ragged bales???

Hey folks,
about 400 bales yesterday...All good except for a knot in the twine that made 10 bales with only one string before I caught it. Anyway, nice even bales but the sides on a bunch are a little rough/raggedy.......Could it be the material, speed, knives (don't think so because some bales are real nice. Still learning this thing.

Dave

what kind of baler again??? ragged side on the knife side?? are the bales ragged all in line or very once in awhile along the way scaddered among the good ones.

(quoted from post at 12:50:58 06/29/11) what kind of baler again??? ragged side on the knife side?? are the bales ragged all in line or very once in awhile along the way scaddered among the good ones.

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Both sides.maybe nothing to worry about (??), just some rough grass sticking out a half inch to maybe an inch in places.... welger AP45 Baler (German made). Gotta look in the manual about the blades.

Never heard of that baler.. however Dave I have a buddy who cuts hay with sickle mower.. I cut with mower/cond. He bales with J.D. 336.. I with a N.H. 273. He complains that his baler makes a "hairy" bale while mine is smooth and clean.. we have adjusted and sharpened knives to try to get his to make clean bale but nothing works. We always kinda came to the conclusion that sicke mower hay cuts hay and lays it over as is while mow/cond cuts and conditions thus making it more pliable in the baler... dont know just a theory but plan to bale some of his with mine just to see what happens and vice versa..good luck

No expert, but I've seen similar results on a NH 315 and an older NH, knives were getting dull, but there were also the beginnings of banana shaped bales too. You have a completely different animal over there. I have always wondered what it was that causes that and each "pad" of hay sometimes connected to the one before or after it instead of a clean cut, balers are an interesting critter, especially to us who are not mechanically trained to work on them.

(quoted from post at 13:10:41 06/29/11) Never heard of that baler.. however Dave I have a buddy who cuts hay with sickle mower.. I cut with mower/cond. He bales with J.D. 336.. I with a N.H. 273. He complains that his baler makes a "hairy" bale while mine is smooth and clean.. we have adjusted and sharpened knives to try to get his to make clean bale but nothing works. We always kinda came to the conclusion that sicke mower hay cuts hay and lays it over as is while mow/cond cuts and conditions thus making it more pliable in the baler... dont know just a theory but plan to bale some of his with mine just to see what happens and vice versa..good luck

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Hairy is the best way to describe it and I guess notreally that bad. I'll try to think about taking a couple pics tomorrow. Cutting with a drum mower in grass that grew some then stopped because of real dry weather, got a couple inches of rain and kicked in again... Pretty coarse stuff.

dull knives or short cutting.. if it were my baler. anytime i bale short hay, it looks bad, really bad as it does not lay in correctly. longer cuttings look much better, as they lay in correctly and then get cut better by the knife. your extra stubby would also be "ugly" bales as well.

(quoted from post at 15:16:35 06/29/11) dull knives or short cutting.. if it were my baler. anytime i bale short hay, it looks bad, really bad as it does not lay in correctly. longer cuttings look much better, as they lay in correctly and then get cut better by the knife. your extra stubby would also be "ugly" bales as well.

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Some is very short and since you mention it, those areas are where the ugly bales came out.....

wife calls them..... "fuzzy bales".. always during drought years..

Maybe your hay dogs ain't barkin right! Several things to check. Wedge like pieces of metal, bolted to the left and right side of the bale chamber, under and a little in front of the knotters.(are they there, are they rusted out, and flattened against the side of the chamber?) Springs on the Hay dogs? (Hay dogs is the 2 finger like spring loaded devices that hold the last charge of hay, before tying, located top of chamber, under the knotters) I would check the hay dog, under the knotter that had the string problem. Also check the plunger clearance, side to side. The plunger rides on bearings, on all sides. These bearings are adjustable, either by a slot on the bearing, or a couple of set screws, on the rails, which the bearings ride in. Check the clearance, at the knife side, by seeing how thick of a feeler guage you can stick between the 2 knives. Or If the baler is empty of hay, you can attack it with a crowbar, trying to see how much side to side movement you can get on the plunger front face, when it is under the knotters.
Of course, I forgot to mention that for guys like you or me, of paramount importance, is to have an assistant, to perform all of these tests, who is sized like wee man, but possessing the strength of Samson, before the haircut! I have trouble fitting into the round baler, with the door open .:^)

I would be checking the clearance between the two knives.

(quoted from post at 20:12:18 06/29/11) Maybe your hay dogs ain't barkin right! Several things to check. Wedge like pieces of metal, bolted to the left and right side of the bale chamber, under and a little in front of the knotters.(are they there, are they rusted out, and flattened against the side of the chamber?) Springs on the Hay dogs? (Hay dogs is the 2 finger like spring loaded devices that hold the last charge of hay,

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I've never seen faulty hay dogs/springs cause ragged bales. They do cause tying problems but usually not erratic but continual tying problems. Hay dogs from my understanding are designed to hold hay away from the twine/wire while knotting is taking place.Ragged bales are caused from dull,poorly spaced PH knives

i would try tightening down bales,or pulling more hay together in my windrows,,but if you baled 400 and only a few are ragged your not doing bad!

Jim, I threw that in the mix because he said he missed a knot.

(quoted from post at 08:14:44 06/30/11) i would try tightening down bales,or pulling more hay together in my windrows,,but if you baled 400 and only a few are ragged your not doing bad!

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bales are not real tight but not sloppy. Could be a little tighter tho. windrows were a little uneven. Starting to look like the baler is fine, just gotta finetune myself a little. Gonna bale some straw in the next few days and will be cutting some more hay soon.

trick in my opinion is to get the windrows as even as possible.got to kind of know your baler though,some like to be fed fast with heavy windrows and others like light windrows to bale best.so it sort of a learning curve to see what works best for you. put those bales on the bottom of the stack and no one will ever know!