New combine cost

[tw15]

Amazing how much money some people will spend just to avoid another operator on a tenner an hour.

We as a industry have to start to help ourselves and be trying to do what we can to help people get the bug for farming . And as you say labour is cheap compared to a 500 k machine you just have to think and work slightly differently . So far getting the combines out the shed this year hasen't cost no more than 1k on parts and that includes a new knife , i know of one jd combine that had its pre harvest main stealer service and a 16k bill to follow . Thats a lot of crop up the road just for that bill .
Most combines put about 200 -400 hours on the clock so double that for labour it` is only going to be 10 k a season to cover harvest and when not harvesting can do the other jobs .

 

[DrWazzock]

My combine was bought for £8000 about 15 years ago. Spending another £192,000 on one would achieve no significant gain for us. I even put a small 14’ bed on it in place of the original 18’ bed. That way I can get out the shed and onto the fields without the clat of taking the header off. And this year having visited one 10 acre field 5 times now, that has been a blessing. Just go at a faster forward speed in the field. Also we can get round the field back to the trailer whereas with the 18’ header the trailer had to follow it round. Small and fast is better than big and slow. Excellent in laid crops as well.

 

[Oliveau]

My combine was bought for £8000 about 15 years ago. Spending another £192,000 on one would achieve no significant gain for us. I even put a small 14’ bed on it in place of the original 18’ bed. That way I can get out the shed and onto the fields without the clat of taking the header off. And this year having visited one 10 acre field 5 times now, that has been a blessing. Just go at a faster forward speed in the field. Also we can get round the field back to the trailer whereas with the 18’ header the trailer had to follow it round. Small and fast is better than big and slow. Excellent in laid crops as well.

Good point about laid crops. My neighbour was complaining that he lost a lot of laid wheat this year because the
Lexion with the ‘here to breakfast time’ header couldn’t get down to it. (To think in my young days the Claas machines were noted for their ability to get laid crops!)

 

[David.]

Actually, I find a 22ft with Autocontour to be way better than the 15ft Dominator cutterbar without it, in laid stuff. It is called progress, and whilst simple is good, it is not always better.
When I went and bought a combine with a 12ft header, my Gramp simply wouldn't accept that one man could properly watch 12ft of table on his own, and asserted forcefully that "More corn would be wasted than he used to harvest" with the 8ft 6" cut that was his comfort zone.

 

[DrWazzock]

Actually, I find a 22ft with Autocontour to be way better than the 15ft Dominator cutterbar in laid stuff. It is called progress, and whilst simple is good, it is not always better

Well my neighbour spent a fortnight bulldozing molehills with 2 30 foot lexicons a few years back in laid spring barley. Took them a week to do 40 acres and they only got half of it. The noise of reversing beepers was deafening.

 

[DrWazzock]

A small light bed with accumulators in the hydraulics should be able to slide along in contact with the soil. No need for any sort of height auto control. You won’t do better than that in laid stuff. Any wider than 4m and that simple approach won’t work due to undulations in the ground and there will be significant knife losses going under the bed.

 

[renewablejohn]

We used to swath cereals years ago here. A couple of days rain on the swath and you were in a pickle. You couldn’t ted it. You couldn’t wuffle it. The underside slowly turned to manure and the weeds grew through them. So the only crop we swath here is OSR. Stiff straw on a tall stubble but even then we have some close
calls when we have had a lot of rain on the swaths.

Used to pick and choose for swathing. If it was flat on the deck then combine followed immediately but if crop still standing then swath high and let the straw sit on top of the stems. That way it would quickly dry out after a shower. Obviously your not going to swath if its forecast a fortnight of heavy rain but treat it like haymaking and you cannot go far wrong. Forgot to say the header was a swath pick up header so feed in losses were noticeably lower. If doing it now would probably not swath the flat on the deck stuff but change the header instead. (shelbourne type)

 

[Al R]

Well my neighbour spent a fortnight bulldozing molehills with 2 30 foot lexicons a few years back in laid spring barley. Took them a week to do 40 acres and they only got half of it. The noise of reversing beepers was deafening.

They now have the Convio for such situations or a Macdon/Griegenhoff header

 

[DrWazzock]

My old John Deere 100 series bed was rubbish in many ways but since moving on to the 800 series bed it’s been excellent. Crop flows well and slides along the ground effortlessly without bulldozing. Yes alright I’m about 20 years behind.

 

[glasshouse]

Our neighbour at home who does our combining runs a newish New Holland and a TX 36 this year his TX36 has broken down so he’s bought another TX 36 off eBay and when his other TX is fixed he’s going to run them all together problem is staff he’s the youth in his early’50’s everyone else is approaching retirement age.
As for new machines my son had never driven a combine in his life this year whilst moving headers and bits and pieces around he’s been on a Claas 8900 with a 13.5 header and he says it’s so easy he can’t understand why his Grandad used to make such hard work of it with his 15 foot cut Dominator 86.

Haha
Anyone can drive a split new combine

 

[jh.]

