Vee wheel hay rake

[Anonymous-0]

I have a carted 8-wheel vee rake with a kicker wheel. In first cutting hay where you have some volume, the rake has a tendency to ‘ball-up’ the hay and plug. An obvious solution to this may be to adjust the angle of the “vee” so that there is maximum width where the hay exits the rake. However, this creates a wide windrow, probably 4 foot at least. If I had a big round baler I doubt this would be an issue. However, I use an older square baler, and such a windrow is too wide for the pick-up. Any advice?

 

[Tx Jim]

Sounds as if you have a fold in the air rake. Get you a bi-fold similar to my H&S h-cap rake and your troubles will be over.

 

[Anonymous-0]

TxJim is right, I bought my Sitrex from a neighbor so he could get a carted fold in the air rake. He borrows mine to bale square bales or uses a NH 56.

 

[Anonymous-0]

Yes Jim you are correct, it’s a carted wheel rake. I was hoping “Get another rake” was not the best solution to my problem though! What I might do is to set the rake to produce a very wide windrow and rake in the morning. Then go back around mid day with only one side of my rake down and just flip the windrow over for more complete drying. This is not an uncommon practice in the eastern corn belt where the humidity is a problem. Flipping the wide windrow over should also narrow it up enough so that my square baler can handle it. Using something like a NH56 is an option as I have access to one, but the working width of the wheel rake is twice that of the bar rake, plus it sets up a nicer windrow.

 

[Erik Ks farmer]

I have a 10 wheel carted rake, I took one wheel off the leading edge of each wing and reduced the amount of hay I was taking in. This allowed me to make a narrower windrow and helped relieve the plugging issue. Then when I wanted to rake lighter hay later in the season I reinstalled the wheels.

 

[Tx Jim]

(quoted from post at 11:58:21 03/06/13)
I have a 10 wheel carted rake, I took one wheel off the leading edge of each wing and reduced the amount of hay I was taking in. This allowed me to make a narrower windrow and helped relieve the plugging issue. Then when I wanted to rake lighter hay later in the season I reinstalled the wheels.

On a rake such as mine all I have to do to rake less hay is move the hyd control lever on the tractor. One of the problems with fold in the air(Butterfly) rakes is that the frames are next to the unraked hay whereas on mine the "rake wheels" are next to the unraked hay. The frames block hay flow in good hay. On my 14 wheel rake I can rake 3 or 2 or 1 nine ft swathes of hay determined by the amount of rainfall

 

[Tx Jim]

(quoted from post at 11:23:14 03/06/13) Yes Jim you are correct, it’s a carted wheel rake. I was hoping “Get another rake” was not the best solution to my problem though! What I might do is to set the rake to produce a very wide windrow and rake in the morning. Then go back around mid day with only one side of my rake down and just flip the windrow over for more complete drying. This is not an uncommon practice in the eastern corn belt where the humidity is a problem. Flipping the wide windrow over should also narrow it up enough so that my square baler can handle it. Using something like a NH56 is an option as I have access to one, but the working width of the wheel rake is twice that of the bar rake, plus it sets up a nicer windrow.

Raking with one side as you described is a built-in option with the H&S. Just pull a couple of pins and lock one set of wheels up plus the angle of the wheels(width raked) can be adjusted with the hyd cyl.

 

[Erik Ks farmer]

Agreed, I upgraded swather and baler this year, my next piece of hay equipment will be a rake like you show. Until then I'll get by with my wr22, it isn't great but better than a bar rake imho.

 

[Tx Jim]

Erik Ks farmer
My H&S was a big investment back in 2002. It is going to start it's 11th season and has now raked several 1000 acres(unknown amt) but I wouldn't trade it for a Vermeer R23A. At least we can change fields by moving a hyd lever instead of manually pushing together to get through a small gate. Also another nice option of the H&S over the carted(butterfly) rake is changing the windrow width without changing the raking width. As you well know this can't be accomplished with a carted rake.

 

[Ken Macfarlane]

I have some pictures on my machine that show welding strips to keep hay moving and not balling up on the beam in front. I'll see if I can find them.

 

[Ken Macfarlane]

If you go down a bit there are pictures of the modification in the link I attached.
V rake mods

 

[Tx Jim]

The Hesston rake in the photos has rake wheels behind the frame which is the reason the modification was required.

 

[Ken Macfarlane]

Yup, exactly, its an inexpensive mod that lets a lot more hay move
through a cart style instead of paying to move up to a big V.

 

[cannonball]

add a gathering wheel to your baler..