Hello KYCowman, What sort of country are you on, flat, easy rolling, hilly ground or tiger country?
What size gear do you have already?
Go to google maps and enter Te Kuiti New Zealand and Raglan New Zealand those 2 areas range from easy rolling to tiger country(to steep to bale up the hill, have to bale down hill).
Ovrszd has it, check the cab for fit and comfort. Is the loader joystick just right? You can get a sore arm at the wrong angle, and what works on 30 bales may not work on 400 bales. SCV contols at right angle?
GEARBOX. What are your main work speeds on the different operations? ie JD quad shift. sub 130 hp has a 6 sp main box and this puts a stick shift in your main mowing speed(on hills), but the 140 hp has a 5 sp main box and you mostly don't have a stickshift until you hit hard hills. This is running a Lely 320 mower/conditioner. The other main constraint is the baler weight. Is it baler only or baler wrapper? Here we do mainly silage and very little hay.
Tractor, on hills you should set to the widest track you can for stability and still be road legal. Are the rims adjustable? Can you fit extra wide tyres? Would duals be a better option? If duals you can drop the outside right for mowing and flik it back on for baling. There is a dual wheel design that is made for this, but I can't remember the name.
Is there much working in sheds? Can you fit a curtain on the back window to stop reflections when stacking bales in a shed running from outside bright light to dim shed? Much easier and you don't break the mirrors.
Mirrors, there are different arm length options. If you are running a large twin rotor rake get the long arm as the rake blocks the view on short arm mirrors.
Talk to other users and pay particular attention to the little things. The tractor makers have the big stuff like engines and gearboxes sorted, but not things like the little things. ie JD windscreen wiper leaves an unwiped section at the top of the screen EXACTLY where I look grrrrr. I need to fit an extra long wiper to fix problem. MF dyna shift, go forward and logical shift, BUT reversing also reverses the (power) shift pattern. (forward, up =higher gear, BUT reverse, up = lower!!! gear, frustrating when swopping tractors.
Also take a leaf out of jeff???? book and lay things out in spread sheet form to help clarify your thinking.