Flagship New Holland combine offers 700hp

New Holland has revamped its flagship CR range of combine harvesters, giving them more power, improved threshing and wider-spreading straw choppers.

The tweaked machines will be branded as Revelation models and will also get an auto-reset concave, as well as adjustable elevator timing to improve crop flow.

At the top of the range, the updated CR10.90 now develops 700hp from its 16-litre FPT engine, up 50hp from the previous model. Together with the internal upgrades, New Holland reckons this has boosted output by about 10%.

See also: New Holland recaptures harvest world record

These improvements start with the front elevator and feed roller – here New Holland has adjusted the spacing of the elevator bars, which apparently improves the timing of crop delivery to the 450mm front feed rotor.

In turn this smooths the flow of crop into the combine’s twin threshing and separating rotors, which have also had some attention.

The first change is at the bottom end of the cylinders, where the concave shearbolt has been replaced with a sprung-loaded auto-reset system.

According to New Holland this will put an end to the half-hour task of replacing the bolt if the operator has pushed the machine too hard.

Now, if the auto-reset system trips, all the driver has to do is press a button on the screen and it will reset itself in about 45s.

The 10.90 has also been given remotely adjustable rotor vanes, which allow the driver to change the settings easily as conditions change throughout the day.

straw-chopper

On top of this engineers have reduced the diameter of the rotor’s central auger and increased the size of the rasp bars.

This helps stretch out the crop mat to help extract the grain more efficiently. 

Rear end

However, one of the biggest changes is at the back end, where there’s a redesigned straw chopper and chaff spreader.

While the old model struggled to spread the full width with headers above 30ft, this upgraded version gives an even spread to at least 45ft.

This has been achieved by fitting the straw chopper with 25% more powerful hydraulic motors, giving the knives increased overlap for a finer chop and fitting V-shaped paddles to improve crop acceleration.

Electronic vanes and deflectors also allow the driver to tweak the spread pattern as they drive along.

The chaff spreader, meanwhile, has been changed from an impact-based system to an air blast one, to help carry the light material.

Also, the flow from the chaff spreader can be directed into the blast from the straw chopper to help throw it even further.

New Holland says the changes to the chopper system also help reduce the power requirement, but the whole outfit still requires about 110hp of the machine’s total 700hp.

As well as the physical upgrades, New Holland has tweaked  the colour scheme, replacing a lot of the black sections with yellow paint.

One of the main reasons for this is to improve visibility in the grain tank and for maintenance tasks.

Most of the CR 10.90’s internal tweaks also apply to rest of the large-frame, 22in CR models. The CR8.80 – the largest of the smaller 17in CR models – has also had a power upgrade, putting it up to 517hp.

Mid-range CX machines

At the smaller end of the scale, the maker’s mid-range CX5 five-walker and CX6 six-walker machines have also had a few updates.

These include a new cab – similar to the one fitted on the CR machines – and some adjustments to the internals.

The first of these changes is to the concave, which now has adjustable geometry from 80deg to 120deg of separation area.

Another clever system has filtered down from the higher-spec machines, which changes the speed of the straw walkers according to the terrain.

-CX6-combine-

When the machine is pointed down a slope, it reacts by speeding up the walkers to prevent blockages.

Meanwhile, when going uphill it slows them down to keep the straw on the walkers for longer, reducing the amount of grain that goes over the back with the straw.

The cleaning area has also had some attention, with the addition of a third cascade in the cleaning shoe and a variable-speed fan that also adapts to sloping ground.

There’s a smart-sieve system, too, that nudges the sieves sideways to even out the grain distribution on slopes.

All of the maker’s new models will be available for harvest 2018.

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