Combines What do you think of the Gleaner Flex Head

[Tom_Russell]

It sounds like you should have gone trick-or-treating with the kids.

 

[MW]

I agree. We run a 800 series 30' flex head and believe it is the worst head we've ever owned. We run it on a Massey combine. We had to go to the Gleaner head when AGCO changed the Masseys over to the Gleaner feeder house design. We previously ran Massey 9750 and 9120 flex heads and believe they did a much better job of cutting and feeding than the Gleaner head. We even converted our 800 series head to a full fingered auger to help with feeding which it did help tremendously. (Why AGCO doesn't offer this from the factory is a mystery to me). Without the full fingered auger the big flighting is worthless in soybeans. But since we added the fingers to it the big flighting is put to work and works well. We run the standard AGCO cutterbar and can't get it to cut as well as our old Massey heads we've tried tilting it down but then it wants to drag. We will probably try the SCH cutterbar sometime in the future to see if it helps.

 

[pack8fan]

Actually he is right about the not cutting close enough to the ground. I have a 20' 8000 head and the knife is still too high off the ground just like my 500 head was.

 

[big_orange]

Have had a 800 head since 2001,thought the same as you,that they didn't cut low enough.This year I played with adjustments and I think it will cut with any Deere head.I am running a standard cutterbar in drilled beans,and unless the beans are totally green and short even feeding has not been a problem.

 

[Illinois_Gleaner]

I have a 800 25' that I run on a R72.I think it does a good job.The beans were poded low this year but I was able to cut them off just fine.Do any of you adjust anything. We have guys around here that would have trouble with anything and others that get along great with the same thing.I dont care what color anything is it is only as good as the operater.I am not saying any thing towards you guys that has commented.But some people dont adjust anything.I would sure buy another one.I cut around red and green ones all the time they dont cut any better then my 800.This was my 4th year with the head.I dont even run my automatic header,I just set it down and cut. Gpurrs will back me up on that one. Illinois Gleaner

 

[Hibred]

AdjustedIJ Yes many times, we even had the guys from Agco out and they agreed with us. We have a 2000 R62 and there is no feederhouse tilt and if you try and tilt the front of the knife it bulldozes right at the curve of the shoe and then you wear the heck out of the plastic skid shoes and very quickly. Our Gleaner dealer modified the skid shoes and it will now cut much lower but after this modification doesn't have quite the flexibility, this i can live with and i admit it does a nice close shaving job. The guys from the factory were in on this modification and assured me a change would be made at the factory soon, this was 3 years ago and now its time to look at a new machine and head and i am going to have to go through this all over again with the mods we made to the head. I guess what i am trying to say here is Agco makes a great combine but there flex heads need a major overhaul to cut as nice as i would like to see. Agco has pictures of the mods we made to our flexhead so they are well aware of everything. Yes we did make many adjustments, thanks again for all your comments and thoughts too.

 

[Silver_Shoes]

We run a 20ft 800 and a 25ft 8000. Have lots of experience with both heads and they dont cut quite as low as some other brands I have noticed but I dont have a problem with that. We rarely will ever sweep a rock in and we dont let many beans in the field on the 2.5 in stem that might be left. The tall flighting is a huge help, again we rarely have feeding problems. Cut 1500 acres of beans this year, running in rocky hills to flat flat bottoms, tall to short beans. And gleaners fingers dont break like other brands, they will bend if you catch a rock but have never seen one break and go through the machine. We have guys that actually plugged up augers and elevators with the other colors. And ask a guy with an sts what happens when they break off an slip though the combine, bing bang rumble rumble crash. I realize they could use improvements but the other guys will improve just as gleaner does, deere had plenty of troubles with sickle heads and electrical problems this year. I guess I am just so happy we had a good year, after 3 years of drought in a row. Bless you all and I hope things get better for ya, I know they did for me.

 

[Trit]

Interested in what you did....

 

[NDSilvrSeedr]

I run a 8000 30ft with a Crary air reel on a R62. This year I ran with two 9600s, one with the new John Deere head and one with the older 930 with an air reel. After spending a day adjusting all three heads, I could cut as low as the new Deere head and at about the same speed, the older head had to run about one mph slower and it could'nt cut as low. We all started with new sickles. The only thing I don't like about the 8000 head is once in a while it gets to shaking. I have checked every thing and even took it to the dealer and had them check it out.

 

[big_orange]

Bar tilt,spring pressure,loosened bolts on the paralel linkage on the ends of the head ,to make sure the ends were as low as the center.lubed all the pivot points with a product called Blaster,that relly helped,and clean the dirt from the top of skid shoes after every load.It now floats,flexes and cuts low,does a real nice job.