Marietta High School junior Brody Bazor, the 16-year-old son of Josh and Amanda
Bazor, was named grand champion in the ag mechanics division at the Oklahoma Youth
Expo, held March 8 through 20 at the state fairgrounds complex in Oklahoma City.
OYE provides an opportunity for Oklahoma’s FFA and 4-H members to showcase their
agricultural projects. This year’s show entries exceeded 30,000 from more than 7,000
exhibitors across the state. All 77 counties were represented in an event that throws
kids from schools of all sizes into one melting pot to see who rises to the top.
In the ag mechanics division, Bazor competed against more than 300 entries to show
the competition who was best. He earned a $1,500 check, assorted tools, and bragging
rights in the form of a traveling trophy that he’ll keep until next year’s show comes
around.
Brody is one of those kids who’s a little hard to read. To say he doesn’t wear his feelings
on his sleeve is an understatement.
“He really doesn’t let a lot of emotion show, but since I’m his dad, I could tell that he was
super excited,” said Josh. “That was a real big smile on his face.”
Brody’s project is one that’s difficult to understand for a lot of folks, much less to build
from scratch – which just goes to show what a unique kid he is.
He fabricated a firewood processor. It’s made up of different systems that basically take
logs, cut them into equal lengths with a hydraulic saw, then send them to a splitter that
will push out precisely sized hunks of ready-to-use firewood.
Most people – at least those who know what they’re doing – can process a rick of
firewood in two or three hours. The machine will do it in 20 to 25 minutes, a substantial
savings of time and sweat since the user pulls a hydraulic lever and the processor does
all the labor.
The Bazors had spoken in the past about purchasing one, but the price tag of $60 to
$70 thousand put the devices out of their price range.
“We had talked before about how you could build one substantially cheaper, and Brody
had even talked about making that his senior project,” recalled Josh.
Then last summer, the duo decided to take a little road trip and see if it was doable.
They went to Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa and visited factories where the wood
processors are fabricated.
“They took him on a tour and showed him the process so he could get some ideas
about how to go about building one,” said Josh.
What Brody didn’t see was a blueprint.
For Brody, that was the hardest part – building a system made up of separate
processors and doing it with nothing more than pictures and an idea of what the final
product should do. But that didn’t stop him from jumping in with both feet.
“To be able to sit and look at something like that and then figure out how to make it
happen, that was his biggest challenge,” explained Josh. “There were plenty of stops
and starts, of putting something together and then figuring out it won’t work because this
is in the way of that, or this has to happen before that, and to have to back up and start
all over again. It was tough.”
The judges at OYE, along with those from other shows where Brody has exhibited his
processor, are wildly impressed at the complexity of the project. Obviously, it’s not
something that the average teenager is going to take on.
To have the kind of tenacity it takes to complete something like that at 16 – it’s pretty
remarkable. By the time Brody arrived at a finished product that worked like it should,
the investment in materials was approximately $11,000, a hefty price tag, but one that’ll
pay for itself in increased production and decreased labor.
Even more impressive is the investment of time – roughly 260 hours from start to finish.
There are some valuable lessons to be learned in designing, building, troubleshooting,
and completing anything that takes that long. Can I get an amen?
If you’re impressed by the younger Mr. Bazor, you’re not alone. After winning at OYE
and collecting his check and trophy, which by the way is named after one of his dad’s
mentors, Brody’s tour around OKC continued. There was the OYE Grand Drive, a
limousine ride and laser light show with the other OYE winners. Additionally, he was
recognized on the House and Senate floors at the state capital.
Championship tour completed, Bazor returned home, where he and the rest of his ag
mechanics buddies prepared to hit the road again and head south for some more big
shows. There they’ll have the opportunity to see how their projects stack up against the
Texas kids.
Next after Texas?
I imagine Brody will start trying to figure out how in the world he’s going to produce
something that can top this.