Feeding a Round Baler

[Bill VA]

Got to roll a few round bales with our new to us JD 335 round baler. It is a 4x4 string tie, 4 ft wide pickup, no gathering wheels.

Jammed the pickup one time starting a bale, but not to bad and once I got going, took the hay pretty good.

Question - any tips or tricks to starting a round baler and feeding it? What kind of ground speed can you go without issues?

On a learning curve. Any sage advice is much appreciated.

Thanks!
Bill

 

[paul]

I have yellow baler, but I assume the same issues.

Easiest to feed in light windrow, cover the full width of the pickup, drive steady but slow. In too dry hay or too long stems can be difficult. You want to feed in like a sheet of paper into a copier machine, slow steady even new hay helping slowly push in hay already in.

Once the bale sucks in and starts can drive full normal speed, no problems.

Weave back and forth to fill both sides, the middle will take care of itself. Especially at the beginning, a narrow windrow you need to be zig zagging a lot quickly. Fill all across as fast as you can.

Paul

 

[DanielW]

Tx Jim is likely going to hop on and give you oodles of advice; he knows more about Deere balers than most of the rest of us combined. But just a quick tip for that series of baler: Once you're rolling, focus on the edges and let the middle take care of itself. Don't weave constantly - if you do, you're feeding the middle 80% of the time and edges about 20% of the time and will make a barrel-shaped bale with ragged edges. Stick to one side until the other side shows a little low, then hop right over to the other side of the windrow and stay there until you need to hop back.

For starting, different hay conditions can cause different issues. I find it best to start in the centre and weave for a bit to get the whole width of the reel covered and get a good core started. Then focus on only the edges.

 

[hoghollow]

I have jd 535 round baler this is from operators manual, Select a gear that will give 4-5 mph at rated PTO speed and run tractor at low idle (900-1200 rpm) when starting the bale Drive forward at least 10 feet without stopping to allow enough crop into the baler to start rolling then resume running tractor at PTO speed.

 

[495man]

I bale 4 MPH with NH 4x4, have baled faster no issue.

I start bales at low RPM waiting for baler to start eating the windrow, once it's pulling it in, up to PTO RPM.

I've jammed it plenty crowding a bunch of hay at full speed & RPM.