What Is a Mower Conditioner

There are three types of mowers: sickles, disc mowers and drum mowers. Sickle rod mowers use a back and forth blade to cut grass and usually use a roller to bend the grass over the knife. Disc mowers have a series of hubs across the entire cutting width, each hub having a small rotating disc (18″) with knives. Drum mowers use two or three large plates (called drums, about 36 inches wide) that move across the ground as they turn. The main advantage of a rotary rod mower over disc mowers and drum mowers is the reduced power required. Its disadvantage is the additional maintenance effort due to the high number of moving parts and wear parts. Disc mowers were historically considered “all eggs in a basket” mowers because all maned hubs were in a large gearbox. If a blade hits something and a tooth breaks, the entire gearbox would suffer a catastrophic failure and there would be nothing worth repairing. If something broke, everything broke. Drum mowers have avoided this by typically having two belt-driven drums compared to six or more gear-driven hubs. Modern disc mowers use insulated gearboxes, and in case of failure, they can be replaced without rebuilding the entire machine. The forage we use today has survived the centuries because they were naturally bred to have drought tolerance. These mechanisms help retain water from plants during periods of limited water availability.

The waxy outer layer of the stem and the closure of leaf space openings are two of these drought resistance systems. Unfortunately, we want the plant to forget or lose these mechanisms once the plant is cut off from its root structure. We need to fight these drought resistance mechanisms while trying to dry the crop. The mower conditioner conditioning system is designed to tear, split or sand the trunk of the plant to provide easy escape routes for plant water and overcome the plant`s natural tendency to retain water. Midwestern producers were eager to see if this system actually offered a drying rate fast enough to justify significant costs. Tests conducted by various researchers in the Midwest have shown an increase in drying rate of about 10 to 15 percent compared to conventional packaging. This means that the plant reaches the moisture of the bales 11/2 to 21/2 hours earlier than conventional practices. Whether this is a significant improvement depends on the situation. If balers could start at 1:00 p.m. instead of 4:00 p.m., it is more likely that balers could be completed that day, and there is less chance that the harvest would have to endure another night because the risk of rain damage is greater. On the other hand, if the balers start at 11:00 instead of 13:00, then, in all likelihood, both systems will allow the balers to be completed on that day, and the intensive conditioning system would be more difficult to justify.

Research has shown that the faster drying rate of the intensive conditioner has already been achieved at the beginning of drying, so the system has the potential to shorten the drying time for silage and dry hay. Conditioners are also available in three main types: rubber roller, steel roller and flail. Roller conditioners have two opposite rollers with a raised and nested pattern; These crimp the cut between the rolls. Flail conditioners have a steel V-shaped arrangement on their main shaft that beats the crop against the top of the mower conditioner. There is no end to the race for high performance. Farms have ever-increasing harvesting areas, optimal mowing times are limited and the production of high-quality fodder is essential. During these periods, you can count on the performance, quality of work and reliability of KUHN triple mower conditioners. Cut and package up to 32`6″ in a single pass. Backed by years of research and development, KUHN triple mowers offer you the cleanest cut and the best conditioned harvest. In recent years, a new intensive conditioning system has been offered to replace the traditional rollers of mower rakes and conditioners (Circle-C Equipment, Hermiston, OR 97838, 1-800-367-1847). This system has a series of non-interlocking rubber rollers that operate with very little or virtually zero clearance. There is a cross-hatching pattern that is milled on the front of the rollers to improve feeding.

The great advantage of these rollers is the ability to work with very little or no clearance, so grinding can theoretically be carried out along the entire length of the shaft. In this video, we use a John Deere 5125M (US CA) utility tractor and a John Deere C350 (US CA) or MoCo center pivot mower conditioner. And we will check the basics of connection, setting and operation. Remember that for all the details regarding your tractor and lawn mower conditioner, always read your owner`s manual and follow all operating and safety instructions. A new intensive conditioner has been introduced that claims to condition the stem by “maceration” (AgLand Equipment, Arborg, Manitoba, Canada, 1-888-933-4440). The figure below shows that this drag pulling machine has a set of nested rubber rollers that feed a second set of serrated steel rollers. Serrated steel rollers operate at a short distance and at a differential speed. They are supposed to carve and scrape the rod as a means of conditioning.