8 replies to this topic

[JustinShepherd]

Hi everyone,

We currently farm just over 1600 acres of hay in saskatchewan and use a 2008 16' MacDon A-30S pull type. I love the MacDon and how it runs in hay. We have demo'd disc bines but there are just too many rocks in our area to run them without significant breakage.

My main question is whether switching to an 18' SP is worth the expense. I have heard you can travel faster with them because of the better ride and seeing everything in front of the cab. Also does airbags on the back of swathers make a large difference? We would prefer sticking with MacDon, probably an M150 with A40D header but the NH8040 with air ride on back axle looks handy. Anyone have experience with either of these machines?

Thanks,

Justin

[Rodney R]

I have no experience with either machine, but if you're limited in speed by how fast the sickle will cut and process the hay, then the SP will only gain you a few moments on each headland when you turn around - most of the SP machines have the same header on them that the PT machines have, so you'll be cutting with the same parts

Rodney

[anokes]

i had to run a pull type at a farm job during college. it was not a pleasant experience. I know many people who run PT's and they get along fine. with 1600 acres to cut i think your life would be much better with a SP. the guy who swaths for me has 5 of the mac dons. i think they are a good machine he runs into some problems with the exchange rate and how it affects certain parts, but it would not apply to you. When i ran my own swathers we had caseih's or new holland. i fell the CNH headers are the most simple and easy to maintain sickle head. maybe if you wanted the versatility of having a tractor for other work you could run a bi-directional and push and pull two headers. there are a few people around who do that with good luck. if you have a good service department at a local dealer you can buy a 1000hr SP machine for the money because big operators don't want them because they have no warranty and smaller operators can't buy them because they are too much money.

have fun, and good luck

Austin

[JustinShepherd]

Thanks for the comments,

I am really curious in knowing the ride on the machines. Do the actual tractor units run smoother because they are wider? We run a Case MXM120 and we can cut around 6 mph, i think the header itself could cut it faster but its just too rough in the field to get going any faster then that, even 1-2 mph faster would make a huge difference in acres in a day which some have said a SP could accomplish.

Yeah I agree with you see a lot of lease trade offs with 600-1000 hours and they look like good tractor units but it seems like the headers are usually in pretty rough shape.

[crash22]

I've never ran a macdon or a "new" new holland, however we just got rid of 2 older new hollands a 116 pull type and a 1114 SP with the exception of the crimpers ( 6 or 8 ft on the pull and 3 or 4 ft on the SP) the headers were almost identical. I saw no real atvantage of the SP as far as speed depending on who was in the other swather they were pretty even matched.. However... I'd say in my opinion that it was much easier to run the SP because I don't have to continually turn around and look at the machine. I agree with anokes the CNH cutter bar system is pretty simple to work on and maintain. They've redesined them since the ones I had but the basic principal is still the same. Hope this helps.

[Rodney R]

You talk about the ride on tractor units..... do you mean an SP haybine or the unit that will fit on a front 3pt hitch? I would suspect that the SP will ride better than the ones on the front 3pt. You have an air ride cab, and the air ride rear suspension (on the NH, not sure if anybody else has that) plus an air ride seat. In many cases the tires are pretty big, easily twice the size of 15 years ago. Why are the fields so rough? Mowing at 6mph is not fast - raking and tedding can be done easily at 6mph. It sorta sounds to me like the fields are just too rough, and that will have an impact on the cut quality when you drive fast, no matter what machine you have - either you set the head so it doesn't bounce, and it wears out the skids (or beat it to death), or you set it a little lighter, and it bounces around.

Rodney

[JustinShepherd]

Currently we use a MFWD Case tractor with a pull type haybine. So I was wondering if the ride to a regular tractor that has air ride seat, no suspension on it, compares to a self propelled swather unit. I am assuming there very similar. I love the idea of the header out in front and I am really trying to justify the added expense of it over the way we currently do it.

Fields here have hundreds of gophers and badger hills in them. On our own land we poison and shoot them all we can and its a struggle to keep up with them. So on about 900 acres its not terrible. But on 5-800 acres of custom work their land is quit a bit rougher. I read about people cutting at 10 mph and I cannot even comprehend that. My head would be through the roof of the cab here haha.

For our land we level the gopher hills in spring with a 25' John Deere cultivator with angle iron shovels that floats on top and it has done a pretty decent job in the 4 years we have been running it.

Justin

[cmsc]

the air bags on the rear axle are a must in my opinion. we havea h8060 with the air ride suspension and love it. we had to use an older NH HW340 with no air ride axle while ours was getting warranty work done and i hated that with a passion the HW340 rode very very rough. I would never go back to a pull type again.

[Hayking]

We just bought a new H 8080 new holland, just got rid of our HW 365, new holland is the only way to go with swathers i believe in my opionion. the air bags are a must you will not be dissapointed by them, Plus the cab suspension. we have a 15.5 disc head on it and i would put it in the field with any swather on the market. it will eat them alive. Good luck