Square Baler Output - Length vs Weight

Bill VA

Well-known Member
Posted this on another forum, thought I'd post a variant of it here:

For those of you that are making a spinkin' tight square bale of hay 14 x 18 inch cross section, and for those of you that have actually weighed and measured, what is your typical weight vs length? Grass hay - not legumes.

I know there are variables with humidity, but generally speaking, what is your typical bale length vs weight when your baler is really dialed-in and you've got a no-apology needed, nice tight bale of hay in front of your most picky customer? What make and model baler are you using?

Tweaking my bale length this year and am curious as to what weight I can expect vs it's length.

Again, talking about grass hay, not legumes.

Thanks,
Bill
 
Bill,
We use a bale wagon to pick up alot of the hay so we are picky about length. I set the baler to spit out a 40" bale and they vary from 40-42". Those are consistently 60# bales coming out of a JD 346. If I don't touch the baler and go over to the oat field the bales will be 70#.
My MF 124 bales will be 5# lighter at the same length in the grass fields. The JD really does spit out a brick.
 

I find that size of windrow and thus number of flakes per bale make a pretty big difference too. When I had my JD and was baling onto the ground I made 40 inch bales. Going to the MF-224 with thrower I shortened them a couple inches and I suppose they went down by five pounds or so from 45 to 40. If I have heavier hay and the flakes get to be five inches the bales will be 8-10 lbs heavier.
46417.jpg
 

The measuring and weighing I did shows the old NH68 making a bale avg 32" long weighing 35-38lbs over the 7 or 8 bales I checked. I get some light ones now and again, probably due to windrow variation. One field they were really tight on they weighed several pounds more but weren't any longer. I'd like them a bit longer, say 36-38", but everyone here and the neighbor likes them a bit shorter.

FWIW, my neighbor, who sold $60K worth of hay last year, has bales that aren't any tighter or better shaped than mine and they certainly aren't as heavy, but he uses a kicker.
 
Bill, I shoot for a 36" bale, and they may vary 2" (+/-).
They generally average 40# (+/-) for weight.
I try to make them tight enough that they will stay together when thrown by the thrower on my NH 570, but not so tight that they explode when they land in the wagon!
YMMV, HTH, Dave
 
Nice, thank you! The pallets take a lot of work and wood, but make the system possible, and store the hay nicely.

New Holland made a complicated wagon that would pick up from the ground and stack bales sort of like that, without the pallet. They had 2 sizes, about 60 bales and 99 bales per load. Some were even self propelled.

Paul
 
Well, now, how'd that happen? I swear I was replying to the fella from Europe, and it got on your thread. Obviously I messed up, but usually I know when I goof, I donno what hapepned here.

I enjoyed your message and thread too?

Paul
 
327 Deere. Bales are 32-34" and 50-55#. 7200 poly twine. Weight will slip if the hay is real dry or I push it up to 400 BPH. This baler also has an aggressive... custom made plunger extension on it.

Rod
 
(quoted from post at 23:27:31 03/07/17) 327 Deere. Bales are 32-34" and 50-55#. 7200 poly twine. Weight will slip if the hay is real dry or I push it up to 400 BPH. This baler also has an aggressive... custom made plunger extension on it.

Rod

My experience with my JD 347 is a faster ground speed will increase bale weight & length of bale due to larger flakes of hay being formed in the bales. Plungerhead extensions merely push hay further back away from needles when they enter bale chamber to bring twine or wire up to tying system. PH extensions could make bales lighter @ higher BPM due to the extra length in the twine or wire around the formed bale in chamber when tying.
 
The old Oliver 62-T baler I bought for $200 with a hydraulic bale tensioner makes the tightest most consistent bale of any baler I have ever owned (includes JD,NH,Ford) in dry hay
a 34" bale will average at least 50 lbs using poly twine too.It was set for about 44 inch bales when I go it,didn't take handing many of those for me to cut it back(LOL)Those Mennonite boys
are a whole lot stronger than me.
 
I really can't comment on high BPH output with this baler before I put the extensions on it because it just couldn't do more than 200 without
falling apart or breaking bales. The reason I added the extensions was that when I tried to crowd the baler it would start missing. The 3 hay
dogs in this baler just didn't seem to keep up at higher production rates. Bale quality and weight does suffer with these extensions tho.
I've also upgraded the drive line to a class 5 from the 3 it had...
IIRC, the extensions were 1 x 1/4" bar welded to the existing surfaces of the plunger.

Rod
 
With brome hay and an old IH 47 wire tie my bales are usually 32"-34" long and weigh in at 45-50 pounds. With junior high help I don't want them to weigh much more. The baler can make them a lot tighter and heavier with about 70 pounds being as heavy as I've every tried. With the old machinery I use it just seems like a lot of extra stress (you can feel it in the tractor laboring some) that could lead to expensive repairs.
 

When we where doing all square bale hay dad set the balers for 36" long 45-50 lb bales. Back then young boys looked for summer hay hauling jobs for run around money.
Dad said a young boy could handle 45-50 lb bales all day and they would want to help again.
65-70+ lb bales would wear them out before the end of the day and they wouldn't want to help again.
Many of the area farmers went by that same philosophy and us young boys would go from farm to farm hauling hay. Farmer didn't have to look for help, just let word out he as going to bale hay and his phone would be ringing off the wall from boys looking for work.
Couple of farmers would only bale 65-75 lb bales, they always had trouble finding help.
The few square bales we put up now are still 45-50 lb, it's hard to get young boys to work these days and the lighter bales are easier on my old back.
 
Bill, 4690 Hesston in-line. 34-36 in bale run in the 60 lb range. This is an average, so figuring 34 bales to the ton we have no complaints on weight or quality. Most all of our hay goes to regular horsey people, [stables or feed stores]. Hay not deemed suitable for picky customers goes to our own animals or goat people. That is hay with a blackberry vine or some other undesirable things in it. John Deere 336-338 balers set up the same way. Never change speed in the field once we start baling, no increase or decrease. Nice consistent windrows like I have seen you post pictures of and find the sweet spot for your to feed the hay from. Right, center, or in between on your pick-up. Every baler will feed a little differently. Good luck as it looks like you are on the right track
 

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