Assiniboine instructor, alum and longtime supporter donates $95K in agricultural parts

An influx of donated combine equipment parts will benefit Assiniboine Community College students studying in the Heavy Duty and Ag Equipment Technician programs, and one of their instructors, Lloyd Carey, is to thank.

When Lloyd looked at the online auction list for the closing of Harvest Salvage in fall 2019, he saw many items that could benefit the college.

“Knowing from being in industry what some of the stuff was worth, I thought it was a good opportunity to acquire it,” said Lloyd, Heavy Duty Equipment and Ag Equipment Technician instructor at Assiniboine.

From his auction purchases Lloyd donated agricultural parts valued at over $95,000—mainly a variety of combine hydraulic and hydrostatic pumps and motors that will be used directly by the students he teaches, though not in the parts of the program he touches.

“I teach mostly electrical component stuff, so the actual stuff I donated, I probably won’t actually touch in class…but it’s all part of the same program.”

Along with being a faculty member at Assiniboine, Lloyd received his journeyman Heavy Duty Equipment Technician certification following his studies at the college in 1994. He is also in his first term as the faculty representative on the college’s Board of Governors.

No stranger to supporting the college, Lloyd has been a champion of in-kind donations to trades programming for many years, even prior to his employment with Assiniboine.

“After I got my journeyman certificate, I ended up working for MacDon Industries in Winnipeg. I guess that’s kind of where I got the idea that we can donate stuff to the college, because working at MacDon we would sometimes donate pallets of parts that were destined for the scrap bin.”

These items were no longer marketable, but still useful for training, so Lloyd put a bug in the ear of his supervisors and when they had service vehicles in the Brandon area, they’d deliver the parts to Assiniboine.

I knew that the stuff was used here and used well. It’s not like the parts come in and they get left collecting dust. They do get put to good use with the classes.

“It’s almost better sometimes for students if they take something apart and they can figure out ‘Oh, that’s what was wrong with this?’”

He admits that in the Harvest Salvage auction, he also acquired some parts for his personal use.

“I have a shop at home and I dabble a bit with farming so I am always looking for something. Out of the auction, I also bought an engine for one of my tractors.

In much of his spare time, you can find Lloyd in his automotive shop that he calls a “hobby turned into a business”, fixing up cars, trucks and tractors for his customers or working on the ‘99 to ‘03 Volkswagens he is continually keeping an eye out for.

“I have a bit of a Volkswagen problem. My wife thought there were 20 around home right now, maybe more.”

Of these many vehicles, he said, it may take the parts of several to make one running vehicle, much like he did with his current car, which is made up of a Volkswagen he bought on the cheap and an engine from a car he purchased at a write-off auction.

One of his more prized Volkswagen acquisitions was a rare Volkswagen Rabbit Pickup that was recently rented by a crew filming an Amazon television series out of Morden.

Lloyd is a father of three, with a school-age son, a daughter who just graduated high school and also drives a Volkswagen, and a 22-year-old son.

“My youngest boy is a real gear-head too—he loves tinkering around with stuff.”

Lloyd’s unique mix of learning and teaching at Assiniboine, and ongoing industry experience has shown him the opportunity for industry involvement in trades education. Outside of his most recent large-scale $95,000 donation, he has regularly donated core transmissions and other parts as they become available in his shop.

Look at what you’ve got sitting around that maybe you can’t sell or market and consider giving us a call to see if it’s something we could use or want,” said Lloyd. “There’s some good stuff that happens when industry gets involved.