Combines sweeps report

Thanks for the kind words. We wouldn't run a machine without the sweeps. They are proving their worth especially when the going is tough (earlier in the day, later in the night, green crops like milo, tough to convey crops like edible beans, large MOG crops like sunflowers, ect.) Some guys are even setting up what I call a super sweep rotor. They just switch the rotor and mow threw some of these special crops with outstanding speed with bin samples second to none. I might have to set up a Bison to fit these small rotors some day even though the normal rotor can be set up to do an amazing job for its size. Someone was asking earlier about running a 30' head on one of these small machines which makes me a little nervous but only because of it sitting on such a narrow feeder house. I have guys pushing 27' heads with R50s mainly because we didn't have a 24 or 25' for them. You might have to look into the pipe trick behind cutter bar for your 324. Or maybe if you have a '90 or newer HCC reel you should look into the orbit drive. A trick that tbran has mentioned is set ground pressure very light so cutter bar will run flater to header. This will eliminate some of the flex but if your ground allows this it should help. The newer 500 head has the cutter bar approx. 3" closer to auger flighting. The 800 has same gap to flighting but with the 7" flighting you'll have the room for very tall crop which I believe is what they had in mind for all the clearance to auger on the old 300s. With the green crops we have today it seems the gap from sickle to auger is often times just to great on the old 300s. Full finger augers and air reels would be good tricks to think about. Thanks again for your kindness!!!

Dan, could you just give a quick explanation on what you call a "super sweep" rotor please! Season is starting to look good down here in South eastern Australian grain belt but not too good further north in NSW or Queensland. Western Australia is good in places and bad in others. We are planting at the moment but have temporarily been held up with some rain which is making everybody walk around with a smile on their faces after the past 10 horrible years.

First it give me chills up my spine to think you guys might have chance at a crop this year. Nothing would make me happier than guys like you being able to heal some wounds. Hears hoping the very best for you!! For the most part a super sweep rotor only has four rasp bars spinning in row D (row next to gear box) and four rasp bars spinning in row C (row on left side of concave). Otherwise the spots in row D and C without rasp bars have sweeps as well as all positions in B and A. This setup allows easy the thresh crop to easily seperate from MOG and go to shoe while green stems and or wet stalks go to discharge. This is so very important in some conditions or crops you may get into. I'm so glad the Gleaner has an extemely easy to R and R cylinder for it can be adapted to most extreme crops without the bother of switching concaves. Most operators in our area just make a few simple adjustments between a great varity of crops but the guys that realy want to shine in a certain challenging crop can go the extra nine yards with a super sweep rotor.

Dan! Sitting in the office because it's a bit wet (Well by your standards it would be most likely a bit dry! but were happy 240 mm so far, for the year!) Ok, have you had the chance to try out less pitch rotor sweeps at allIJ going from 6 inch to 3 inch pitch and more turns around the rotor sep end, we think it might make MOG a bit more controllable! Any thoughts! Rolf

Well we've went from worry of drought to worry of seed rotting in ground and or getting the rest of the crop in!! No I have not tried any less pitch sweeps. That might be an absolute wonderfull idea. We just have been getting along so good with original design that I don't see myself spending any more time on it. While designing what we have I wanted to cover complete area of removed cylinder bars while saving room between cresents or sweeps for corn cobs. This gap or space may not be needed as long as a sweep is aiding the rasp bars to keep material flowing no matter condition or cylinder RPM. I do think we would see less wear on lesser pitch sweeps especially in the high RPM crops. You might want to check with JR's dealer for I believe he has played around with other pitches and maybe he has a good gut feeling what is the best. If you figure even at 200 RPM how many times that sweep covers the same spot you may be spot on with lesser pitch and still get excellant results. Best of luck