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'Here' you see about 3 New Holland balers for every JD out there. Don't pay attention to any other brands, as both NH & JD perfected bale knotters bacck in the late 1950's. And the knotter _IS_ the baler!!!! It's what makes or breaks you. Any NH baler model 69 or newer (69 through 271 are the good old fashioned type that are lower capacity, but very durable dependable) in good shape would be a good deal, see them for $500-1000 all the time. I hear good things about JD 14T & 24T balers, they are about equal. Far less of them around 'here', but a good solid machine as well. If you are looking for newer models, any of the newer NH or JD are real good machines, buy on condition, don't worry about quality of design. The other brands - you might get a good one, you might get a bad one. Quailty from one machine to the next was varriable, even in the same model. Parts can be tough, finding a mechanic to understand the machine can be tough, and there sits your hay in a windrow with rain on the way..... .. Ick. I've been looking at the back of the same 270 NH baler all my life, getting 2000-6000 bales a year. Think dad bought it slightly used when I was too little to remember. I'm real disappointed if it misses more than 2 bales per 500 (barring wet hay or the ball change), and it hasn't used very many parts over the years. I hear the same for JD. Now, you need to start with a machine that was stored indoors, and taken care of. The knotter parts need to be kept up, not worn out & banged up. I hear folks with other color balers hoping they can get 10 bales in a row without missing a knot. What a miserable experience that would be! --->Paul
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