Leon, Our move from the two implement system was based upon several factors. Timing was one of them. Having to divide a field into quarter sections and not mow down too much before moving the baler into the field to p.u. the windrows, bale the windrow and then hurry back to swap out to the wrapper and return within the 24 hour period to wrap was always hard. The bales tended to dry out a bit too much on the outside. The second reason was my wife, who has been bale flipper laborer, into the lift arm and cradle of the wrapper, started to develop knee pain after a session and it was evident we needed another solution to continue the seasonal harvest for our sheep operation. As luck would have it a neighboring farmer couple much younger than us wanted to buy the Wolagri R500 baler and the RW500 wrapper. That helped supplement the purchase of the new Combi which we saved up for for two years.
Both of these balers use HDPE netting, 24" wide which we buy by the pallet from Farmers Net Wrap (UK) who have a subsidiary manufacturer in Kansas.
The baler does not use knives. Forage length is critical but we mostly cut, wrap and bale in the early part of May. Mow into windrows, bale and wrap. If the forage gets away from us we use a Falc flail mower set high to top the forage, then mow into windrows. Basically you are swapping raking for flailing in that situation. Stretch wrap can be 10" or up to 15" which we have sourced from Canada, and the U.S. through Protexia who handle the Rani stretch wrap from Finland. The Canadians at SilaGrow sell a Chinese product that works well too. Both netting and stretch wrap we clean off and dry when pulling a bale to feed. It gets stuffed into plastic garbage bags and taken to the recycling drop off on the mainland every year.
The baler and wrapper module both uses metric chain in 10B and 12B sizes. Baler three loops on the right side under the cover and two on the left. Chains can last up to three years if you give them a good lube at the beginning of the season and adjust tension and re-lube after 100 or so bales. After the third season chains are swapped out with new chain. This preserves the cogs much better as chains do stretch with use. Much like a motorcycle or bicycle chain and similar maintenance. Chains drive rollers with steel cogs that are aluminum with solid steel shafts mounted in the frame with sealed bearings, no belts. Wrapper module is hydraulic driven connected to rear remotes and the whole Combi has an electronic control module that mounts in the tractor and is wired into a separate 12V circuit to the battery of the tractor. An add on that helps is a rear mounted camera that is magnetically held on to the Combi hydraulic switch box and points back towards the wrapper so you can monitor the wrapping sequence from the tractor while rolling up the next bale to drop into the wrapper after the current wrapping bale is finished and dropped onto the ground.
Use compressed air to blow all the dust and forage residue from the chamber, rollers and under the sides where the cogs and chains run and other areas that hold on to this debris. The bearings in the unit are all sealed type and the original baler we had did over 5200 bales in a ten year period, each weighing around 100-110 lb. as haylage at 45-50% moisture with no problems. Very heavy duty machine that produces a great 28" diameter X 36" high bale. Compared to the other brands such as Abbriatta or Star, the Wolagri bale size is slightly larger which is great when it comes to feeding time. Fits perfectly in a Rubbermaid barn cart so you don't need to fetch the tractor to load them up, move from the stack to the feed area at the barn. Great work out for the muscles and fun.
We have had very good luck with Wolagri/Tonutti. Parts come directly from Italy and a lot of the metric parts are obtainable in the U.S. if needed like chain. The company stands behind their product too.
The hydroponic fodder system that I have seen is used at a small dairy on the mainland where they use barley and sprout it in large, long half pipes under LED lights. Taking that from the half pipes to the feeders is how they use it. They also feed haylage. Two different systems combined. I really don't know how one would try to bale it and ferment it as a haylage product without a lot of thought out adaptations and additional machinery. As a single source feed it just doesn't make sense.