Hay Tedder waste of money?

[15444]

I agree. Rotary rake is superior to a wheel rake. Price point probably keeps people away. There is purgatory and then there is changing rake teeth. How about those bar rakes like Vermeer?

Guess I should have specified a bar V-rake. The wheel rakes are mediocre. Guys think they are great because they can't afford the bar rakes. NH redid their bar V-rake, but still not as heavy built as Vermeer. Rotary is best, but you need to have perfect fields or you start busting support arms and teeth fast.

[Hay Farmer]

A good Tedder will definitely drop a day off the drying time. The best investment we have found though is running BD rollers or Circle C in our disc bine. Crushing all of the stem greatly improves drying time.

[Taiga]

Wgi in spruce groove is suppose to be getting the big 30 ft Pottinger rotary rake in this week... I’m going to drive there just to see it live that will be a sweet unit

I have the 842C rake (27.6’) and wouldn’t want to go wider, the windrow would be too huge to fit under the baling tractor. Grow lots here though, other areas may be different.

Still waiting for a 4 rotor rake that will give me two swaths.

[Tucker]

I've made alfalfa/timothy/orchardgrass hay in a single day with a Kuhn tedder. Cut super early, hit it with the tedder twice during the day and rotary raked and baled that night dry. It was a perfect day, only 30 acres and I have never done it again. Ha. I cut with a 12' disc, leave it 11' wide on the ground driving over it of course. Hit it with the tedder the next morning with dew on it and almost always bale it the third day dry and green. Medium square bales.

During the fu cking CWB years and BSE 800 acres of hay kept my farm very profitable. I sold one years production to Dubai for racing camels. That one was a very hard year. (To pay that much income tax) ha.

[6V53]

Put the widest pick-up you have on an old swather and off set it, but make sure it still covers the throat so you can feed the swath straight through. Straight through will pick the swath up and drop it down . Move to the side and the canvas will flip the swath over very jently. Saved my ass few times . One night late at work my wife and co-workers Googled my name and discovered I was an inventor,been on TV and print all over North America a few times.

[woodland]

I've never used a tedder but its gotta be pretty hard on alfalfa leaves. The guys with double crimpers seem to take at least a day off the drying, most seem to lay it about 8ft wide and then rake up. I have a pull type so leave it as wide as I can without driving on it and depending on conditions v rake 2 togeather or rotary rake individually.

I'm sure you know more about your machine than I do but have you adjusted/checked the roller clearance? 5 to 6 days seems excessive drying time for your machine unless its 100% alfalfa. It also helps drying time to cut a bit higher.

We’ve had a tedder for a few years and it’s not leaving the place anytime soon. You back your rpm down as it gets drier and you may lose some leaves but what’s it worth getting rolled up a day or two earlier?

Cheap and easy to operate. Sometimes our ground is like mud so you let it sit in swathes a day to dry the ground a little before spreading them out. If you follow the discbine then it doesn’t leave the hay fluffy since it’s so limp and heavy. You can always go at night or with the dew on to save leaves too.

It’s another tool in the toolbox. Ours paid for itself the first season. A perfect world wouldn’t require a tedder, bale wrapper, preservative, silage chopper, duals on the baler tractor, floaters on trucks, etc..... if the dang sun would shine for more than a couple hours a day and not be followed by the liquid version. Then you’d just need a baler. 😉



I was skeptical before we got it but wouldn’t be without it. This pic is from last year and I don’t think we’ll even attempt dry bales unless the sprinklers quit. Raining again tonight.

Any questions just ask.

[woodland]

Put the widest pick-up you have on an old swather and off set it, but make sure it still covers the throat so you can feed the swath straight through. Straight through will pick the swath up and drop it down . Move to the side and the canvas will flip the swath over very jently. Saved my ass few times . One night late at work my wife and co-workers Googled my name and discovered I was an inventor,been on TV and print all over North America a few times.

Hmmm a self propelled inverter. Very interesting. Great idea👍

[AlbertaFarmer5]

I modified the discbine. Sc****d all the damaged rubber off the rollers. Welded 1" square tubing end to end( but in segments). 1 1/4" spacing all around each roller, intermeshed. Run them really tight. Ends up squishing, almost breaking the stems almost every inch, and hay dries fast. Neighbors drive by really slow when I am baling heavy hay in 1 or 2 days with no additive. I'm sure they come back later with the tester.

It takes more HP, and makes a lot of noise empty, since the drives have too much backlash to run that tight.

I haven't quite figured out the purpose of a rotary rake. They don't turn the swath, they stand it up tall and narrow, and the wet from the bottom is mixed throughout. I want a rake to fully flip the entire swath upside down, wet side up in one operation. Have NH bar rakes (V or parallel by switching 1 rake), and Home made wheel V rake( which can also convert to parallel operation).

I borrowed a tedder once for wet lumpy swaths that had been raked already. All I accomplished was making the piles and lumps even bigger. must work better on a virgin swath.

[Hamloc]

I've never used a tedder but its gotta be pretty hard on alfalfa leaves. The guys with double crimpers seem to take at least a day off the drying, most seem to lay it about 8ft wide and then rake up. I have a pull type so leave it as wide as I can without driving on it and depending on conditions v rake 2 togeather or rotary rake individually.

I'm sure you know more about your machine than I do but have you adjusted/checked the roller clearance? 5 to 6 days seems excessive drying time for your machine unless its 100% alfalfa. It also helps drying time to cut a bit higher.

My discbine has 4 instead of 2 steel crimper rollers with adjustable hydraulic pressure. I purchased it new and this is its 4th season I believe. I have always thought it should flatten the stems more than it does as I run the hydraulic pressure up at the high end of the range according to the gauge. I will have to have a better look at the crimper.

[Hamloc]

Put the widest pick-up you have on an old swather and off set it, but make sure it still covers the throat so you can feed the swath straight through. Straight through will pick the swath up and drop it down . Move to the side and the canvas will flip the swath over very jently. Saved my ass few times . One night late at work my wife and co-workers Googled my name and discovered I was an inventor,been on TV and print all over North America a few times.

I can remember my Dad mounting an old combine pick up on our versatile 400 swather back in the mid 80s to turn sprouted barley swathes one wet fall. It worked very well.