Self Propelled Baler

[JimMeade]

What do you think of the Vermeer self-propelled baler?  Looks pretty sweet to me.  I wonder what they cost?

http://www.agriculture.com/news/machinery/vermeer-introduces-first-self-propelled-baler?utm_source=a...

I like the zero-turn feature and know it will make baling corners and waterways much easier.

[r3020]

Just looks to me like another engine to worry about. Another radiator. Another starter. Couple of batteries. Another alternator. Another water pump. Pretty easy to back up drop in a hitch pin and connect a wire. I wonder how much harder it makes it to work on the baler.

[Longcreekfarms]

I doubt that the round baler will take much market away. Now a large square with enough weight to pull an accumulator behind it might be a go.
I still want a double round baler that you never have to stop with. Two separate chambers that can tie one and eject it while it's filling the other.

[hardwayfarmer]

A year or so ago we saw a video from Vermeer where they were working on a round baler with a second chamber behind the first one.  The bales were formed in the front chamber and then transferred to the rear chamber for wrapping and ejection while the front chamber started a new baler.  That enabled non-stop baling.  Now, if they could add that feature to this self-propelled baler, with a turntable on the wrapping chamber so it could eject the wrapped bale to the side they'd really be increasing productivity. 

r3020, I believe the video for the self-propelled baler said the baling mechanism could be removed in 10 minutes for service.

[Longcreekfarms]

I had an idea of two side by side chambers with a gate or rake wheel that transfers the windrow to the opposite side when the first is actuating a tie. Maybe an override button for ejection on hilly hay fields.
Of course I also want to mount a right and left delivery rollabar on quick attach of the front end loader of the baler tractor. Hay that is extremely dry could be raked and baled at the same time. Krone or Claas had a video of a rotary rake mounted on the front end a year or so ago. I can just see beating all the leaves off of alfalfa with that outfit.

[hardwayfarmer]

Vermeer experimented with the side-by-side round baler concept years ago.  A couple of drawbacks to that idea are the width of two bale chambers compared to one, and of course the cost of two complete bale chambers.

Back in the 70s IH had a narrow parallel-bar rake that mounted on the front of the tractor pulling a baler or forage harvester so two windrows could be combined just ahead of the harvesting machine.  I think, without digging out one of my old IH Buyer's Guides, that it was probably hydraulically driven.  Seems like it wouldn't be too hard to make a homemade  wheel rake that would do the same thing, either on a loader or mounted to the tractor frame.  Or you could go all out and get a tractor with a front 3-point hitch.

I think the most unusual hay raking set up I've seen was along the Indiana Toll Road a few years ago.  On an Amish farm they had taken the tongue off an old steel-wheeled side-delivery rake and made a push bar for the back end.  It was being pushed across the field by a skid loader!