has anyone used jones balers?

[startinghandle]

i am sure there are plenty of jones baler owners reading this and the reason I am asking is on tonight's S4C farming programme there showed a display of jones balers at Ruthin

 

[REStracTORATION]

Yea we used to have one
I was 12 and remember it never giving any bother apart from a slip clutch
I think it was a mk 10 t if that's correct
We only made 12-1500 bales a year

 

[multi power]

@Selectamatic

 

[SMID]

We had a couple of mk 2 s then a mk 12 T , the mk 2 s were built like battleships twin wheels on the heavy side could make bales like bricks , The mk 10 T and 12 T were basically the same apart from a wider pick up on the 12 T . A flimsier machine than the older ones but never let us down , the draw-bar had a foot of 4 inch x 2 inch channel welded underneath to position the chain for the pressure control coupler for baling straw when things were damp underfoot.

 

[wr.]

Jones Baler story here

There was another excellent piece of old film about the factory on youtube which I can't find.

 

[wr.]

Here's our 12T which my father bought new back in the 70's. Only come out to bale a neighbour's neddy idiot cubes now but never gives a moment's trouble

 

[Selectamatic]

Our's are still in yearly use, nowhere near as busy as they once were, but enough to keep us going.

The early Jones Balers were made to work behind the Threshing Machine, as time progressed they were made more to be used behind the tractors of the time, the Jones Minor, Royal, Major etc eventually became the Star, and Super Star, ours shown below, the Super Star I believe to be the best baler of it's time.

The only baler painted blue, because Jones secured a large American order Super Star balers, on the condition that they were painted the same colour as the Fordson Power Majors that the dealership sold, blue and white.

I remember Mr Jones junior, son of one of the Jones Brothers who founded the company, telling me that the Super Star was designed to run behind a Fergie FE35 set to flat out.

Jones made several ventures into other fields, manure spreaders, grain drills, mills, hay tedders, and most notably the Combine Harvester, with the Cruiser Combine drowning near the shore when Allis Chalmers pulled the plug on the project, in favour of their own Gleaner combines.

During the Star and Super Star production, Jones sold the company to the Allis Chalmers company, who integrated their products into the AC lineup, with limited success.

The Jones name made way for AC, and sales fell sharply, so much so that the Jones name was reintroduced, the balers could either be purchased in Jones or AC Colours, there are even stories of already built balers being repainted in the old colours to help shift them.

Accountants got hold of the job, and the Mk 10T and 12T were introduced, still very capable balers, but a lightweight thing compared to the heavy duty construction of it's forerunners. Later AC found themselves in difficulty and the company was sold to Bamfords of Uttoxeter, who already made their own BL, Bamford Long, balers.

After the 10 and 12 the content of the Jones Baler became less and less, an early example of Badge Engineering where a Bamford, such as a BX9 was Badge Engineered as a Jones Mk 16, below. Few Jones parts carried on into these balers. Bamford's fortunes were on the way down, and after an uncertain period, the job came to a close.

 

[SMID]

Just reminded my " record " with 12T, 540 bales in 3/4 of an hour building on diamond sledge a bale hitting me on the knee as i turned one every 5 seconds.

 

[startinghandle]

thanks to selectamatic for his interesting report
we have a Jones Star T baler bought new by my late father in 1968 from DR Davies of Newtown and I remember it arriving on a Saturday morning and it was covered in mud because there was a new railway bridge been constructed at Penstrowed and there had been a lot of rain, for the first 10 years our dexta was used but in 1978 we bought a power major and we found out the hard way that a different drawbar should have been used

 

[startinghandle]

I have just remembered something else , at the Royal Welsh Show in 1993 I was surprised to find the knotters on a new Massey Ferguson baler were the same knotters as on our Jones baler from 1968 and the only difference from what I remember was different string knives

 

[Red Fred]

Really interesting to read, why did sales drop off so much when badged as Allises? Was there a stigma attached to the AC brand as dad was always very fond of our little AC -B and it seems pretty well made, although I understand they had some labour disputes over the years in the USA.

 

[borderterribles]

My first baler was a blue Jones Super Star which I used behind my non live-drive Dexta. It was an interesting learning curve for a novice , to say the least, especially in a thick crop of seeds. The first one was later joined by a red Star baler. The blue one was a short drawbar model and the red one had a long drawbar. Both did many thousands of bales, and I particularly remember how very well built and robust they were.

 

[Selectamatic]

Really interesting to read, why did sales drop off so much when badged as Allises? Was there a stigma attached to the AC brand as dad was always very fond of our little AC -B and it seems pretty well made, although I understand they had some labour disputes over the years in the USA.

I think there was, to be honest. How true this was in overseas markets, I do not know, but it certainly was the case in the UK.

 

[Selectamatic]

I have just remembered something else , at the Royal Welsh Show in 1993 I was surprised to find the knotters on a new Massey Ferguson baler were the same knotters as on our Jones baler from 1968 and the only difference from what I remember was different string knives

The early Jones's, Minor etc had Jones's own patent "Tucker" Knotter system. To be honest I have no experience of such things, but understand that they worked well enough.

Star and Super Star balers onward were fitted with Rasspe knotters, identical in operation to those fitted to New Holland balers. Rasspe Knotters, working as they should, were probably one of the best on the market at the time.

When Jones became Bamford, Bamford knotters were fitted, again the same design, but slightly different in dimensions etc.

I have no experience of MF knotters, but understand that the MF Sure Tie knotter was different to the Rasspe design, perhaps the younger knotters were the same? I know that today's modern knotters are the same, just a bit beefier.

 

[Red Fred]

I know when I needed a new billhook for my NH945, the John Deere folks next door let me have one of theirs which was identical. They said quite a few bits were interchangeable.

 

[Selectamatic]

 

[SMID]

The early knotters benefited from the the tucker system which meant the bales were exactly the same length with the length of string determining when the needles tripped We replaced the minor mk 2 with a massey 20 one of the early ones without the triple packers a backward step as far as bale shape was concerned.The silage tower went up in 1966 and that was to be the end hay the massey got a change of address.

 

[multi power]

The early Jones's, Minor etc had Jones's own patent "Tucker" Knotter system. To be honest I have no experience of such things, but understand that they worked well enough.

Star and Super Star balers onward were fitted with Rasspe knotters, identical in operation to those fitted to New Holland balers. Rasspe Knotters, working as they should, were probably one of the best on the market at the time.

When Jones became Bamford, Bamford knotters were fitted, again the same design, but slightly different in dimensions etc.

I have no experience of MF knotters, but understand that the MF Sure Tie knotter was different to the Rasspe design, perhaps the younger knotters were the same? I know that today's modern knotters are the same, just a bit beefier.

MF balers do indeed have sure tie knotters

 

[multi power]

My experience of balers isn't huge, but I remember dad had a international b47 and I don't remember it being too reliable, most people at the time had new Holland, but the posh people all had Jones
We currently have 2 Jones balers, dad has a super star and I have a mk 10, it's the dogs rubbish compared to the super star

 

[Selectamatic]

My experience of balers isn't huge, but I remember dad had a international b47 and I don't remember it being too reliable, most people at the time had new Holland, but the posh people all had Jones
We currently have 2 Jones balers, dad has a super star and I have a mk 10, it's the dogs rubbish compared to the super star

Really? In what way?