Baling hay with a CUT

[cowboydoc]

Just had a friend call me who bought a baler last fall for his Kubota 3710. The baler was a New Holland full size. Last week he tore the pto out of it while he was baling. Now Kubota is denying his warranty because they said that their CUT's are not designed to run a square baler. The dealership is saying the same thing. They told him that the CUT's do not have the sufficient torque and specs to run one even though they have the hp. It makes sense that one wouldn't be able to do it but I know alot of guys on here were trying to do it. So even though you can run it doesn't mean your tractor is going to hold up to it. It does put alot of strain on your tractor when that ramming arm compresses those bales.

 

[ddl]

amen, the manufacturers do know what they are doing. Or maybe they need to listen to the experts on this group who think they know more than the manufacturer.
DAN L

 

[timb]

How big is a "full size" baler? I know the wisdom here is not to do run a baler with a compact, but seems like many people around this area baled for a lot of years with the *little* Fords or Farmalls *not* any heavier or more powerful than current big-end compacts. Most farmers around here now are using big Internationals, Massey's etc., ag tractors but they're also doing round bales. Have square balers gotten that much bigger and more demanding over time? If so, what about using the old, smaller (if it is) equipment?

Tim

 

[cowboydoc]

timb,
Tear apart one of those old farmalls sometime and look at the size of the gears and pto shafts in those tractors compared to these cut's. Also those tractors have alot more torque as well. They were made to hold up to the demands of the square balers and such. These new CUT's aren't. As far as the square baler itself they are bigger no doubt but not that much. The New holland this guy was using is about 25 years old so it's still more of the smaller one.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

The old Ford's and farmall's were built heavier then comparable hp Compacts. They were designed to be able to run balers so the parts that would fail were improved so that they would hold up. Compact tractors are designed to run 3pt implements which do not put much strain on a tractor so the comparable parts that would break are not as strong as they should be. Different tractors for different things.

 

[ddl]

this is a good thread for it brings out the importance of reading and following the tractors manual. We all abuse our tractors from time to time but over loading beyound its abilities is bad and you will pay the piper sooner or later usually sooner.

Dan L

 

[Ledgemere Farm]

Alot of those "old timers" used a baler with a pony motor. Most a 2 cylinder Wisconsin Robin.
You look at an old NH 68 Hayliner and an old John Deere 14T and compare them to a newer John Deere 347. It's like comparing a Yugo to a Tahoe.
If you had a compact with a 14T and a Wisconsin Robin, you could "pull" it and let the Robin "run" it.

 

[timb]

Gents please don't think I'm trying to start an argument here - maybe I'm just being a little dense. Again the "common wisdom" statements - "the old tractors were built heavier and had more torque".

One thing I'm really trying to do is put the new CUTs into perspective with the oldtimers. Truth is though, a Ford 8N or NAA shipped to your door considerably *lighter* than the current large-end blue, green or orange. A Farmall A, B, or C was also lighter or at most the same. And so on. Yeah, those were all considered small tractors in their day too, but they got a lot of "real" work thrown their way.

If the new compacts are physically *heavier* but still "not as strong" - where the beef going? Seems to me shouldn't be anything on a tractor that isn't contributing to the cause.

Likewise the torque number. Yes, the math doesn't lie - an engine producing x horsepower at 1500 rpm has more torque at that rpm *at the flywheel* than another engine also producing x hp but at 2700 rpm. However, if you factor in the different amount of overall gear reduction to reduce the crank rpm to the *same* 540 PTO rpm then they will have the *same* output torque (plus or minus minor loss differences in the system). I don't think displacement really factors into it - besides the old 4-cyl gas engines weren't much different in size than the big compacts either.

Certainly self-powered balers and other implements take the load down considerably - but a lot of this old stuff was still powered by the tractor. So what happened to the basic durability in the last 50 years?

Thoughts?
Tim

 

[Kodiak]

<font color=blue>"So what happened to the basic durability in the last 50 years?"</font color=blue>

I think they call it corporate effeicency.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Look at a ford N series, do you see a rops, cup holders, fancy electronic's and a bunch of other parts you will find on a compact today? Tractors were built simple back then and it is not what you see that makes a tractor, it is what you don't see. Mainly the guts of the tractor as that is what takes the abuse. The guts were a lot heavier on the old tractors then they are on the compacts so even if the overall weight is the same between the two tractors think about where that weight comes from.