the history of silage machines?

moy83

digger58 wrote: »

Fair point Moy, we just didn't have the option of more power, I remember a neighbor pulling a JF with a E27N Major (TVO) about 1965/6, he then got a 35, huge improvement! I would say up to the mid 70's most didn't have the option of more than 80 odd HP, most had a lot less, 6 cylinder Majors were fairly popular, I even saw an engine mounted on a single chop years ago, hand clutch and all. 188/5000 were big in their day, then again what choice was there? I haven't cut silage for years but the gear now is so big that it's left me behind. I worked a self propelled in about 80/81, JD 5420 I thought it was huge, you'd need that much horsepower now just to draw diesel to the rest of the gear.

80hp in the 70's must have been a fine rig ! Id say mid 90's when we got the 884 on the harvester but we would be slow advancers around here !

moy83

Greengrass1 wrote: »

He had to change to mengale harvester last year because he tried putting 10ft swards through the tarrup.
Split her open

Must've been some sight !

ford 5600

That Taarup of ours was driven for a few years in the beginning with a Fordson E27n. Then Power Major , succession of Ford 3000s, low 2nd gear, painful progress but a lot better than the alternative, rotten hay.

moy83

ford 5600 wrote: »

That Taarup of ours was driven for a few years in the beginning with a Fordson E27n. Then Power Major , succession of Ford 3000s, low 2nd gear, painful progress but a lot better than the alternative, rotten hay.

What used ye take it out of the pit with then in winter ? The old man used to cut it out with the hay knife , fork it onto a flat trailer , bring that as far as the sheds then barrow it into the stalls . I reckon it was mid 80s when he got his first blockcutter on the back of the tractor . Must ask him again

6480

i have a claas 51 trailed flywheel preision chop harvester , it has ten blades or kives on the face of the flywheel , if i take half the knives out would it leave the grass a bit longer

ford 5600

moy83 wrote: »

What used ye take it out of the pit with then in winter ? The old man used to cut it out with the hay knife , fork it onto a flat trailer , bring that as far as the sheds then barrow it into the stalls . I reckon it was mid 80s when he got his first blockcutter on the back of the tractor . Must ask him again

Sprang fork, transport box . Didn't get a grab till 1988 when we got into precision chop with a JF FC 80. JFs since to the present day. Pit covered with dung , stripping it was nearly as big a job, then got the brainwave to scatter grass seed on top, at least you had a scraw you could pull off. God, it was a lot of work for very little result.

Muckit

Have you a pic of the fish tail hitch you were talking about? Was it like a swinging drawbar?

digger58

Have tried the net but can't find a pic, will try and draw a sketch later. Not at all like a swinging drawbar, I only ever saw them on a UG or a Kidd, Anybody got a pic?

Nekarsulm

ford 5600 wrote: »

Sprang fork, transport box . Didn't get a grab till 1988 when we got into precision chop with a JF FC 80. JFs since to the present day. Pit covered with dung , stripping it was nearly as big a job, then got the brainwave to scatter grass seed on top, at least you had a scraw you could pull off. God, it was a lot of work for very little result.

Today came across a copy of Dairy Farmer magazine from 1957, with a two page photo feature on all the silage harvesters available to the progressive farmer that year. Will try to scan or photo copy if any one is interested.


Well remember the FC80. Only 2 feed rollers, and easily blocked, especially when you were using a PZ165 mower etc. Crossing swathes was a big No-No. Block it and you were off the tractor with a buckrake tine in the hardy spicer turning it backways. The buckrake tine lived on the tractor for this purpose. Started out with it on a Leyland 272, then the wet year of 1985/6 really showed the limitations of 2wd. Then had it on a 3140 4wd for a couple of years till we went double chop.

digger58

Great to see a scan of that, I remember we had a thing nicknamed "The walking stick" shaped like one but a good sharp point at one end for getting at blockages and as you said the other end for turning driveshafts backwards, Oh the glorious hardship of it all!

