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west central illinois | http://www.tractorhouse.com/listingsdetail/detail.aspx?OHID=6921473& We bought some large square bales of hay and I like handleing and storing them better than the round bales, but Their arent but 2 of the big square balers in this area and none are close by. I was wondering about buying one of the cheaper ones to do our own and maybe some custom baling also. Would the one above be good? If not what are the ones to look at or stay away from. Also is their a lot more maitance to these than a small square or round balers? I have been around both of the other types but not one of these any advice would be greatly appreciated. Also how much horsepower does it take to run one?
Edited by emtbd1979 6/19/2012 20:10
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NW Washington | In your neck of the woods getting hay dry enough to store well in large square balers can be a real issue. http://www.cattlenetwork.com/cattle-news/latest/Dont-let-your-hay-p...
I am sure Hesston or MF now is the most popular large square baler. I'll save the details for the real owners and operators.
Edited by JohnW 6/19/2012 19:56
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EC IL | I bleed green but that is definitely one piece of green equipment to stay away from. There are several here in the Arthur area, all various shades of red. A couple Case IH, a couple New Hollands and at least one Hesston. |
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Oxford County, ON | Run fast and far from a JD square baler! It depends on how flat your fields are, but we ran large square balers behind a JD4450 for over 10 years. We had a JD for 2 years, actually 2 different machines because the first one was so terrible (the 2nd machine wasn't much better), then ran a NH BB940 for 7 years. We now have a 4 year old Massey (Hesston) 2150 and it will bale circles around the NH. Last Friday and Saturday I baled 1000 bales for 8 different customers with only 2 misties and a broken flywheel shearbolt. And the misties were from switching twine balls.
The majority of used machines *here* come from custom guys and are fairly worn. If you find a good one, they should last quite a while, but they do require a fair amount of maintenance. If you look at used, check the bale chamber where the plunger ends its stroke and the plunger roller track for excessive wear. This will indicate bearing issues. Short of gearbox or computer failure, most things can be fixed or replaced if you are willing to pay for the parts. |
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west central illinois | I have a new holland dealer close and a case IH, Hesston and massey are about 50 miles away. What numer of case ih would be good and not too old? How many bales would be a lot for one of these balers. I have seen some advertised that had 40,000 on them.
Edited by emtbd1979 6/19/2012 21:09
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Northeast CO |
I would go for an 8590, although an 8580 would be OK too. I would want at least 150 horse on one. A hesston 4900/4910 is the same as a Case 8580/8590. For quite a few years hesston/case had an agreement and hesston built their balers, you can get hesston parts at a case dealer. If its been well maintained I wouldn't be afraid of one with 40K bales, but it also depends how many bales a year you plan on doing. |
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Woodham, Ontario | Just went through a similar process. Bought a New Holland BB960A Rotocut with 24,000 bales. I think you'll be happy with any New Holland or Hesston Baler. Case balers used to be built by hesston and now by NH. NH is way more common around here and our local NH dealer had the one we bought. Made some hay last week and works well so far. |
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East central Indiana | Don't buy Deere we have one and would love to let it go. Dad is hardcore Deere though. Nh or case or Massey is the way to go. Deere is cheap and does all right but if you have better options go with it. We pull ours with an 8320 with front duals it does fine. When you stop and idle down it will make the tractor lope at the rhythm of the plunger |
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Embarrass WI | I was in your shoes about 5 years ago. I ended up buying a CIH 8575(same as Hesston 4755) that had been traded in by a guy who did custom baling. The pickup had already been rebuilt, I had a good mechanical guy helping me at the time and we completely rebuilt it over one winter, I had about $3500 worth of parts from Maize Corp. Re-did the bale chamber, rebuilt the knotters, worked on the stuffer, etc. etc. Supposedly my baler had 32K bales, but he did do some cornstalk baling. Stalks are VERY hard on balers, lotza dirt.