It is getting to the stage that bums on seats is going to be cheaper than buying a 500 k combine and having one bum on a seat a year . Getting staff is not that hard and if you are prepared to put a bit of time in there are plenty of youngsters who want to get experience to help start there careers but would not get a chance to learn as no one in their right mind would let them lose on a 500 k machine first off . As we work them in the same field usually us older boys help them out and keep an eye on them . That gives me a idea combine training courses they can pay and play . Win win Might be able to afford a holiday in Bournemouth .

I've gone the other way. I've bought large used fresh kit , bigger than I need to save taking anyone on . It's all very well saying plenty folk out there at a tenner a hour but they won't last or are simply not worth it . If I took someone on full time , I'd need to let them go out contracting to justify the wage so I'd still be here myself . We as a family gave up the cattle in early 2000s , if I took someone on I'd have to go back into livestock to give them a winter job . A self employed person would be about 14 a hour , I'd happily pay them that but I can't offer them the hours they all want on the wet days , so I know I'd never hold on to them for long.

I used to collaborate with a neighbour. He was in charge of combining and I did drilling . This was ideal as he wasn't a contractor needing to cut malting barley at 25% jist to get on , so treated my crops like his own . This was perfect until he had an accident and is no longer here.

Now there is no 3 crop rule I am fence to fence spring barley so later harvest plus I have only seen the neighbours farm for a few hours total in the last 3 days and counting due to fog off the east coast . A contractor swooping in with a monster and throwing 25% barley in the shed even just for those few hours a day is not something I want so having my own combine is the way I've gone , despite what the calculator and experts would say .

Each to their own and no 2 farm's the same .

 

[Bossfarmer]

I've gone the other way. I've bought large used fresh kit , bigger than I need to save taking anyone on . It's all very well saying plenty folk out there at a tenner a hour but they won't last or are simply not worth it . If I took someone on full time , I'd need to let them go out contracting to justify the wage so I'd still be here myself . We as a family gave up the cattle in early 2000s , if I took someone on I'd have to go back into livestock to give them a winter job . A self employed person would be about 14 a hour , I'd happily pay them that but I can't offer them the hours they all want on the wet days , so I know I'd never hold on to them for long.

I used to collaborate with a neighbour. He was in charge of combining and I did drilling . This was ideal as he wasn't a contractor needing to cut malting barley at 25% jist to get on , so treated my crops like his own . This was perfect until he had an accident and is no longer here.

Now there is no 3 crop rule I am fence to fence spring barley so later harvest plus I have only seen the neighbours farm for a few hours total in the last 3 days and counting due to fog off the east coast . A contractor swooping in with a monster and throwing 25% barley in the shed even just for those few hours a day is not something I want so having my own combine is the way I've gone , despite what the calculator and experts would say .

Each to their own and no 2 farm's the same .

Would cattle back on the farm not have the added benefits of putting fertility back into the farm and having an extra income for years grain doesnt pay as well? Out of interest what type of combine have you gone for?

 

[Bossfarmer]

Does anyone on here shift their combine regularly i.e every 5 years and what rough number is it to shift each time? Cant be much less than 70k a change? Can you get warranty for the 5 years?

 

[Lowland1]

Haha
Anyone can drive a split new combine

You’d think so but I reckon my Dad with 60+ years of combining experience would have struggled with an 8900 he wouldn’t have been able to read the screen for a start let alone adjusting anything and swiveling his head through 45 feet wouldn’t have done him any good so I’d say you need a new set of skills for these machines.

 

[glasshouse]

It is getting to the stage that bums on seats is going to be cheaper than buying a 500 k combine and having one bum on a seat a year . Getting staff is not that hard and if you are prepared to put a bit of time in there are plenty of youngsters who want to get experience to help start there careers but would not get a chance to learn as no one in their right mind would let them lose on a 500 k machine first off . As we work them in the same field usually us older boys help them out and keep an eye on them . That gives me a idea combine training courses they can pay and play . Win win Might be able to afford a holiday in Bournemouth .

Its been that way for a while
Running older combines is far cheaper but just not trendy

 

[glasshouse]

You’d think so but I reckon my Dad with 60+ years of combining experience would have struggled with an 8900 he wouldn’t have been able to read the screen for a start let alone adjusting anything and swiveling his head through 45 feet wouldn’t have done him any good so I’d say you need a new set of skills for these machines.

The skill in combine driving is spotting things going wrong before a disaster occurs.
That doesnt matter with a new one as the warranty covers it

 

[Lowland1]

The skill in combine driving is spotting things going wrong before a disaster occurs.
That doesnt matter with a new one as the warranty covers it

Surely the skill bit applies to new or old combines. It’s just newer ones are bigger and faster than older ones. A warranty doesn’t help when you’ve run a fence post through the machine or set it on fire with linseed straw around the bearings.

 

[glasshouse]

Surely the skill bit applies to new or old combines. It’s just newer ones are bigger and faster than older ones. A warranty doesn’t help when you’ve run a fence post through the machine or set it on fire with linseed straw around the bearings.

“Things going wrong” does not mean being stupid

 

[quattro]

 

[Steevo]

View attachment 981643

They didn’t make the CX8.80 in 1998….probably didn’t even make the CX880.

Surely that should be 2018…!