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| I don't recall posting these before but KelB's Sugercane post made me want to share with you guys. These are a few videos I shot of our grape harvest this year. The blue Korvan is my friends machine and the yellow Gregorie is another friends who is harvesting one of my vineyards. http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y33/Robert_in_NY/?action=view¤t=004-1.flv http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y33/Robert_in_NY/?action=view¤t=MarkMartainsharvester020.flv http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y33/Robert_in_NY/MarkMartainsharvester025.jpg |
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South Plains of Texas | How many acres do you have? Also how much does a Gregorie cost? I didn't know they made a pull type grape harvestor. My brother has 50 acres of grapes. |
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Slicker than a Yes album. | Are these for eating, raisins or wine? |
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| The Korvan costs $220 new and I am not sure what the Gregorie pull type cost. The self powered unit is about the same if not more then the Korvan. I currently have 10 acres of grapes but am in talks with another to buy his 50 acres which will be plenty for me to take care of without hiring any help. |
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| These grapes are Concords and Niagara's which go to Welches and Cliffstar for grape juice, jams, jellies and anything else. They are great for eating also but are the seed variety so not as desireable as a table grape. |
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East of Dowagiac Michigan | 10 years ago I worked 4 seasons for a farm that had 2 Chisholm-Ryder OW harvesters (IH 574 hydro with 6' lift kit, mid 70's machines) we picked into lined boxes that went to the Welch plant on a flatbed.
Do they still have to have a sh*t picker (bin attendant)? I don't see a place for one. |
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| There are still plenty of Chisholm Ryders around here. The guy who owns the Korvan still owns his older Chisholm Ryder for harvesting his double curtains. The lady driving it is my fiance and it is her dad that owns the Korvan also. 
For the most part the newer machines pick cleaner and clean the garbage better then the Chisholms ever dreamed. You do not need a crap picker on these new machines. However, when we ran the Chisholm we needed to have a guy on the harvester picking sticks and such out of the conveyer as the side dump boxes don't have a spot for anyone to stand. Most of the guys still use lined boxes like you are use to but the bigger guys changed to side dump wagons which hold 4 ton at a time. Two wagons replace 3-4 tractors with bins and there is no messing around changing bins. The side dumps can dump into bins still (you need to level the boxes off by hand though but it is still faster) but to really take advantage of the side dumps you need to go with bulk boxes. The guy who owns the Korvan has three flatbeds with 2 bulk bins on each. Each bulk bin holds 12-13 ton and the processors are set up to dump these bins (they are side dump bins also). |
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| Your fiance looks like she's got a pretty big smile on her face. Those things must be fun to drive on the roads. Must get a lot of funny looks! How's your back, anyway? Am I right remembering you had a back problem for a while? |
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| This was the first time she has drove the harvester and was smiling because my daughter was out waving to her. I am in the F-250 following. We get more strange looks driving a combine around here because they are kind of rare as this is grape country. Harvesters are common place on the roads September thru early November. My back is strong again and the repair seems to be holding up great. I can do just about everything I could before I was hurt but now I have more pain and a few other serious problems related to my damaged L1 vertebre. Thanks for asking. |
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Sumner GA, Located in southwest GA, | So these would be labeled processing? Would assume table grapes wouldn't be able to handle the abuse of machine harvest.
Also, it looks as if the pull type picker is being pulled with a tractor on 60" spacing instead of a narrow tractor, or am I seeing things. Interesting videos non the less. |
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| Yes, these are all for processing. The harvester knocks the berries off the stems so you have mainly broken berries going into the bin. The machines are designed to keep almost all of the juice going with the berries so you don't lose the juice. Table grapes need the stems. Case-IH didn't have a proper narrow tractor for a while so the CX pulling the Gregorie is basically a plain CX with very narrow tires set as tight as possible. That tractor would not be able to run thru double curtains though as it is way too wide. |
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Grape harvest videos
