Conventional kit still popular for fodder baling

When it comes to manhandling hay into feeders and troughs, it is not always the case that big is best. In fact, it can be a positive hindrance when fodder is being put out for youngstock and certainly for horses – large wodges of forage extracted from big bales are a bit of a handful in the confines of a stable.


So it is little wonder that there remains a significant market for fodder in small bales, whether produced by a farmer for home consumption or by a contractor for growers or to sell on to the equestrian market.


The efficiencies of handling and storing forage in large round and square bales made new conventional balers a rarity and a good used unit a popular buy. But as the years take their toll on the stock of elderly conventional balers, demand for new machines has grown once more.


As a result, five manufacturers now vie for sales of balers producing an “old-fashioned” 36cm (14in) wide package, 46cm (18in) deep in most cases but 49cm (19in) on the Welger AP balers. The numbers involved are not going to set the market alight – demand fluctuates, but around 130 units a year is about average, according to AEA, the machinery trade body.


Gallignani


Gallignani baler


Italian manufacturer Gallignani now specialises in conventional balers having sold its round baler business to Kverneland Group, whose Vicon division supplied the small square balers in Britain for the past couple of years.


A new manufacturing operation in Turkey produces the three models available in Britain, including the Gallignani 3690 S that has a base specification making it comfortably the lowest-priced conventional baler available at £12,293. Essential options such as a pick-up wheel (£146) and mechanical drawbar offset (£138) lift the price a bit.


But buyers can also add road lights (£192), hydraulic pick-up lift (£308), a hydraulic drawbar (£500) and central knotter lubrication (£292), all of which are also options for the Gallignani 5690 S Gold, which has a wider pick-up, an extra tine bar in the pick-up for faster working, and a longer ram stroke.


It can also have a knotter blower if very dry conditions are anticipated – and that is a standard fitment on the 6000 S model with its 1.94m gathering width pick-up. This machine can also have hydraulic bale density adjustment installed for £777 to help achieve consistency during the day, taking the base price from £18,506 to £19,283.



John Deere


John Deere baler


The John Deere 459, priced at £23,568, has central knotter lubrication as standard to streamline morning preparations. Operators who want the further refinement of a hydraulic cylinder to offset the drawbar for work pay a further £486.


The 459 and its 359 sibling are both alone in redirecting material coming up the reel by means of an auger and feeder forks rather than two or three sets of forks. Deere maintains this arrangement provides an even and regular flow of material into the chamber where it is compressed by a long-stroke plunger, while critics point to a risk of wrapping in some conditions.


Lely


Lely Welger baler2


Three of the four conventional balers built by Welger are equipped with two sets of crank-action feeder forks, while the range-topping AP830 gets three sets to cope with the machine’s substantial appetite.


This machine tops the charts with a list price of £25,575, complete with hydraulic pick-up lift and drawbar positioning. An extended drawbar (£135) and an accumulator tow bar (£290) are about the only options for this machine, which can carry no less than three times as many twine balls (18) as most competitor machines.


To minimise frustrating shear bolt breakages, the feeder tines can pivot against oil pressure in a damper if a blockage or erroneous item in the swath threatens to disrupt proceedings, while shaft and bevel gear drive to the pick-up, feeder tines and knotters aim to keep everything synchronised correctly.



New Holland


New Holland baler


The Hydroformic automatic density system of the New Holland BC 5000-series conventional balers is a standard feature of the BC 5070; the operator gets the machine producing bales to the required density and can then leave the system to make adjustments automatically for drier or damper conditions.


The £19,080 machine also comes with hydraulic pick-up lift and drawbar offset as standard, as well as central knotter lube and a supported pto shaft that permits tight turns. At 76cm, the baler has one of the longest-stroke plungers available.


Massey Ferguson


MF baler


In this company, the most unconventional “conventional” baler is the Massey Ferguson 1839; its in-line design means the tractor straddles the swath in the field and can pretty much drive straight out on to the road at the end of the job with a relatively narrow overall width of 2.6m causing few problems for fellow rural road users.


It also has shades of its Hesston-type big brothers with its upward curved pre-chamber between the pick-up and main bale-forming chamber. Here, material is pre-compressed to some extent before getting the full treatment from a plunger with the shortest stroke of all – just 55cm.


The £24,360 machine has hydraulic pick-up lift and can be equipped with hydraulic and density control for an additional £1,080.


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