Why not pull a wagon behind a baler?

[Robert_in_NY]

chh, I have never seen a wire tie baler except for pictures online. Around here 2 tie balers using twine (natural is what the horse people want) are what rules the roost for small square bale operations. The small dairy farms who can't afford a round baler hire the baling done. About the only people who still do small squares are people who sell hay. But the horse market keeps us busy if you can provide a good service and quality hay.

pengs68, if your fields are flat you will be ok with a Ford 4600. I use to run a TN65 pulling my 575 with a kicker and wagon on some hilly ground and I just had to do the hilly section first and when I got about half full I stayed up on the flat section. On the flat fields it wasn't a problem as the TN was able to pull fully loaded wagons behind the baler and stop just fine. Use your head and you will be ok, then when you get a bigger tractor you will have more fun.

 

[pengs68]

Our fields are fairly flat so it would be nice to get the majority of hay picked up onto a wagon.
My five year plan is a 570 or 575 Kicker pulled by a Ford 7610 and upping our bale total from 7,500 to around 20,000. Might turn into a ten year plan.
I am jealous of your 575. Watched a neighbor bale hay last summer with one and I was sold. Its a monster that needs to be fed!!

 

[jwcinpk]

I'm looking both for a faster square baler with a wagon hitch and wagons. I too have wondered why more folks aren't using this setup. Granted an accumulator would be great but for a cheaper alternative I'm going to try the wagon route. Given my storage buildings (old chickenhouses with 6 ft sidewalls) I think this is as close to automation as I can get. The wife has agreed to do the baling or switching out wagons. I figure if I can find 2-3 more dependable folks I'll be in business.
I've seen folks doing this with MF 135's so I don't think the 6000 will have any trouble with this setup on flat ground.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Our fields are fairly flat so it would be nice to get the majority of hay picked up onto a wagon.
My five year plan is a 570 or 575 Kicker pulled by a Ford 7610 and upping our bale total from 7,500 to around 20,000. Might turn into a ten year plan.
I am jealous of your 575. Watched a neighbor bale hay last summer with one and I was sold. Its a monster that needs to be fed!!

It was a lot of fun when I bought the 7710 and could really use the 575's capacity. I have ran the 575 behind a TN65, TL100A and 7710-II. If you put enough power on it you can have a lot of fun. I double and tripple up windrows (9' cutter) and can fill a wagon fairly quick. My one field I get around 140-160 bales on the first trip around with a double windrow.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

I'm looking both for a faster square baler with a wagon hitch and wagons. I too have wondered why more folks aren't using this setup. Granted an accumulator would be great but for a cheaper alternative I'm going to try the wagon route. Given my storage buildings (old chickenhouses with 6 ft sidewalls) I think this is as close to automation as I can get. The wife has agreed to do the baling or switching out wagons. I figure if I can find 2-3 more dependable folks I'll be in business.
I've seen folks doing this with MF 135's so I don't think the 6000 will have any trouble with this setup on flat ground.

Are you looking to go with a chute and flat wagons or a thrower and kicker wagons? The thrower is great if you are doing small fields as you can load up the wagons if labor is unavailable till later and if rain is approaching you can just tarp the wagons. I have a tarp that will cover three of my wagons if I park them side to side. I have some plastic twine that does a good job of tieing the tarp off if I need to tarp. So far I have been caught twice having to cover a load as rain approached, one time I covered a load as it was suppose to be delivered the next day and I didn't have any more room in the barns (all 5 wagons were filled for delivery, one in my barn, three in my friends warehouse and one left in the field).

One trick I found with unloading into low barns is that you can usually find conveyors that were hung in barns. If you have to unload on the end of the barn you can set the conveyor up and use the unloader to unload the bales where you are stacking and just move it down the line. If you have a 200' barn and a 100' conveyor then you eliminate half the walking and that is the hard part (draging the bales gets old quick )

 

[pengs68]

Robert, How many bales do you put up a year with your 575? I wish I was able to make a lot more bales this past season the way hay is selling here outside of Albany,NY. Hows hay moving where you live?

 

[chh]

chh, I have never seen a wire tie baler except for pictures online. Around here 2 tie balers using twine (natural is what the horse people want) are what rules the roost for small square bale operations. The small dairy farms who can't afford a round baler hire the baling done. About the only people who still do small squares are people who sell hay. But the horse market keeps us busy if you can provide a good service and quality hay.

That's funny. I didn't know that they even made twine square balers until after we had already switched to round bales. Still run onto piles of baling wire piled up in odd places. I see a lot more around at auctions now days since the price of steel has driven the price of baling wire thru the roof. Most have been brought in from other areas. Horse hay and a few die hards are about the only ones really using square bales around here now.