Now it should be good for my 500-1000 bales/year. I would do it again, 'here', it is a real challenge to get a custom guy to show up when you need him. The guys who did a good job got sick of the BS and went to just raising grain. |
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west central illinois | I won't be doing a bunch I doubt. There isn't anyone around here that does any custom baling with one,everyone does round bales but I have heard guys talking that they would rather store the big squares so if there is intrest I thought it might be something to do for extra income and plus do our own but Like I said I'm kind of just thinking out loud at the moment. There might not be enough custom work here to even mess with it but I don't know for sure yet. |
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Southern Indiana | We run a MF 2160 (I think thats the right number). Its the same as a Hesston or Challenger. 6 strings can hold lots more tension than a 5 stringer. We have had a problem with the hydraulics overheating until we installed bale chamber "grippers" that kept the bale from working the chamber every plunger revolution. The monitor is simple but it does have silly symbols. All in all it is a beast with the "pre chamber" and auto luber for the knotters that really works. I would take one over any other color but I don't bale 10,000 bales a year either. Our 3 by 4 will make our Case IH 3594 thats turning 230 pto hp pant! |
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| Just my personal opinion, but no baler is better than the Hesston design (be it from case or whomever). We've ran them all, and the Hesstons edge them all out in every category that counts. The older 'mechanical' ones are pretty simple to maintain (not as simple as a round baler I suppose) unless they are completely worn out. If there are no other big squares around you, you can almost certainly pick up some custom baling; there are a number of advantages to square bales, the biggest probably being shipping, which is becoming more important again in the hay business.
We ran a Lot of hay through a JD100 (and a few years on a JD110 too), but it has some real design flaws. It is literally a scaled up small baler, which is not effective for making that heavy of a bale.
Get the 'newest' (least amount of honest bales) one you can afford, fix anything thats too worn out, and it will probably outlive you.
I'd like to second the Maize corporation too. They have been a Very important resource for us for many years now. I try to use our local Hesston dealer as much as I can, but Maize has always outclassed them in pretty much every aspect. Quality service outfit in my opinion. |
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SEON | Hayhauler - 6/19/2012 21:06
I would go for an 8590....
IIRC a 8590 is a 4x4 baler and I wouldn't use it for hay. The bales are too heavy and the larger the bale, the more likely you will have mold issues etc. We use ours for straw only.
We have a 4x4 Hesston, a 3x3 Hesston, two 4x3 Case LBX's (431 and a 432 model) and a 3x3 Case (Lbx 332 roto cut). The 332 will do approx one 850 lbs a minute if the conditions are right. I drive the 332 the most and I take care of it pretty well. It has 30,000 8 ft bales on it and haven't really spent that much money in repairs. Driveshaft, PTO yoke, tines and pickup bands here and there. The LBX 431 also has 30,000 bales and it's needed more repairs but alot of that is operator. I have another recent post about custom rates that sorta itemizes the cost. We use a '03 MX150 to pull it. If I was to buy one baler, it would be a 4x3 size. 30% fewer bales to pick up and at ~1100 lbs they are still managable. |
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Transplanted to New Mexico | There is a reason JD is not still making large square balers... they sucked at it... worse machines that every came out of them.. And I bleed green for my small balers, tractors and swathers.. I am one of those evil custom guys that has no ground for himself yet, I am always on time... one think I can tell you about the custom business is if you do not show up on time you will not be making the next cutting here... And remember, not sure there but here I have to charge sales tax as it is a service just like the coop spraying one more thing you have to keep up with. My CPA knows I am looking at buying a farm and has strongly suggested keeping the two separate..
Edited by jrcrumii 6/20/2012 02:09
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WCNY | It was my understanding that krone made the john deere 100 for Deere. Would have thought it would have been a better baler but it appears not. I went with a new Holland 590 c first, it was a lemon to say the least.honestly some of the problems were self induced. But regardless I would stay away from that series. I then went with a lbx 331 cih same thing as the 590 c but beefed up in the right areas. I was doing about 2/3 rds alfalfa balage 1/3 rd Timothy dry. Would stay with a Heston cih new Holland with the double knot per bale system. If you have tying issues look at the twine guide rollers if there is any catch or hesitation in the bearing replace it.
Good luck.
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west central illinois | Thanks for the advice guys. Also some of our hay fields have some pretty steep hills. Will theses balers handle running on the sides of slides very well? |
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WCNY | ran on some lose site of radiator cap fields with ih 5088 no problems. |
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Northeast CO | If you are doing real steep hills its a good idea to have a pretty heavy tractor in front, they can push pretty good. |
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Just thinking out loud. Tell me about big square balers
