New Holland round belt balers

essexpete

Member
Location
Essex
Hi All
What sort of reputation do the mid 000 New Holland yellow livery round balers have? Are they reliable and easy to use? I currently have a JD 550. Anything to look out for? If they are set up for chopping can knives be easily removed for hay only?
Thanks
 

Bramble

Member
They weren’t that bad

Mine was, luckily it got exported and replaced with a NH 658 which was loads better (predecessor of the yellow ones).

Did 25000 bales over 14 years with it, a few bits fell off/broke over the years but it was fairly simple to fix. The Cropcutter knives didn't do a great deal and I hardly ever used them.

Replaced it last year with a 2007 Claas Variant. Probably 30% more output, the feed rotor on the Claas is much better than the stuffer fork on the old 658. The Claas seems more 'delicate', once it's running it goes well, whereas the the old 658 just plodded along for ever.

I looked at the yellow NH ones, I was told sometimes the rotor on them can cause problems because they are a bit too far back from the pick up.
 

Tim G

Member
Livestock Farmer
Hi All
What sort of reputation do the mid 000 New Holland yellow livery round balers have? Are they reliable and easy to use? I currently have a JD 550. Anything to look out for? If they are set up for chopping can knives be easily removed for hay only?
Thanks
I'm hoping they're are a good baler, we've got one coming soon, 2008 model replacing a 648. 648 has been an okay baler for what we were doing, not going to set any records but does the job. Wanted to chop bales hence the upgrade.
 

Two Tone

Member
Mixed Farmer
I had a 7060. It was OK but suffered a few electrical problems. There seemed to be always something about it that worried me about it reliability wise. Got a Krone now, which is a different animal altogether.

I think the most important thing about most round baler and especially a NH is to slow down the hydraulic flow rate to opening the door to release the bale Every time those rams gets to the end of their stroke, is one less time before something is going to go bang, particularly if the flow rate is set too high.
 

essexpete

Member
Location
Essex
I had a 7060. It was OK but suffered a few electrical problems. There seemed to be always something about it that worried me about it reliability wise. Got a Krone now, which is a different animal altogether.

I think the most important thing about most round baler and especially a NH is to slow down the hydraulic flow rate to opening the door to release the bale Every time those rams gets to the end of their stroke, is one less time before something is going to go bang, particularly if the flow rate is set too high.
You have lost me there.
 

Martin Holden

Member
Trade
Location
Cheltenham
Have you tried baling haylage with them!!! It's the devil's machine. Spent Many an afternoon pulling silage out of the starting roller and belts. The thought of it sends shivers down my spine.
No I haven’t but I sold competitive makes. All belt bakers went through tough times when baking “wet” crops. I would say all now have cured the early gremlins
 

hally

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
cumbria
Did 30k bales on a br740, no major issues but fiddly problems, pick up bars snapping etc, new belts at 20k bales. Didnt make a tidy bale in short stuff but handled it
Replaced with mchale 550, different quality all together
 
Have you tried baling haylage with them!!! It's the devil's machine. Spent Many an afternoon pulling silage out of the starting roller and belts. The thought of it sends shivers down my spine.
When you can bale axial flow straw with a narrow pick up 550 , 👍👍👍you can bale owt , maybe devils machines now , but where the baler in their day ,like 30 drills ,and fahr drum mowers ,
 
We've got a br7060, it had 10,000 bales on the clock when we got it, but it must of done 5 times that.

We only make less than a 1000 bales a year.

For about 5 years it was great, a few little problems, but nothing major. Then one year it never went into a field where it didnt break down. In that one year it needed about 10 bearings, hydraulic pipes, not cutting the net correctly, the net actuator stopped working, one of the big rollers wore away, cam bearing in the pick up, somehow the pickup reel was twisted.

Then to top it all off it set on fire when the main gearbox to chain shaft bearing went. Luckily not too much was burnt, it was repaired then a about a year later the same bloody bearing went again and it nearly caught fire again. We've now put 2 bearings on that shaft instead of one which seems to of cured it.

Last year, other than grease and oil, it never had a spanner on it.

After saying all that, they are a cheap, easy to work on baler, and if you could get a good, well looked after one i cant see it being to much hassle.
 

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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