Gleaner K vs Gleaner F

Hello
We currently have a gleaner k combine
It is a good unit and I know it's history pretty good
I have a chance to buy a gleaner F for a pretty good price but I don't know any of that units history
My question is it worth it to switch to the F or stay with the K
We currently cut about 25-30 acres of corn a year but we are looking at planting more acres in the future
Thanks for any suggestions
 
F will have about 25 % more capacity than a K. The F series were built for more
years than the K, thus more parts should be available, but many will interchange.
Most headers will also interchange with the correct adaptors. No real advantage,
unless capacity is the issue. Ben
 
I would be much more concerned about the condition than the size.

What about heads?

I'm assuming you're talking K vs F, not F2?

At my age, operator comfort would be an issue- such as heater, AC, hyd. fold auger, etc.
 
We have a nice 2 row corn head on the K
The F does not have a corn head so that will be another expense
I am talking about a plain K vs a plain F
the manual auger fold on the K is a pain sometimes but I can handle it
My thought is if the F will handle a 4 row head it would speed things up a lot but with that said we are only cutting around 30 acres
I could take the extra it will cost me to pay for the F and use it to fix my K really nice
 
If you have plans for expanding but still need a small size, The F would be a good fit.

What row spacing are you on now, and do you plan on staying with that size?
 
We are running 38" rows
I have no plans on changing row size
The only real problem I have with the k is it takes so long to fill the truck or maybe I am just running to slow
 
Have you ever experimented with pushing the ground speed up to see how far you can push it? My cousin used to push his E so that the KL238 head on it was hardly keeping up with his ground speed!

The limiting factor on the E was elevator capacity. Especially so in wet corn.
I had a K2 w/330 head, and it worked well. When I went to a F2 w/430, it was right back to fighting an over worked elevator, depending on how full the bin was, and how wet the corn was. Then, I discovered the K2 and F2 had the same elevator! I think they changed the elevator drive on the F3 to try to address the problem. I never had 200 bu corn until I had the F2, so that's another factor.

I suppose you could run 3 row wide on a F, but that would require small tires, and probably would be tight. Another issue might be which head you could find. As I recall, the orange 4 row head with the F was 435. It worked well with 36" rows. Not sure how well it would work with 38". If I'm remembering correctly, the A series, adjustable black head, was 438. Adjustable down to 36, or up to 40.
 
Orange heads came as 438 as well. They are pretty cheap these days.

I've seen two 3-row heads for an F, but I've never understood how that fit down the rows.

I've also seen one 6-30 head for an F2, boy I couldn't make a 1/2 round with that head on an F2, and one would be driving very slow, and need some weight on the rear....

Paul
 
I am happy with the ground speed of the K
We run in 2nd gear with the hydrostatic speed on the slower end
Cutting 2 rows at a time takes me about 3.5 hours to fill the truck
I think a orange head 438 on F would cut my time in half it takes to fill the truck
 
You never said how big your truck is...3.5 hours is a long time to fill it but that all depends on the size of the truck.
 

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