Combines overloading the chaffer sieve 2366 in milo

Do you think there is more trash on the outside (indicating an air problem) or just more material in general (indicating uneven separation at the rotor)IJ Are you running a large volume of returnIJ That might explain overloading on the right side. Is the rubber paddle on the left side in placeIJ Just some thoughts. Mike

We had installed a small wire and then two large wire concaves. We replaced the small with a large and am running the slotted grates still. Dad ran all afternoon so apparently it helped. We must have been pulverizing too much considering the large amounts of leaves being ingested to get the milo heads. Do you think there is more trash on the outside (indicating an air problem) or just more material in general (indicating uneven separation at the rotor)IJ The trash is more of the powdery dust, fine type of trash including the grain than leaves. Are you running a large volume of returnIJ At times the return will go way up but this problem was constant at any speed. Is the rubber paddle on the left side in placeIJ Yes. Dealer suggested maybe adding another one there and one on the right side. Not done yet.

I agree that the large wire concaves are the way to go. Most people run the keystock grates to cut down on rotor loss, but we always run the slotted grates and get along fine. Make sure you slow the vanes down over the grates to allow the grain time to fall out. If you feel like you are over-threshing, you could speed the vanes up over the concaves. I'm guessing you have the standard rotor. We have the specialty, so over-threshing is not usually a problem. I'm not sure there is much you can do if you have to take in a lot of green leaves. That will make the return volume go up and probably make the chaffer loss go up also. Perhaps you can try to run the header just low enough to get the heads cut off, but no moreIJ

In the past we have run all small wire grates but that was cutting low yielding dryland milo. We thought we'd be in the same boat so we changed everything over to cut wheat like before but it appears we were wrong. There's more milo out there than we initially thought for the small wire concavess. I really don't understand installing the keystock grates because we're threshing every head as it is and that would put an even larger load on the sieves. "Perhaps you can try to run the header just low enough to get the heads cut off, but no moreIJ" The heads are so low that we're taking in almost all of the leaves to get the heads. Caught between two rocks there. Thanks.

I had a similar problem with dryland milo this year; low heads, juicy green stalks and leaves, and a big juicy load of silage on the chaffer. I have the deflector with an air chaffer and there was absolutely nothing I could do but go slow. The combine would process at 7 miles_hour but grain loss was unacceptable above 3.5 mph. I thought that there was something wrong with the combine until I cut some other milo (later date) that had taller stalks and dryer leaves and everything was fine.

That's not what I really wanted to hear but we've about decided that's the problem. Bad thing is all of the milo did not exert the head high enough to not eat a bunch of leaves, even my irrigated. Fortunately, we are running in the 5 to 6.5mph range with acceptable loss. thanks

Click below to see a photo of milo havested on 10-10-02 in Kansas. Without disclosing details, this sample was achieved by sieve modifications. Capacity in 120 bu. irrigated milo was at around 2.8 to 3.0 mph

Neat trick Marv. I'd like to know how to harvest 2002 milo already

Keep tuned for more details next spring. Parts will be available for next harvest season.