Should I Be Interested?

A good friend of a very good friend has a "Field Chopper" as they keep calling it, that he keeps trying to pass onto me.. I think he wants $250 for it.

Here is what I think I know about it! Have seen it once from the road;

It is off-set to the right, like a baler or swather.

Pull behind.

PTO drive.

Red with yellow features (fairly sure it is Sperry/New Holland, maybe just NH)

Been sitting in one spot for a LONG time.

Tires are I am sure trash.

Has a really tall chute on the right side of it, for blowing into wagons and stuff.

I think, this is the kind where you would mow your "material" (ie hay, grain, whatever) into a windrow, then this picks it up like a baler before doing what ever it does to it?!

Not sure if I should be interested in it or not. I know this is part of the silage making process, which I will more than likely never be a part of, but maybe to fix it up and resell? Is there demand for these things??

If anyone has a better guess as to what it may be, PLEASE let me know!!! Thanks my friends!

Bryce

Regardless of the brand, that's a tool that guys need right when they need it - no break downs. Around here it would have to be very field worthy for guys to be interested. Sileage isn't something that everyone does anymore - usually just the big guys.

Might be worth the scrap parts.

Only you know if it is of interest to you. You should know what you like and dislike

Refer to WIZZO'S post below to see pic of that type of silage chopper in operation. Notice the Other pieces of equipment needed for silage operation.

KEH

These choppers are rarely used for silage production here anymore. Some local brands have proved to be pretty good for wood chopping. You just have to make a chute in front instead of the pickup and manually feed the wood through this chute. Don’t know if the chopper in question would be suitable for this.

(quoted from post at 13:52:52 06/13/15) A good friend of a very good friend has a "Field Chopper" as they keep calling it, that he keeps trying to pass onto me.. I think he wants $250 for it.

Here is what I think I know about it! Have seen it once from the road;

It is off-set to the right, like a baler or swather.

Pull behind.

PTO drive.

Red with yellow features (fairly sure it is Sperry/New Holland, maybe just NH)

Been sitting in one spot for a LONG time.

Tires are I am sure trash.

Has a really tall chute on the right side of it, for blowing into wagons and stuff.

I think, this is the kind where you would mow your "material" (ie hay, grain, whatever) into a windrow, then this picks it up like a baler before doing what ever it does to it?!

Not sure if I should be interested in it or not. I know this is part of the silage making process, which I will more than likely never be a part of, but maybe to fix it up and resell? Is there demand for these things??

If anyone has a better guess as to what it may be, PLEASE let me know!!! Thanks my friends!

Bryce

Click to expand...

I bought a MF chopper with pick-up and corn head at an auction probably 10 years ago for $40. I use it to chop my mulch for garlic and used to use it for chopping up leftover produce. Not many people make sileage around here as the dairy farms are pretty much gone.

It's a forage harvester, commonly known as a chopper. You don't have a use for it and apparently no one else in your area does either as it's been sitting there for "a LONG time". You'll never get back the "fix it up" money you'll put in it. Forget it Bryce.

It is just as its called, a field chopper(sometimes called forage/silage chopper) You know what a stationary feed cutter is for, its the same thing just made to pull behind the tractor.

Its for chopping material(straw, hay, silage(corn or hay) into little pieces running in the field. The blower(some models the knives are the blower) on back has a chute on top, like a snow blower, to direct it in the wagon(used to get material to yard), that can be removed to blow back material onto the field. There are two main heads that go on them(not saying they have to have both), a pickup(like baler for windrows) or a corn head for cutting of corn(or sunflower..ect) stalks.

The chopper we have is rarely used for silage. It mainly gets used to chop straw in the field to blow up in the barn for bedding. Also used to disperse windrows by chopping it and blowing it up in the air. We even used it a couple of times to play like the big boys and filled the bunk wagon behind another tractor.

A green chopper(different type) is basically a lawn mower for a field. it cuts the hay/grass crop when sanding green and blows it into a wagon for feeding or silage. Not as much demand or use for these as the basic forage chopper.

When we had a lot of small dairies they were pretty common. Usually chopped one row of corn at a time for silage, or an equivalent amount of hay for haylage. since there aren't any small dairies left, the big dairies are using self propelled units, 300hp or more, or hiring custom choppers. Now they chop into semis or tandem axle straight trucks, not wagons like in the past. Not much call for the small pull type choppers or the wagons any more.

Look like this one? I chopped hay with this harvester last week for my dairy cows, still works like a charm . Bruce

NO! For your 'operation',run.Leave it be.......

YES! It is strikingly similar to that one, but I don't think it is as modern looking?? Maybe so though.... What is an approx year on that one?

Do you like it? Good machine?

I am still thinking about talking to the guy and seeing if he will come down on it a little...

Just off the top of my head. I believe that they ran it with an 8N!! :O

Ya.... I am thinking you are right!!

Have you seen that new M I am getting Tuesday?? If not shoot me an e-mail!

They use the wagons here, not trucks. And even the biggest dairys have pull type harvestors and wagons. Ohio.

If there is money to be made with parts or scrap iron, maybe... But to use you won't even have enough HP to run one modern enough to be worth owning. Choppers are not like balers in that they can easily be resurrected from the dead and used when they're 50 years old. The knives are much more finicky and need to be set right to get a good chop. It can be done on and older machine, but go price out a set of knives. They usually run in the ball park of $100/each for just about anything. Deere might be cheaper where they had a whole mess of knives, but then volume makes up for it.

Our NH 892 has a 12 knife cutter head. I have it set with 8 to get a slightly longer chop in corn, but that's still a lot of $$$ to replace a set of knives and the shear bar.

Donovan from Wisconsin

I have seen a few that were trashed out converter to flail mowers for mowing pastures.

When I was much younger I worked for a Chinese fellow who always used the "chopper" for his hay. He would cut with the chopper and just let it blow. Then rake and bale normally. It really did work pretty well and was fast in comparison to the sickle mowers most others were using. The grass hay bales were pretty heavy. Great guy loved working with/for him. Every day we had to have lunch served by his wife. Best Chinese food I have ever had. Sure miss them.