digger58

Found a pic of the hitch on an old kidd rotoflail, I had to enlarge the image so its a bit grainy. When the trailer hitch "ran" up the "fishtail" the front of the ring on the trailer hitch hit against the pin pushing it down, to release it you backed slightly to take off the pressure and pulled the rope, this pulled the semi circular pin up and it clipped in the open position with two pieces of spring steel on either side which sat in small groves until it was tripped again by the next trailer hitch hitting it, Very simple and fast when you got used to it, and as I said before, when the trailer was facing down towards the harvester so it didn't run away from you.

digger58

Rest of article about the hitch, it was even timed!

ford 5600

Nekarsulm wrote: »

Today came across a copy of Dairy Farmer magazine from 1957, with a two page photo feature on all the silage harvesters available to the progressive farmer that year. Will try to scan or photo copy if any one is interested.


Well remember the FC80. Only 2 feed rollers, and easily blocked, especially when you were using a PZ165 mower etc. Crossing swathes was a big No-No. Block it and you were off the tractor with a buckrake tine in the hardy spicer turning it backways. The buckrake tine lived on the tractor for this purpose. Started out with it on a Leyland 272, then the wet year of 1985/6 really showed the limitations of 2wd. Then had it on a 3140 4wd for a couple of years till we went double chop.

You must have bought the t-shirt that was an FC 80 as well. Our 1st year with it was 85 , it was like trying to feed dung into it , the grass was sogging wet, we had a Fahr km 22 5ft6, we stuck the buckrake tine into the piece of box iron the front wheel was mounted on. Worked it with the Ford 5600. After it I bought a fct 110 jf still worked a 5ft6 in 1st cut , got a contractor with a 10 ft for the bit of 2nd cut. Completely different machine. Best output in first cut with narrow unconditioned swart was 6 acres in 3hrs 20 minutes with a crystal driving it. Had 3 of them and gave 600 punts, 700 euro for 2 - 1 for parts and 300 euro for the last one , had parts to spare.

kingchess

just found this thread-we had the taarup 40 inch and before that a yellow coloured one called a pierce in the late sixties-went to the scrap yard a few years ago

Nekarsulm

:rolleyes:

ford 5600 wrote: »

You must have bought the t-shirt that was an FC 80 as well. Our 1st year with it was 85 , it was like trying to feed dung into it , the grass was sogging wet, we had a Fahr km 22 5ft6, we stuck the buckrake tine into the piece of box iron the front wheel was mounted on. Worked it with the Ford 5600. After it I bought a fct 110 jf still worked a 5ft6 in 1st cut , got a contractor with a 10 ft for the bit of 2nd cut. Completely different machine. Best output in first cut with narrow unconditioned swart was 6 acres in 3hrs 20 minutes with a crystal driving it. Had 3 of them and gave 600 punts, 700 euro for 2 - 1 for parts and 300 euro for the last one , had parts to spare.

If you had a perfectly laid swath, drying nicely, it wasn't too bad. But that was rare. Neighbour had a FC80 as well. Initially we had one between us, think there was a grant of some sort for co-operation with machines. Neighbour then bought a Deutz mo-co, and that made a great difference to how the FC80 performed. The Deutz was a bit of a pain however. Sometimes when you lifted it out of the swath, the circlip that held on each drum (4 drum mower) would fail, and that drum stayed on the ground. Big farmers back then were buying Grasshopper mowers, remember them?
If you broke a pick-up tine on the JF, the broken piece could jam the pick-up reel, and break the cast end spider wheel within the pickup that carried the bars the tines were bolted to. we solved that by getting lengths of alloy bar and feeding them through the row of pick-up tines, with a washer and spilt pin on each end. then when you broke a tine, it just hung on the alloy bar and couldn't escape.
Then there was the fiasco of throwing two swaths together with a haybob , in an effort to speed things up. Lose a haybob tine in the swath and see what happened. My personal best was 18 knives broken. Hit a lost tine, jammed on the brakes when I heard the bang, and stuck the tractor in reverse. Only to pick up a few of the broken knives from where they were spat down behind and run them through again.:rolleyes:
when we put it on the 3140, you couldn't see the pickup, so mounted a big lorry mirror on an arm up at the Front attachment point of the side mounted FC80. Bloody well go blind, or hypnotised watching the pick-up in a mirror.:D

