Best Mower Conditioner???

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SSS Angus

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Who produces the best/most reliable mower conditioner? Please provide facts to support your opinion. We will hopefully be in the market for one shortly and I would like some opinions from people that already own a conditioning cutter. Our main use for it will be in Sudan fields.
 
SSS Angus":3gbbj1q4 said:
Who produces the best/most reliable mower conditioner? Please provide facts to support your opinion. We will hopefully be in the market for one shortly and I would like some opinions from people that already own a conditioning cutter. Our main use for it will be in Sudan fields.

Wow this subject ought to bring lots of post. :p

Guess I'll take a crack at it. Hmmm on the other hand I won't. :lol:

I'll just throw out what's worked best for me and I haven't tried them all. I've used steel rollers, one rubber and one steel roller and both rubber rollers. Two rubber rollers is what I like.

Now I've never tried a disc conditioner. Reason being I'd have to buy another tractor or trade up to be able to pull one with what most require in HP and tractor weight on these hills. If I had the HP and weight, I'd most likely have one by now.

I've run NH, Case and JD. The one I have now is a 820 JD moco . It's the best I've used but it's also the most modern I've used. So that may not say much. I like the fact I can spread the windrow was wide as the machine if need be. Couldn't do that with the other older brands. I also like the 5 bars/bat reel with the one bar that can be flipped over to make the cutter bar easy to get to. You also won't catch me running anything but non-clog guards. Wouldn't have anything else. So until I try them all the 820 is the best I've used. :)

I could be wrong but I don't think JD makes anything but disc cutter conditioners now. The reason I bought the 820 was I got one heck of a deal on it because it was left over from the year before and was the last one on the lot. Everyone was going disc then. I traded in a 16 year old JD 1217 for it. The 820 has lots of improvements over those older machine. Bought the 820 over the phone and the first time I saw it was when the truck delivered it.

Only comment I'll make on the disc cutter type is I saw 3 different brands go in a field of soybeans (hay type beans with runners) and none of the 3 could cut that field. But they do a mighty fine job with grass and other crops. Guess most folks don't cut soybeans for hay but around here it's been going on since the late 50's. Makes good hay.

You got lots of brands and types to choose from and I'm sure you'll read many advantages and disadvantages. Just remember to look around where you live and see what's working for the folks around you. They can't all be wrong.
 
Thanks for the well rounded reply. I will deffinitly only go with a disc type cutter and Im somewhat unsure on what type of conditioning route I will go. As it stands right now the possible candidates on my list are JD & New Holland. The cutter will be pulled with a 125hp tractor so I dont anticipate any problems with whatever route I decide to go & I would like to stay somewhere in the neighborhood of 11'6"-13' in width.
 
Got an older Vermeer 7120, well pleased with it. Somewhere between 9' and 10' disc conditioner. Matches up perfect with a Ford 7610. Had rubber rollers in it, ripped a chunk out of one and since the rubber ones were not available anymore, Vermeer paid half of putting a set of steel ones in. That was respectable. I like the steel ones. Our local (1hr drive) Vermeer dealer is one of the nicest people you'll ever meet, has helped me out on many occasions. He has my business from here on out.

We have 2 NH dealers closer than the Vermeer but I think their machines are built lighter. There's 4 JD dealerships fairly local to us but I hate green paint. They won't deal on prices and act like they're doing you a favor to wait on you. They won't wait on me anymore.

cfpinz
 
We switched from JD with all rubber condidioners to MacDon with steel on steel. I doubt I would ever go back to the rubber, our crops seem to dry much faster with the steel. Takes a bit to get used to the clank when you run somthing big through them and they slap back togetheer though.
 
The MacDon dealer here is very good, the price is very fair. It is 100 times the swather our JD was. We went from a JD1600A to a MacDon 5020. Both pull tyes but the capacity of the MacDon is awsome.
 

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