Flail Mower Let's talk flail mowers

[DavesTractor]

Why do you say this? That is one of the questions I have.

I will have to mow around 10-12 times a year. I like the idea of a flail, whether that is with the 3 -flail floating version like offered by Iowa Farm Equipment or a repurposed crop shredder. As I've thought about it, the one downside I can foresee is a solid (non-flexible) mower 15-20ft resulting in (high/low) spots, regardless of how smooth I can make it. My pasture will still roll. That is certainly a positive for the 3 shorter flail mower.

But all in all... why do you think it's hard to beat a rotary batwing?

I'm thinking mainly of speed. If you are ok with a pretty decent cut but do not need the park like quality of cut of a flail, the rotary is much faster in tall grass conditions.

The flail I have is the lo-pro orchard mower by Vrisimo. It is a 12' and weighs 2400 lbs and I run it on a 67 HP tractor. It runs it fine, but grunts a little if the grass gets tall. In orchards, you seldom let it get tall. It is maybe 4-8" tall and then I mow it down to 3/4". It does scalp a little if I have an uneven spot, I figure that is my way of eventually leveling that spot, albeit sort of an expensive leveling device. What I have found in tall grass, like hood high thick green stuff (rarely have I mowed such, but I have a few times) is that the flail is determined to do a great job. It holds the clippings in suspension until they are tiny bits. This gives such a nice finish. But if there is a lot of material to chew up, the groundspeed on a tractor needs to be quite slow. Even with a lot of HP. I mow at 3.5-4mph with my flail on my property. I could mow faster, but I don't want the mower bouncing around and this gives me a park like cut. When I took my flail down to our church property years ago and mowed hood high grass, I could hardly believe how slow I had to go. A couple buddies had rotaries and they were lapping me. What they did looked rough, but they got it done quickly. Since then, when I have really tall stuff to cut, I knock it down with a rotary and come back a week or two later and flail it nice.

I don't own a rotary, although we sell a ton of them. I so much prefer the flail. But it seems like a batwing rotary is built for what you are doing. If you "road" a tractor with a 12' flail, it is 13' overall width and it takes some real caution. If you haul it on a trailer, it has to be spun sideways.

 

[CADplans]

I'm thinking mainly of speed. If you are ok with a pretty decent cut but do not need the park like quality of cut of a flail, the rotary is much faster in tall grass conditions.

It seems to me, you are not comparing apples to apples.

In your example, the rotary mower is cutting high, the flail low,,, that would account for all the difference.

Have both mowers set at some normal height for tall grass cutting, like 6 inches,,,
I think the flail will shine over a rotary.

I had a JD 6 1/2 foot wide rotary, with new blades.
The rotary was a horsepower HOG compared to my 7 1/2 foot JD flail.
That was in the same fields, the same grass, the same conditions,,, pulled by the same tractor.

 

[DavesTractor]

It seems to me, you are not comparing apples to apples.

In your example, the rotary mower is cutting high, the flail low,,, that would account for all the difference.

Have both mowers set at some normal height for tall grass cutting, like 6 inches,,,
I think the flail will shine over a rotary.

I had a JD 6 1/2 foot wide rotary, with new blades.
The rotary was a horsepower HOG compared to my 7 1/2 foot JD flail.
That was in the same fields, the same grass, the same conditions,,, pulled by the same tractor.

You may be right. I have never flailed at 6" high as it blows the grass over and does not give a nice cut. My experience is limited to my conditions so I am glad you added in how this works for you.

 

[Dadnatron]

I'm thinking mainly of speed. If you are ok with a pretty decent cut but do not need the park like quality of cut of a flail, the rotary is much faster in tall grass conditions.

I don't own a rotary, although we sell a ton of them. I so much prefer the flail. But it seems like a batwing rotary is built for what you are doing. If you "road" a tractor with a 12' flail, it is 13' overall width and it takes some real caution. If you haul it on a trailer, it has to be spun sideways.

If I let my pastures get 'hood high' its my own fault. That, or I will be letting it grow for hay.

Most of the pastures will be mown at about 12-18" or seed head height. It will be mown to about 6". This is to maintain grass quality for grazing horses.

What is your interpretation about travel speed in this instance?

 

[DavesTractor]

If I let my pastures get 'hood high' its my own fault. That, or I will be letting it grow for hay.

