Sickle bar cutter hangs from FEL

[Sodo]

The general plan is to build a quick attachment sickle bar that hangs a couple feet below the FEL bucket. I have a sickle bar mower for the 3-pt and it works great, but want another that mows ahead of the tractor.

I bought a complete Farmall Cub sickle mower attachment (6 foot) on craigslist just for the sickle bar. Would like to run the sickle bar alone, with a hydraulic motor. B2710 hydr system is 9.5gpm
Does anybody know how much power (or gpm) it takes to run a 6 foot sickle?

 

[RedNeckRacin]

the 2- 6' sections on my 499 haybine are driven by a single 540 rpm 2.77 cu in pump and each motor has a 5.04 cu in volume. The system is rated at 23.5 gpm so I imagine half to each pump would be sufficient for the 1700 strokes per minute??? 12' haybine with dual opposing sickles.

 

[Sodo]

A great in-use example, with numbers! Thanks very much!!

Where do you get the 1700 strokes/min? It seems to me that it would be 540*2.77/(2*5.04) = 148 cycles/min My MasseyFerguson 3-pt sickle runs at appx 700cpm.

Can you post a pic of the motor / sickel bar drive mechanism?

 

[RedNeckRacin]

Sodo, Your very welcome.

I apologize; the spec says 850 cycles per min from the manual. (I must have doubled it in my head!)


This is the best pic i could find in the manual. Basically, there is an arm that is mounted about 20" above the end of the cycle and pendelums back and forth. That motor attaches to a short arm that drive the sickle back and forth.

 

[BukitCase]

Sodo, think of it like an old steam locomotive, only BACKWARDS - the loco makes longitudinal motion (the piston and valves - then the piston rod runs a "crank" (the drive wheel)

My Samurai (no good pics in the manual, sorry) uses the hydraulic motor with a "crank" attached, this has a connecting bar attached. The crank end goes round and round, the pin in that wheel runs the connecting bar, and the other end of that bar is pinned to the moving half of the sickle... Steve

 

[Sodo]

the spec says 850 cycles per min from the manual. (I must have doubled it in my head!)

RNR how do you think it gets to 850 cpm from 540, 2.77 & 2x 5.04?


Steve I could just turn the same crank that the PTO turns but just want to see how they do it nowadays. And also be more compact so the weeds pass by, not pile up on the mechanical shenanigans. Saw one on a combine where the crank part was more like a swash plate. Was kinda large but the stroke was the same (one cutter).

 

[RedNeckRacin]

Sodo, I would have to say there is a gear ratio on the hydraulic pump that sits on the pto shaft of the tractor. I can send you screen shots of the manual if you would like. This new Holland 499 haybine came in a 1000 and 540 pto option. The pump is quite a handful to get slid onto the pto of the tractor.

 

[RedNeckRacin]

I sold the machine so I can't go look at it, but I think the hydraulic motor didn't drive the Sickles directly now that I think about it..... hmmm

 

[SPYDERLK]

The general plan is to build a quick attachment sickle bar that hangs a couple feet below the FEL bucket. I have a sickle bar mower for the 3-pt and it works great, but want another that mows ahead of the tractor.

I bought a complete Farmall Cub sickle mower attachment (6 foot) on craigslist just for the sickle bar. Would like to run the sickle bar alone, with a hydraulic motor. B2710 hydr system is 9.5gpm
Does anybody know how much power (or gpm) it takes to run a 6 foot sickle?

A simple sickle bar takes very little power to run. You have about 15 hyd HP [Im surprised] and 5hp will run a 6' bar unless youre really pushing it. Find a motor that uses ~ 6GPM at the rpm you need to run the sickle. That way you will not have to use full engine speed.

 

[Sodo]

I wouldn't 'push' the sickle, I just use it for cutting weeds, keeping up appearances. Good to hear that it's within the realm of my tractor's hydr output. I'd want it to useful to someone else (be sellable).