petes
Silver Member
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2009
- Messages
- 108
- Location
- Bellingham, Washington
- Tractor
- Kubota B8200 (21hp) , IH B275 (28hp), JD 1830 (68hp)
This past year was my second haying. First year I used a Kubota B7100 (18hp, 4x4, 1500lb with the loader), 7ft NH-451 sickle, kuhn GRS-21 2-basket rake and a 1950's-ish JD14T. (the 'bota looked pretty tiny hauling that stuff around but did 500 bales without much trouble!).
I upped to a 38hp International B-275 with a 2-stage clutch which made things a lot easier. I also traded up the baler for a JD 24T and did 2200 bales this past year. The 24T was great (after fixing a snapped-off input shaft). They're very similar to a 14T and easy to work on. The 24T has some refinements that are nice (and it's a foot narrower so it'll fit in my barn door).
With the bigger tractor and once I got the 7ft sickle adjusted correctly I mowed at 5mph. At slower speeds the grass would push over in front of the mower and cause clogs. You can't run over already mowed grass with a sickle or it'll clog, so corners and finishing the last row in a field can be tricky. The only real problem I had was going "downwind" on lodged grass, the mower wouldn't get/stay under it, but If I mowed the other direction it went through it fine... but that screws up patterns and geometry more than you think it would. If you do a poor job mowing the remaining "anchored" grass screws every subsequent operation up - causing ball-ups with a rotary rake and it gets tangled up in the baler pickup tines which is hard on the whole mechanism. The grass that gets pulled out by the pickup ends up a a green slug in the bale causing it to go moldy... so a good mower is really important.
I don't regret buying the sickle since it allowed me to get started with minimal investment of ~$4k including the IH tractor, but everything was non-functional when I bought it including the tractor. I did all the repairs and maintenance myself.
Now that I've determined I love haying, I can use the profit to justify upgrading some of the equipment - This year I hope to supplement my 2 basket Kuhn rake with a side delivery rake so I can combine windrows in 2 instead of 5 passes (for second cutting), and I'm keeping my eye out for a good deal on a used disc mower. I'd also like to get a proper hay wagon.
I upped to a 38hp International B-275 with a 2-stage clutch which made things a lot easier. I also traded up the baler for a JD 24T and did 2200 bales this past year. The 24T was great (after fixing a snapped-off input shaft). They're very similar to a 14T and easy to work on. The 24T has some refinements that are nice (and it's a foot narrower so it'll fit in my barn door).
With the bigger tractor and once I got the 7ft sickle adjusted correctly I mowed at 5mph. At slower speeds the grass would push over in front of the mower and cause clogs. You can't run over already mowed grass with a sickle or it'll clog, so corners and finishing the last row in a field can be tricky. The only real problem I had was going "downwind" on lodged grass, the mower wouldn't get/stay under it, but If I mowed the other direction it went through it fine... but that screws up patterns and geometry more than you think it would. If you do a poor job mowing the remaining "anchored" grass screws every subsequent operation up - causing ball-ups with a rotary rake and it gets tangled up in the baler pickup tines which is hard on the whole mechanism. The grass that gets pulled out by the pickup ends up a a green slug in the bale causing it to go moldy... so a good mower is really important.
I don't regret buying the sickle since it allowed me to get started with minimal investment of ~$4k including the IH tractor, but everything was non-functional when I bought it including the tractor. I did all the repairs and maintenance myself.
Now that I've determined I love haying, I can use the profit to justify upgrading some of the equipment - This year I hope to supplement my 2 basket Kuhn rake with a side delivery rake so I can combine windrows in 2 instead of 5 passes (for second cutting), and I'm keeping my eye out for a good deal on a used disc mower. I'd also like to get a proper hay wagon.
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