Nekarsulm

From Dairy Farmer Magazine. December 1957.

vincenzolorenzo

Nekarsulm wrote: »

:rolleyes:

If you had a perfectly laid swath, drying nicely, it wasn't too bad. But that was rare. Neighbour had a FC80 as well. Initially we had one between us, think there was a grant of some sort for co-operation with machines. Neighbour then bought a Deutz mo-co, and that made a great difference to how the FC80 performed. The Deutz was a bit of a pain however. Sometimes when you lifted it out of the swath, the circlip that held on each drum (4 drum mower) would fail, and that drum stayed on the ground. Big farmers back then were buying Grasshopper mowers, remember them?
If you broke a pick-up tine on the JF, the broken piece could jam the pick-up reel, and break the cast end spider wheel within the pickup that carried the bars the tines were bolted to. we solved that by getting lengths of alloy bar and feeding them through the row of pick-up tines, with a washer and spilt pin on each end. then when you broke a tine, it just hung on the alloy bar and couldn't escape.
Then there was the fiasco of throwing two swaths together with a haybob , in an effort to speed things up. Lose a haybob tine in the swath and see what happened. My personal best was 18 knives broken. Hit a lost tine, jammed on the brakes when I heard the bang, and stuck the tractor in reverse. Only to pick up a few of the broken knives from where they were spat down behind and run them through again.:rolleyes:
when we put it on the 3140, you couldn't see the pickup, so mounted a big lorry mirror on an arm up at the Front attachment point of the side mounted FC80. Bloody well go blind, or hypnotised watching the pick-up in a mirror.:D

Ah yes, plenty of memories there. We had a Deutz mower originally and you had to be fierce careful to keep the swart centred on the pickup or you'd be down and winding it back. We actually made up a handle using a hardy spicer from and old pto so spent plenty of time swinging out of that.

I had forgotten about breaking the wheel at the end of the reel. 'Breaking the cross' as me grandfather used to call it. That was the stuff of nightmares alright, down tools and off for half the day looking for spares! Having said all that they were a great little machine, and one farm could be completely self sufficient for a relatively small outlay. The best we got out of it was 17 acres in one day, driving with an International 885. Silage time and all the activity around it was what got me hooked on machinery and farming in the first place. Even to this day I'd recognise the sound of a JF a mile away. Great memories!

ford 5600

kingchess wrote: »

just found this thread-we had the taarup 40 inch and before that a yellow coloured one called a pierce in the late sixties-went to the scrap yard a few years ago

Never saw a pierce harvester, what was it like ? Rare machine , any one else have or had one ?

blue5000

Happy new year to ye all, seeing as the thread is 10 years old thought I would share a photo from the early 60’s or late 50’s. I believe it’s the DB Hurricane I mentioned earlier in the thread pulled by a Ford son major diesel. Anyone know what the truck is?

tabby aspreme

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121554016#Comment_121554016

Looks like a Ford Thames ET6, my Dad had a later model Thames Trader NC, I still remember the first time I drove it on my own I was about 12😊.

The earliest memory of silage I have, was a single chop, I think a JF driven with a Ford 3000, a Nuffield drawing the trailer, only one trailer needed as the pit was in the field being cut, and a Massey 65 with a Kverneland trip buckrake on the pit which was up against a graveyard wall, and a few lads with 4 grain fork's levelling the pit

Lime Tree Farm

What a great read this thread. Best laugh I had was the army guy telling local farmers to put the rain gear on for saving hay.

Screenshot_20240104_085920_Adblock Browser.jpg

Good loser

There was a sunken area in the 11 acre field with a fall out of it in 1968. Silage contractor arrived with single chop and buckrake in trailer; as we pulled out the buckrake he asked me where was the tractor? I said I was going to level it manually - no comment. The first three loads weren't too bad as they sort of tumbled into the hollow. After that it was murder on a hot day with no help (I was fit).

Covered with 50 mm clear plastic (not 500) and some ground limestone. Self fed, it was a disaster; most plastic whipped away before Winter. Towards the end there was about 6" edible silage along base in spots.