 

[dgl24087]

Well I am going to experiment with pulling a wagon behind our NH 310 this year.We have always dropped the bales into to a Farmhand sled accumulator. You can get about 8 bales in it it at a time. Then my brother and I load them onto a flatbed wagon driving to each pile. Last year we put in 7500 bales.
My father bought the baler at an auction 15 years ago for $3000 with a kicker. Then he sold the kicker for $1700. The hitch went with it. So I bought a whole hitch assembly on Ebay for $40 shipped and am looking for a chute and we will be in buisness.
My concern is our biggest tractor is a Ford 4600 which is only 52 HP. I dont know how big a load I will be able to pull making 50 pound bales. The old man wont budge on a new tractor or a kicker so I am trying to make the best of the situation.
I will let you know how I make out in June. (Only 5 months away!!!)

When I was a teenager, I worked for an uncle and cousin who baled with a JD 1530 (45 PTO HP), NH 269 then NH 310 baler, pulling a haywagon behind. We did this on fairly hilly ground in WV. We generally loaded 100 bales on the wagons.

 

[blueriver]

Not pulling a wagon has been a question of mine for along time, as a kid growing up in MN, My dad used a farmall M, I think they are about 35 drawbar hp. He had an International baler, I think a #27? The hack racks where JD running gear with a 8'X16' flatbed with a rear rack, good for I think around 125 bales of alfalfa. The neighbors had racks that everyone would just borrow them back and forth.

Hooked together, the M, the baler and the hay rack, one man stacking on the rack. The other tractor an H farmall was the tractor that pulled the load to the barn, to the elevator and then brought back the empty rack. This went on all day. Somtimes there was 2 or 3 loads waiting in the field. It just seemed to work good and never had to go back and pick up bales.

NOTE: Unlike today, there was always plenty of Highschool kids who looked forward to the summer work!!!

 

[Robert_in_NY]

This year was terrible as there was no rain and no second cutting on grass hay. I ended up doing 5000 this year as I didn't do a couple fields I normally do because the grass got too stemmy (canary grass). Then with the low first cut and no second cut I did not have any hay in the barn in September. Normally it is full into March as I normally do 10k bales of hay and 500-1000 of straw depending if I plant a crop and how much I bale for my friend.

I sold my hay early in the year for $2/bale to my new customers and $1.80 a bale for my regular customers. I got a great deal on fuel and bought my twine 2 years ago before the price went up. So I passed the deal along to my customers. This year I filled my tanks at $2.349 this fall (I was surprised I got that good a deal as it was 20 cents cheaper then Noco) by a local fuel supplier 3 miles down the road. Since last year was so light I should have plenty of twine for first cutting next year but will have to raise my price some anyway. I also charge 25 cents a bale to deliver and stack locally (usually make 5-10 cents a bale profit, 10 at the beginning, 5 at the end of the day).

I have had a lot of calls looking for hay so if you have any PM your number and I will refer you to them as they are getting desperate around here. I imagine around January people will really be scared here. If I didn't have a broke back I would be bringing up some hay from some of the better hay areas this last year and reselling it for a decent profit to some of these people who are price shoppers during normal years. If my normal customers needed more I would sell it at cost to them to keep them supplied.

I have some very good, loyal customers and they I do my best to take care of them. This last year I had a new customer who bought 2100 bales and already placed a order for 3k next season. My stacking service helped seal the deal with this customer as they didn't have to worry about a thing and they liked it. I am sure if I was greedy I could get more money stacking but I have never been greedy. As long as I make enough to keep me profitable I am happy and this year my baler and discbine will be paid off before I bale a single bale so then I will have a lot more money in my bank account then CNH's.

I am adding more fields each year and right now 12k is all I am set up to be able to normally handle. If I build a new barn it will be big enough to handle 15-20k and will accept a NH stack wagon to unload. This way I can do most of my haying with just one worker unless I am putting hay in customers barns in which I might park a tractor with a set of grabs on site and run the stack wagon to the site and drop in the yard. This way it is all automated unless it has to go into a loft in which case it will be half manual.

If I do get bigger I want to add a second baler with a quater turn so that depending on where the hay is going I can either use the kicker wagons or the NH stack wagon. It will give me a lot of versatility and a backup baler in case of a problem. I have found the more automated I get the more helpers I can find

And in case you are interested, I paid $7500 for my 575 3 years ago. It was used but in great condition and only the model 72 thrower had any wear.