to be a great day tomorrow. And, I may have to work my tail off, but. That hasn’t killed me yet. I you know, as well as I do do whatever you need to do as an equipment manager in this business from mucking out the wash rack to busting tires, to whatever comes in the door, you know, the buck stops here. So, no, it’s, it’s a good place to be.
Trent Manning:
I remember changing the pump and our gray water tank at the shop and July one year. And after I did that, I did, I asked Courtney if maybe next time we could sub that out. So luckily I hadn’t, hadn’t had to get back in there in a while, but the pump hadn’t went out either. So I’ll probably be the guy. So. but you’re exactly right. I mean, we, we do what we gotta do. And honestly, I know me personally, I like being that guy. I want to be the go-to guy.
John Patterson:
No
Trent Manning:
If you need something done, I want somebody to come to me and I’m going to get it done some one way or another.
John Patterson:
exactly.
Trent Manning:
It was definitely very, uh, rewarding that way. We’ll tell the listeners how they can get ahold of you.
John Patterson:
Well, I’m on Twitter at the JPS turf. I don’t do Facebook. I do have, a blog page, JPS turf, that blogspot.com hasn’t been updated in a long time. That’s one of those things. Um, you. know, anytime I do something on social media, anytime I make a post on Twitter and you know, I really feel good about doing it. I just don’t never think to do it. I, you know, I’ve got about a half a dozen things. I’m like, oh, I should put that on my blog. I just never think to do it. So, and people can always email me. JRP uh, AAC, one dot orgy. that’s my go-to email. And, that’s basically that
Trent Manning:
thank you, John so much. It’s been a blast.
John Patterson:
you’re welcome. It’s been fun. It’s been good to talk to you.
Trent Manning:
yeah, yeah, no. Good, good catching up with you. And I know we’ve talked over the years and I’ve been by your shop and, but this was a lot of fun to really pick your brain on some of this stuff. And I asked the normal questions too,
John Patterson:
Yeah,
Trent Manning:
and thank you for everything you’ve you’ve done for our industry. Getting RG SEMA, one of the founding members that is impressive. Um, you helped write some of the tasks questions for EMCP.
John Patterson:
yeah, I was, I was around for, the first, I don’t know, maybe two thirds of level one, and then I had to get out, I had other stuff going on and I was like, it’s time for other people to take the reins, man. I’ve just been going for a long time. So,
Trent Manning:
yeah, no. And
John Patterson:
thank you too, man. Right back at you, you, I mean, you’ve been, you’ve been a part of that in a major way and pushing, pushing forward. So.
Trent Manning:
well, that’s all we’re trying to do here at real turf tax podcast is promote this industry and promote all the wonderful people that work in it, and hopefully put a little more money in their pockets
John Patterson:
Roger that.
Trent Manning:
and dislike. You were saying at a golf course, they’re trying to hire a master tech. They’re going to have to Patty for a master.
John Patterson:
Yeah. You know, you can’t, and that’s one of the neat things about the certificate and certification program is, you know, and that’s where we started with IGC EMA. You can’t just stamp your feet and say, I’m worth more money. You have to be able to show it and you have to be able to carry yourself professionally and show that you have the skills and the commitment to this industry to, to warrant the competence.
Trent Manning:
Yep.
John Patterson:
And that’s, that’s where, that’s where our bosses are coming from. Whether anybody likes it or not, you know, they’re like, Hey, you know, put up or shut up.
Trent Manning:
exactly. Well, thank you.
John Patterson:
thank you. Trump.
Trent Manning:
Hope you enjoyed hearing from John. So much. Bond catching up with him. And I don’t go seem near enough. Super smart person. Joy to be around. Can you say anything bad about the guy? And I also want to thank him for all he’s done for this industry. Going all the way back to his work. I G SEMA, which now has resulted in the AMCP. And CTM. Tam. I also think it’s important. John’s point about maintaining a perspective. And mental health. With all the stuff that we face. On a day-to-day basis. What a great mantra. It was a great day to day. And more than likely it will be a great day tomorrow. Who’s excited about It’s launched. It’s finally here. We’ve been working on this for so long. And I really can’t believe it. I’m glad it’s here. I hope everybody’s just as excited as I am about it. I hope you’re trying to get levels one and level two of the EMCP completed. And get your application in for CTM. And if you need any help. Call Diana Kern. At GCSA. And she can tell you everything. That you need to know. So you can send you the scoring rubric. To help you prepare. And feel free to reach out to any of us that are already CTMS. And we’d be glad to help you out any way we can. This is a great, great time for our industry. And I’m glad we’re here to see it. Until next time. See you. Bye. thank you so much for listening to the real turf techs podcast. I hope you learned something today. Don’t forget to subscribe. If you have any topics you’d like to discuss, or you’d like to be a guest, find us on Twitter at real turf techs.