Combines R50

We bought one 4 years ago and the only problem I had this past fall was both rear spindles broke (turned in water way with full tank on one and found blow hole with full tank on other). Be sure to fix all oil leaks on motor and blow out dust every couple of days. Doing mods listed on this sight will make it a beast. Only limiting factor I have found after mods is throat capacity.

Sounds to me you need to hyperize the feeder to bring that R50 full circle. It is truely amazing what them little machines will eat especially when the feeder is tuned also. let's get in touch if you should want to make it hungrier.

would like to add more capacity before next fall. Added the shock kit three seasons ago, but big eared corn still somewhat of a problem. Would love to hear what you have for the feeder house.

There is something unique to the R40-50 and maybe even ealiest R42-52s. That is the gap between the front feed chain drive sprockets and square tube. This gap needs to be no more than 1_2". You will likely find gap at 3". We just welded in a piece of 2"x4" steel tubing to back of square tube to close up the gap. Another thing about R40-50 and R60-70s is that there may be an arrow shaped piece of steel welded to bottom side of square tube just above the chain sections that slats are fastened to. These chunks of steel need to be removed. These pieces were bolted in on some later machines and were to act as a stipper to keep cobs from getting between chain and drive sprockets. I would remove them and chuck into garbage. Now what I would do to give your R50 feeder more capacity is this: Remove feeder and cut rear 20" of front feed floor loose. Now tilt floor down 3_4" from original position. Now reweld floor to new position and weld in piece of iron to get rid of square corner at both sides of feeder wall. If floor is worn it would be a good time to get replacement panel for a R55. It will be 1_4" thick and have new style seal mount area. The new panel will replace the rear 1' of floor. Next I would cut out the front 16" of rear feed floor. Replace floor with new 1_4" fabricated floor without humped up area. Weld this floor in with it tilted down 1" from original position. This will make feeder very hungry. I could get you the new fabricated floor and a couple more things. Get me your email address and I'll get you some pictures if you wish.

sounds like something I need to do. thanks for all the great advice. Corey Baker cbaker@greenapple.com

I have a friend that uses an R50 with an 8 row corn head and he thinks it works fine. I bet you would get along with it ok, but long rows are what will get ya if your corn is yielding really good because your grain bin wont have the capacity. You would just have to figure out a way to pick your way into and out of the field. Of course your grain bin will have just as much capacity as all the other colors combines of the day and I supposed they figured out how to do it.

I use to run an R50 with an 8-30" cornhead, 20' beanhead and got along fine. I have terraces and rolling ground. The machine could handle about as much grain on the shoe as you could put through the machine. As a whole I liked the machine because it seemed very well balanced, meaning, the rotor, shoe, and horsepower were all evenly matched up. Your limiting factor in 200 bu. corn will be horsepower but if I remember right I could run 3 - 3.5 mph in dry corn. But overall, it still has quite a bit of capacity. You may need to slow down some on side slopes and etc. depending on how much slope you have. I remember on 100 bu. corn I could run flat out in 2nd gear at 5.7 mph. I always thought that was pretty impressive. Weight of the cornhead on the R50 was no problem.

I don't know where you are located but I just traded 2 R50's. One has a 318 head and one has a 320 head. One has rear wheel assist with 67x34x30 tires and the other is two wheel drive with 30.5x32 tires. Both have had recent engine work. They're located at The Farm Shop in Edina, MO. The only reason I traded was to go to one bigger machine because I'm short a driver most of the time. If you want more info I'll be glad to answer any questions for you.

The R50 has a P3 in it. At very minimum, I would install the helical extension over the feeder opening and install the helicals into the discharge area. This will at least keep crop moving through the rotor better. But, you will have to remove the rotor to do this so why not do the rotor mods as well - quick and easy to do as long as you have it on the ground. Once your wheat is done, I would then look at installing the shock absorbers on your feeder drums and possibly the chaffer mod and hose mod on your flex head before going into corn and beans. I'm sure you will be quite impressed with the 50 compared to the F3. Don't be afraid to cut her loose and use that capacity - rotaries work best when you keep them well fed.

I think you should also consider just putting in a CDF rotor or have St. John's welding build you one. I have no personal experience with small P3 machines but our dealer has some R50-52's with CDF's and have sold more for this fall. I've used Hyper mods for many years in large P3's and yes they are a huge improvement over standard machine. However, CDF rotors win big time in corn.