Combines Why there are no gleaners in EuropeIJIJ

My understanding is that the AC company was bought by Bamfords or somebody and they started selling Volvo combines (which were discontinued) and later Italian laverda combines later owned by Fiat. I think the Gleaner there was in need of a more modern version. Deutz trialed the AC rotary in Europe I think. The R's are maybe too wide for easy transport down EU roads. Maybe if Deutz had retained the Gleaners, there may have been some. I would expect straw and wet conditions or western and central Europe would make rotaries popular only in specialized places like France where alot of the corn is grown if they could get past the popularity of Claas and NH. The Massey rotaries built in Portage, Manitoba were sold in France for a while for corn harvest. They carried the Western Combine name. I saw a bunch of them outside the Canadian factory in the early 90's.

Hello Are you in EuropeIJ I am very interested in the British built Gleaner's if you would like to talk about them please e-mail me I would be more than happy to discuss all this with you.

Rotary combines are not favored in Europe because they often want to bale the straw and they don't want it chewed up. Also they often harvest crops when damp, cut close to the ground and stuff a lot of MOG through the combine. And finally corn for grain is a relatively minor crop. All reasons why a rotary combine is not the first choice.

Gleaner shipped some (4 to 7) machines to France in 1985 - 87 time frame. Performance in wheat was excellent, much better than Deutz had expected. Even with all the straw the losses were extremely low, grain damage low, capacity high. Straw breakup was a problem. But by that time Gleaner was losing $30,000 on every combine they built (per Mr. Ratliff). The program was ended. Richard Terrel at Gleaner has the most info on this program.

I think it was Richard that told us about them machines that were taken over there. I thought he had said that conditions were to tough and damp where they went not to mention extreme tough times hear in the states. Who knows but I do know they would of had a very tough time in them conditions with P1's if they had standard helicals like our machines in the states got. And if they were the P3's they certainly didn't have the extended cylinder bars which would of made them a dog. They probably went over with bunches of reverse bars too which would of damaged straw quality. Certainly no way to beat straw quality out of a conventional but I'm sure with a little work the rotarys would of made a much better showing. I remember Richard hounding us to order some C62s but we asked him why when we have the rotarys working so well. Of course that was after performing the nesessary hyperizing and straw isn't a big issue around hear.

im 90% sure ok 98% that those r60 combines and r70 combine were purchased by homiers in continental oh,shipped to ohio and resold around here. they are 40 miles from me in northwest ohio.

It was said on another forum that Agco has a rotary on trial in Europe now with modifications for their conditions. No info on results or which type of rotary it is.