Combines STS shoe frame failures

Just had one break on our 9650 sts and we also had the seives break on one of our 9600's last year.I did not have any time to look at the sts yet, just put the combines away and an ice sorm came through and we have been with no power fo a week.

Broke frames in both 01 and 03 9650 walker machines, no trouble with 05 9660STS.

Have always had a problem with the chaffer frames cracking on the STS's that I have seen, we have solved the problem by welding a peice of angle iron to the middle of the chaffer frame at the rear (right over where the adjusting mechanism is) a six inch piece seems to work well. dont know if this will work on the 60 series w_ the electronic adjusters. seems JD could find something better than cheap pot metal to build those frames with. traded a 900 hr machine with w_ original chaffer and angle iron mod. new machine had less than 300 hrs and chaffer was cracked, luckily we saw it before we left the dealer w_ the machine.