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Hay cutters

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Trinity man

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Well our Krone broke today maybe for the last time. I have about enough of the disk cutter maybe thinking of going back to the old sickle cutter. We use to have a 12 ft one and it cut good, but the ant bed was allways tough on it. Now the fire ant aren't so bad any more so I was wondering what most up you use.
 
Sorry to hear about your equipment woes.

I've been using a New Holland 1431 Discbine for quite a few years now and just love it. My main obstacle in cutting is gopher mounds. With my sickle bar machines I was always stopped digging dirt off the cutter bar but with this machine the dirt clears its self rapidly and keeps on a cuttin'.

This machine cuts 13 feet and they recommend 90 PTO HP or greater. I'm using a JD 4440 and it's a good match.
 
What is it you don't like about the rotary? I've been thinking of going back to one myself.
We've been using the same ole MacDon 12' for years now... about 10 I think. It's been a great machine really, in fact I doubt anyone makes a better one.
 
We went from a Gehl discbine to a JD haybine and love the change. Less horsepower and fuel and more flexible for us (we even do our swath grazing through the haybine). Even though the discbine was cheap on blades, gearboxes, etc. can get pricy. The biggest issue around us is availability of parts. JD wins there hands down, but that may just be a regional thing.
 
We just switched from a NH 1475 18ft Haybine to a Kosch double 9 sickle bar mower. So far I like it. It probably won't be so handy for green feed as it does need a rake pulled behind but it sure cuts the grass hay we are working with this year.
 
John Deere dealer being 10 minutes away plays a big influence on the color of our equipment. We have one of those cute little JD disc mowers. I'd love to have one that uses the little clips to replace the blades. The nut on my right side end blade is rounded over, that's going to be fun considering that it's recessed.

We didn't like our first JD round baler and replaced it with a Gehl, now I want to go back to JD. The electronic stuff is starting to tick me off.
 
Don't really know much about the disc machines, as I got out of the hay bidness about 10 years ago. I grew up with Allis-Chalmers tractors and attachments. I ran a 9 foot Allis sickle mower from the time I could drive the tractor. If you had a sharp sickle, you could mow anything. Dad had a Shadle sickle sharpener at the shop and I disremember how many stones I wore out on that thing, but boxes of them. I still have my anvil made from a chunk of RR rail, my 13/64" punch, and rivet set. Snuff cans worked well to hold rivets and an old ammo box to hold it all worked nice. The thing I really liked about the Allis mower was there was no pitman stick to mess with...that thing would mow straight up or straight down.

We had an old 16 foot 620 Hesston swather that I ran for years, and then we updated to a 16 foot 6610, but we ALWAYS did the 1st cutting of alfalfa with the Allis, just to speed up the drying time. Only thing I know about the disc machines is that the fields look pretty ragged when you are done cutting compared to what they look like when you are done mowing them.

Another thing that amazes me is it seems like all anybody knows anymore is top-serrated bolt on sickle sections. Then they wonder why they have problems cutting prairie hay, especially wiregrass. I could rivet on a new section everybit as fast as you could bolt one on, and the riveted section would be tighter than the bolted on one. We had quite a collection of sickles, and had probably 10 with all smooth sections....you could cut ANYTHING with those. We had 1 that was top-serrated, that was strictly for alfalfa or sometimes cane. Under-serrated sections worked pretty good for a lot of crops, but the smooth sectioned sickles were my favorite. That was another winter job, repairing all the sickles, rebuilding them if necessary, and making sure they were all sharp and ready for the next season. We still have boxes and boxes of Herschel sections for about any mower that was in use from 40 years ago and later.
 
we use NH 1475....really like them. they are simple, and don't care how short, tall, thick the crop is. if you want it cut- its comin' down. good machines. if you are really feelin' froggy....i would recomend a NH bi-directional with header on the front, and pull one behind. i don't think there is a better way to cut.
 
I switch form an JD 820 moco cutter bar to an JD 630 moco rotary this year. I will not be going back to cutter bars anytime in the near future. With the rotary mower I can mow 2 to 3 times faster allowing me to cut fields in 3 to 4 hours that used to take a day or more with the sickle bar mower.
 
We went to a diskbine years ago, a Heston 1340. Its been trouble free and cuts good but doesn't like it too short. Didn't need it or any other kind of 12 foot machine this year. 24' macdon swather here and 16' sp JD haybine raked together where our custom balers are working for us. Less than a bale to the acre. :cry: It ranged from 3.5 to 5.5 ton last year.
 
We changed from sickle bar cutters to a good used NH 1411 discbine in 2005, would never go back. Added a used 1431 this spring.

Our repair bill and cutting time was cut by more than half.
 
we used to have a NH 499- not a thing wrong with them, but bought a Hesston 1340 discbine for less than we got for the 499. ( both 12' cut)Both are good machines, but the discbine is much faster. Where I had to slow down in heavy damp hay with the 499 to about 2 mph, I can blow through with the 1340 at 7-8 mph. Its a fantastic cutting machine. We have no gopher holes, so thats no problem. The power you have limits how fast you can go, but you still have to fit the hay through the steel on steel conditioner rolls. Usually go 7-8 mph in a 2 1/2 to 3 ton crop. On the 499 the odd time you hit a damp spot and would plug and leave a wet wad of hay. The 1340 we cut the whole field and never stop and no wads, makes for better baling and better bales.
 
Vermeer makes a great disc cutter- a bit less buck than a jd but equal in performance- a little easier to work on even the major stuff we ran a 14 ft and through thick grasses or tall sorghum it cut great
 
I use a rowse double 9 mower works fine for me in our RRR ground rented rough and rocky.

We are seeding down some owned ground and we have an old OMC haybine it works fine and cost $250 we only need it on 35 acres or we could use our 12' swather.

Most of our hay is Timothy so the double 9 really works well on it.
 
I run a HW340 disc bine and love it. Will never go back to a sickle mower. I can cut hay alot faster which in turn helps get it up and out of the field faster. Also the knives are cheaper than the replacing a whole sickle section if you need to. The only draw back is with all the mole hills that I have around here we get some sand in the windrow which slows the drying time down some.
 
I don't know a thing about disc machines. I have 16' MacDon 5000 I bought 150 miles away at a farm auction. It's been one of the best auction sale purchases I have ever made. I use and wouldn't want anything less than a 100hp tractor on it, both weight and powerwise. Ford 8600 is a good match.
 
Trinity man said:
Well our Krone broke today maybe for the last time. I have about enough of the disk cutter maybe thinking of going back to the old sickle cutter. We use to have a 12 ft one and it cut good, but the ant bed was allways tough on it. Now the fire ant aren't so bad any more so I was wondering what most up you use.
Click to expand...
I use a Vermeer disc mower - same mower as a Lely, only with yellow paint. It'll cut wet bahia grass and gopher mounds and never slow down - it cuts so fast I get dizzy sometimes. I can change out blades in about 30 minutes with an impact, but the newer ones have blades that just clip on, so they're even easier.

And if you use the original Vermeer blades instead of the cheap ones, you'll be surprised how much ground you can cover between changes. You can also touch up the better quality blades with a grinder for another half days cutting if you need to.

I only do about 300 acres/year max, but my time is still worth something. There's no way I'd go back to a sickle mower.
 

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