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SCIA | What is the opinion of FD owners. We have fairly flat to rolling ground, which one will work the best. Looking at 35 footers as here 40 seems a stretch. 30 foot auger heads seem to run out of flex and contour speed through areas. Was looking only at MACDON, but local Deere dealer says that they have a 635FD available.
TIA,
Tiler |
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| 35ft JD Flex Draper does a better job hands down. |
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southern edge of central illinois | Can't comment on the Deere, we have a 35' macdon. It's about the most impressive piece of machinery
we have bought. The amount of shatter is hard to believe. We are flat too. Can't believe the Deere
could be better. I'm sure the color blind crowd might tell you otherwise though. |
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Flora IL | the mac's reel can run alot closer to the cutterbar than deere.... macdon's done this for a long time too so thats a plus.. good luck im sure you will be happy with what you get. |
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MN | Have you owned/been around both motoman? Or do you work for a John Deere dealership- |
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central Indiana | if you are talking flex get the video of the demo Deere put on last year at the new S series combines on the west side of indpls . Pretty dramatic video of the difference |
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South Western Ontario, Canada | I haven't run a new deere head so I'm a little bias.
I have run Macs for years and think they are one of the best heads available.
I like the concept of the deere. The two belts per side really doesn't sit well with us.
We will wait a few years and see how the deeres hold up. That will be the true test. |
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SCIA | From your comment, it sounds like you are happy with the durability of the MACDON. Are they expensive to run? We have a few rocks and some times have to deal with drift wood in the bottoms if they flood. How many guards and sickle sections do you break in a season?
Thanks,
Tiler |
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Central Ohio | I admit that about everything we own is green but we have run Macs for four years and had tried the green prototype two years ago and the current production model last fall. Bought new Macs again this year to put on our new green combines. I tell everyone that if you had an auger head before, you will like the Deere. If you ran a Mac before, you will not be happy with the Deere. Flat to slight roll here also. |
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central Indiana | you are a moron sorry, but I call bs. east central IN ran both, Macdon
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Flora IL | weve ran mac's for 8 years now and no they are not expensive to keep up.. as long as you keep them adjusted.. the fd70 model is alot better typically you can set it and be fine threw the year.. the sections will handle 2-3'000 acres where it seemed like the 1020 heads sections would need changed about after 1,000 acres
They hydraulic driven cutterbar is nice.. i hit a ground rod one time with a 1020 head and it wrecked the head... hit one with the draper last year and didn't even break the section lol... sure liked that.. the guards are well made and not a issue.. only broken or messed up a couple in all that time..
Don't really know what else to tell ya.. except you will really like them..especially in a year like this with short beans... drapers will pay for themselves in bad years... |
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Shelbina, Missouri (NEMO) | I've been trying to get our Deere dealer to bring their demo draper out to let us run it side by side with our MacDon for 2 years now. For some reason they want absolutely no part of it... The MacDon works GREAT for us.
Bill |
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Husker Country | What advantage does the Mac have over the Deere? The only Mac I have seen cut was a 45 footer on a newer Lexion it might not have been set properly (the customer just drives) I was not impressed with how it cut in hills. But I would be comparing it to a 35 foot head. |
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| I didn't know macdon had a draper with a flex cutter bar. I know some pivot in the middle but unless the cutter bar flexes it wouldn't work very well in steep hills and terraces that we have... |
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SW Iowa | I've never seen a Deere head work. I suspect that there will be a trail of beans between the outer belt and the second belt. On our MacDon we had head loss where the outer belts dump into the middle belt. A seed saver kit solved the problem. I don't see how anything will fill the gap between the outer belts of the Deere.
Michael |
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southern edge of central illinois | Mmiller- couldn't agree more. We looked at the deere at FPS last year and couldn't believe
that gap between belts. Rep said centrifugal force would keep beans from falling thru. OK? |
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| MMiller - 9/20/2012 22:11
I've never seen a Deere head work. I suspect that there will be a trail of beans between the outer belt and the second belt. On our MacDon we had head loss where the outer belts dump into the middle belt. A seed saver kit solved the problem. I don't see how anything will fill the gap between the outer belts of the Deere.
