Found a video of Leroy's "Invisible" twine sp

Leroy mentioned this baler twine splice on another thread (no pun intended) as a solution to my fat old square splice knots in my 7200 sisal twine binding up my knotters.

Looks easy enough. Looks like the key is to make it so that the part with the shared/frayed strands gets pinched when you give it the final cinch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3KiAFPsPvE

There is also a video for a "fisherman's knot"... which also may have a lower profile than my big and clunky square knots.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTQzpG1Spuw

This post was edited by lastcowboy32 on 06/30/2022 at 12:57 pm.

As you may have seen, I tried LeRoy's splicing knot and it was amazing. Worked for me on the first try. A knot approximately the
same diameter as the 9000 sisal. I have not tried it thru the baler yet, but it has to be better than my fat knots. gobble

My dad showed me the fuzzy splice 55 years ago just when we started using twine. It is great. Jim

I learned from my FIL, square knot but before pulling it tight I roll it between my palms so it loosens the fibers and elongates the knot. Then pull
it tight and trim the ends. Only time I had a problem was when the knot landed right in the knotter when it cycled.

We used the fuzzy knot on the square baler, worked fine.
But they seemed to come apart using it in the round baler...so use a square knot there, but use a pair of dikes to trim the ends back close.

(quoted from post at 13:20:22 06/30/22) As you may have seen, I tried LeRoy's splicing knot and it was amazing. Worked for me on the first try. A knot approximately the
same diameter as the 9000 sisal. I have not tried it thru the baler yet, but it has to be better than my fat knots. gobble

Click to expand...

I tried all three baling last night.

I did my regular square knot... no problem.

I did Leroy's fuzzy splice... no problem.

I tried the fisherman's knot, and just cut it out and remade it as a square knot. Maybe I didn't do it right, but in 7200 sisal, my fisherman's knot seemed to be as big as a golf ball.

I think my issue is my twine discs. They must be worn, or out of adjustment. The baler is tying knots and wiping them perfectly, the only time I've had issues is when the splice knot pulls through (which tests the twine discs, because the splice knot slides hard against the hay in the chamber) and when my bales start to get too tight (which also tests the twine discs by pulling the twine with more friction)

The issue came to a head last night, because what I was baling was so non-uniform. The field had patches of nice dry timothy where I had to keep the bale clamps tight to prevent making puffballs...and the same row might have patches of thick clover, which was "dry" for clover, but packs way differently than timothy... throw in some wild parsnip and goldenrod on the backswath for even more variety... I was on and off the tractor 50 times baling four loads to keep the bales right and keep my knots happy.

My twine balls changed over on the nice packing stuff, no problems there. When I encountered the clover wads though... I had some issues.

It seems that my twine discs have a narrow zone of bale tension to operate in. With the field being so patchy, I couldn't get a feel for what tension to use. Usually, I can just check a few bales on the wagon and combine that with how the tension cranks "feel". That feel wasn't very good. The baler might have a wad of clover in the pickup, one bale of clover tied and a bale of timothy under the tension clamps. The bales in the wagon could be a mish-mash of timothy, clover, other stuff... all good feed at the stage of growth we baled it, but all different when it comes to packing and twine friction.

I took Advanced Calculus in college... so I can recognize when I have too many variables to deal with

It was always just as knot was trying to go turu the knotter.,

Tried it, rewatched the video, retried it....looks good but doens't work in my state. Must be against the law here.

How far did you get the ends frayed? At least an inc and half? It was the 7200 ft twine as there was nothing else then. I don't know if on the 9000 ft twine if there are enough strands for it to work. And know nothing about the plastic twine. Dad bought one bale od it and it caused so much truble it got tossed. The new twine might be made different now, I don't know. The baler left in 81 so have not had a chance to try it in 41 years. All I do know is it worked good then. Not getting the fraid ends long enough and pushed together far enought it will not work, 2 inch might be better than the inch and a half.