Tractor Sizing Is Powerstar 75 enough to round bale

[Nitrobay]

Considering a 75hp Powerstar or Case IH 75c. I can see myself using it for large round bale hay production. But, I'm uncertain if it's enough HP to do that. Anyone have experience with large round balers and the 75 hp tractor? If so what size bales did you make?

 

[RickB]

Not enough weight or HP for a 5x6 round baler. Somewhere between marginal and inadequate for 4x5 bales. Adequate for a 4x4 baler or a 4x5 baler making 4x4 bales.

 

[Nitrobay]

Thanks. What HP would you consider large enough? Not necessarily ideal but adequate. What weight also? Thanks

 

[RickB]

75 PTO hp for 4x5 bales, 100 for 5x6. That means engine hp about 95 and 125 respectively.

 

[RustyA]

Really depends on your terrain and how many acres you are making. We used a vermeer rebel 5400 with a 35 hp pto john deere 1070. Struggled on hills with full bale in chamber. Added a montana 5740 with 50 hp pto and it more than handled hills. If you want to ever run a discbine rather than sickle bar conditioner you will need 75-80 hp pto.

 

[Nitrobay]

How big of a round bale are you able to make with your Montana 5740 RustA?

 

[Timm250]

Baled this with a Kubota M6800 2wd & a Hesston 845 for about 10 years before I got a bigger tractor.

Parts of it was so steep I couldn't bale across the hill because the bales would turn over. Could only bale uphill because the weight of the loaded baler would push me off the hill with the tires skidding without touching the brakes.

These pictures are from 2015 after I got my Farmall 95.

 

[Nitrobay]

Ok, so now I get RickB's point about tractor weight and RustyA's point about hill side balling. The 95C is about 1300lbs heavier than your old M6800 and that seems to have solved your hill side balling problem. So, back to my original question. Do you think the 75C that weight 800lbs less than the 95C can do the job on your hill side? Or is the 95C as small as you are comfortable with? Obviously I'm try to figure out what the least amount of tractor is I'll need to get the largest job done so I can keep my cost down and actually afford the tractor that can handle the task I need it to do.

 

[RickB]

But you have yet to describe your land or mention what size bales you want to make.

 

[WM75Guy]

As Rick said, what size do you want to bale? When I was looking at haying my dealer recommended the smaller Vermeer Rebel baler to go behind my Boomer 8N. It will do 4'X5' bales with a minimum of 40HP, 50HP recommended. The larger size will do 5'X5' bales with 50HP minimum, 60HP recommended. My Boomer 8N only has 40HP PTO so I held off as I didn't want to do minimums.

I am looking at 75 HP tractors now such as the NH Workmaster 75 to use a 10 square bale hay grapple. With ballast I will be around 7000# so it should handle my needs. I will be look at haying options again, most likely the smaller Vermeer Rebel.