Michael
The way those belts are moving there isn't time for anything to fall through.
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Boone, Iowa | I know of a guy that bought a 35 ft Deere draper head. Nobody could get it to cut right. Tried a 40 ft JD draper and was better but not what it should be. They ended up with a 40 ft Mac Don on their "S" combine this year. |
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NW MN | we have custom harvesters that run Macs, on flat to slightly rolling ground that has been rolled. checking for harvest loss once in every 4 sq foot checks will you find a bean. buddy runs S680's with flex drapers and you usually find 2 per check. |
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| The Macdon doesn't have a true flex head. Our 30' head bends in basically 3 10' sections. It is not just the cutterbar that bends, but the backbone of the head as well. In essence you are combining with 3 10' heads. For our hills and terraces, it cuts closer than any flex head we have had in the past. |
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Roann In. | Rather ironic, we were contacted earlier this week by the local BTO and his Deere dealer about some issues with a new 40' Flex Draper. The operator, owner, was field testing a Mac Don and a Deere at the same time in the same field and the Deere was having issues leaving allot of bean in the field. As mentioned above, where the 2 draper belts meet was a large issue (trail of beans through the field). However, the main area of concern with this operator was the beans rolling off of the platform and back in the field. There is nothing like a dam (as it were) to prevent the beans that shatter from rolling off of the front of the platform and back out in the field. And as a result of the design, really no place to mount a hose or "bean saver" to that area. These were dry beans and he was having a great deal of shatter at the sickle. That being said, the Deere was going to replace all of the "long-long" sections with the "short-long" to hopefully eliminate the problem. When we left, the Mac Don was going to be his header of choice. The Deere DID and does flex allot more as talked about above..............however, the loss of beans was not going to make up for the flex in his mind. |
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Central Ohio | This has a lot to do with what we experienced. The belts are on a much steeper angle than the Mac. Most of the material was slung inward across the cutterbar, not the belts. The split belt was not an issue. As someone said, the belts go so fast, there is no time for a bean to fall through. Tried slowing them down and it does not cut or feed well. Extra wear on belts for poor design. Again, we ran them side by side and you would think that the full flex would cut lower but it does not. If you have severe gulleys or terraces, I do not see how the flex header could flex enough. The Mac will bend that far though. I would like to see a narrower knife section offered on the Mac for some situations. |
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nwks | im a dyna flex fan but the first company to combine a macdon flex draper and a dyna flex or deere will have a real FLEX DRAPER. |
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Southern Saskatchewan | We run a 2011 FD70 40'. When buying there wasn't a question as to what we would buy but how big. We went with the 40 and love it. It cuts beside a 30' draper and shaves the hills. We have some hills that i don't want to cut up and the 40 did great. That was our concern too but everyone assured us don't worry if you want a 40 it will do the job. Neighbor has a 30" FD70 and he swears my 40 cuts better. The setup is so important! Good luck. |
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ND | The reel also flexes so the reel teeth stay closer to the cutter bar in more places |
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ND | You will see MacDon headers sold as John Deere headers in 2014. Just like the Case IH 2062 head is actually a FD70 with Case IH end shields. MacDon is a great header, put on an AWS Air Bar and you have the best in my opinion (I work at a Case IH dealership). |
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SC Kansas | We ran a 45 ft Macdon for wheat harvest. Mostly flat ground but with terraces. I cut out a terrace channel, and had it literally smiling, cutting 12" from end to end, also in the middle. Hydro cutter bar as mentioned is also a plus. Neighbor with JD complains about the strip of beans left where the belts meet in the middle |
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| ran 2162 or fd 70 for a long time. deeres is a joke. its to heavy two belts on each side?? its not flexible, maybe the cutter bar is, but do you really need it to be. wont smile in a terrace. been out cuting flexheads for years. you cant change the pitch of the cutterbar on the go on the deere. macdon by far |
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Deere VS MacDon flex drapers