Most of the pastures will be mown at about 12-18" or seed head height. It will be mown to about 6". This is to maintain grass quality for grazing horses.

What is your interpretation about travel speed in this instance?

I seldom cut in those situations, so keep that in mind. But I think a flail would work fine in those conditions at a decent travel speed. Cut quality will not be much better than a rotary, if at all, at those cut heights. In my experience we get almost stellar cut quality with scoop knives if we mow at about an inch. At 2" it still looks pretty good. At 6", I'd think cut quality would suffer. Let's see what others with more experience in these conditions say.

We have higher HP tractors (100 hp plus), and we have seen that even a very high quality flail can slip and burn the belts if you get too aggressive. I always like to consider what has to give. If too much material is kept under the deck and is unable to exit at about the rate of what is entering, then the rotor will try to slow down. If you have enough power, you can overcome that to a point. I often run a little wide on the flail as I do not mow tall stuff often. I have 62 PTO with a 12' cut on the tractor I normally use in my orchard. It handles it easily, but if the grass was 18" tall and thick I might need to switch to a little higher HP. In thinking about the times that flails have disappointed me with ground speed, I was probably always on the bottom end of the HP requirement. Next time this happens, maybe I'll hook it up to some more HP and give it a go.

 

[vlcakc]

I have a serious buyer for my TC45D and New Holland 918H flail, so will probably be replacing them both soon. I will probably buy the flail from the same dealer as the tractor to hopefully get a little price break. If I buy a Deere tractor I'll probably go with a 390 flail. If I buy a Kubota tractor I'll probably go with a Landpride FM 3188 or FM4188. Both flails seem to get good reveiws here. The Landpride is somewhat heaver than the Deere. Either seems to be a good choice, but is there any real advantage with one over the other? Vic

Update: I'm now looking at replacing the tractor with another NH. The dealer now sells the Alamo flails instead of NH. If I read the specs correctly on the Alamo website, the equivalent Alamo flail the the 918H would be the Super Heavy Duty flail. Haven't checked on blade availability on the Alamo, but would want the mower to give a good finish mow to grass and be able to handle taller weeds, grass and light brush. Vic

 

[leonz]

All the blades are available you just have to decide who to buy them from and
whether you want a large number of spares which gives you the least cost per knife

The other issue is the knife hangers and the cost per unit and how many spares you
want to have on hand. bolts can be purchased in bulk lots of one hundred per bag and
large bags of nuts as well deciding on whether you want fine threaded bolts and nuts for
spares is a major issue as the fine threaded bolts and nuts will have more gripping power.

Allen head bolts reduce the amount of money that goes into the swear jar and you can buy long handled allen wrenches and ratcheting box wrenches-do not skimp on a ratcheting box wrench or a ratchet but snap on and be done with it and you can mount a tool box on the mower for tools and spares if it does not come with one.

If you have changed your mind about the Landpride/Maschio units with the cast hammers be
sure to purchase the Alamo unit with hardened side slicers NOT the standard unhardened side
slicer knives.

If the unit does not list hardened heat treated side slicers ask for them to be installed at the factory
or purchase them in bulk and save the knives supplied on the mower as spares.

Just remember if you invest in the the Alamo flail mower it will not have the
trash ejection door so keep that in mind in your thinking.

 

[Fallon]

I wouldn't classify my 917 as anything more than medium duty. It's 30 years old & beat up, but still running, so it's durable, but it's not a really heavy duty machine.

No clue what Alamo actually means by super heavy duty though. Could just be marketing.

 

[kimaran]

Anyone recognize this type flail
Looking for owners manual
And what type of knife is this

 

[leonz]

Anyone recognize this type flail
Looking for owners manual
And what type of knife is this
View attachment 485474View attachment 485475View attachment 485477

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This Flail Mower appears to be a JD flail mower with scoop knives that are beat to death and need to go to the happy hunting ground.

You can convert it to a finish flail mower by adding more knife hangers and side slider knife pairs on the air paddles as it has the required number of holes to use it as a finish mower.

At least with this flail mower you can attach more knife hangers and fully outfit it with side slicer finish knives as the air paddles have the extra holes for a full set of knife hangers to convert it into a finish flail mower.

I would imagine that they painted it black to hide the butts ugly rusty finish it had-its a shame as there is nothing wrong with green paint that needs a little work.