MAN Corn in Kronefornia,

Hi Followers,

Sorry, that you had to wait a little bit longer for news this time! The last two weeks in California has been busy and very successful. Like at the last round in the spring, I could run a lot of demos in the Central Valley in California. This time I showed the BiG X 850 and the BiG X 700 with our new trifold 10-row corn header Easy Collect 753. Most of the demos have been in the northern part of the Valley around Turlock and Modesto. 

Beside the demos, we had a very interesting field day in Modesto. This field day was organized by Mycogen Seeds and it was all around chopping quality and pit management. All the competitors have been around. We were there with the BiG X 850 and the EC 753. Approximately 180 people from University and Industry, Farmers and Contractors came to see the choppers running. For the comparison of chopping quality every forage harvester chopped one truck load each with different length of cut (longest chop, 19 mm, 16 mm and 13 mm) and a KP distance of 1.5 mm. The samples were investigated by the visitors at the pit. With shaker boxes, they defined the different particles of the sample. You could really see the difference! People really liked the consistency in the chop and the good processing of our BiG X 850. And that what Dairy Farmers in California want! After that, we had people waiting to fill a few truck loads with the BiG X and see the performance in corn. And the performance was impressive. In 15/16 feet tall corn, yielding 38 tons/ac, the customers were filling trucks in no time. 

This big corn in California is nothing special. The yields are averaging between 30 and 35 tons/ac. That’s really MAN Corn. The length of cut are mostly around 19 mm, reaching from 13 mm to 25 mm. More important for the farmers is the processing of the kernels. They don’t want to find a kernel and grind it up. That’s why the KP is so important around here. In the Krone choppers we are running chromed hard faced KP-rollers with 30 % speed differential. More surface and the speed difference allows to run with a wider gab and still getting the high processing. A wider gab follows in more performance. Good processing at high performance: That makes farmers and contractors happy. During the demos, the customers were really impressed about the high torque of the MAN-engines and the possibility to push it down to under 1300 RPM under load. It will recover easily! 

Customers liked the header. With the collector chains instead of turning drums it is much lighter than the competitive headers and needs less power to run it. It feeds the corn plants more consistent and leads to better chopping quality. Customers, who are running Krone headers on competive machines (The Easy Collect 6000 FP is available for John Deere, Claas and New Holland choppers) told me, that they could speed up to 1 mile/hour during chopping after changing to the Krone header! Again, better performance of the chopper!

Right now, I am on my way to Sunny Side, Washington, where I will run demos this week. I have heard, the corn is even taller than in California! I am excited…

Regards,

Benedikt

Corn and Sorghum for Beef Cattle…

 

Hi followers,

the last week was just flying by. Because of the drought in Texas, the contractors are running full throttle right now. It won’t take long and the corn harvest is done for this year. The last week I could run several demos. Most of the customers were chopping for the feed lots here in the Panhandle of Texas.

Most of the feed lots are only calculating with the fiber content of the corn silage and want a long chop between 19mm and 25 mm. In some places they don’t even use the kernel processor to break up the corn. The corn this year is very uneven. In some places it reached to the cap, sometimes it was only 3 feet tall. Then it’s not very easy to show the performance of the chopper. But still, the customers were impressed with the machine. They liked the VariStream, which helped a lot in that uneven crop. A big advantage was our corn header Easy Collect, which is feeding very good in short and down crop and has no problems with weeds.

Beside corn, I have chopped some sorghum this week. Sorghum is getting more and more popular in Texas. It won’t reach the yield of good corn, but needs a lot less water to grow. And water is getting a bigger and bigger problem… 

Yesterday I flew back to California. The corn harvest is on, so there should be lots to do this week.

Regards,

Benedikt

It's dry in Texas...

Hi followers, 

this time I can give you only a short update. After a very interesting week in Memphis, I am back in Texas since friday. Yesterday I prepared the choppers for the coming demos in the Southern and Northern Panhandle. Beside the 1100, we want to show the BiG X 700 with the Easy Collect 753. A lot of customers around here have to chop at different places at the same time and like to play the "chess game".


Because of the heat and drought, there won't be much to chop this year. In some areas it hasn't rained for more than a year. High temperatures over 100 degrees and winds up to 35 miles an hour just dries out the corn. The best irrigation can't keep up with that. The yield of the corn is expected to be between only 8 to 17 ton/ac. There will be a big problem to feed the cattle. Right now, they are already trading hay for over 340 USD per ton. 

On the way to the dealer, I made some pictures of the landscape. Where you see the fence, you should see some cows, too. But what to eat? The big role of the pivots shows the last picture. For more pictures, just have a look at Google Earth at "Hereford,TX" or "Dumas,TX".

More about the corn in Texas next week. I will keep you up to date. 

Regards, 

The BiG MAN

Corn and tomatoes...

Hi Followers,

sorry, that it took some longer to keep you up to date. I had a lot of stuff going on the last days. The demonstrations are starting slow here in California. The cool and wet spring delayed the crop, so that I could run only one demo with the BiG X 850 and our Easy Collect 753. It was very nice and tall corn. Unless it was a little bit green, the yield was about 32 Ton/ac. Massive Corn!

The customer was impressed about the performance of the 850 hp-Krone chopper. I was running against the biggest Deere and was going a little bit faster than he did. But: I had two more rows to chop!

On the way home, I passed a tomato field, where they were harvesting. Time to stop and take some pictures. The tomato harvester is working like a potato harvester. A knife is cutting the tomato plant of the ground and sieves are transporting it. Optical sensors sorting out the green tomato, the leaves and the rest of the plant are sucked out with big turbines. The tomatoes are overloaded “on the go.” Tractors are transporting the trailers to the dirt road, where they get picked up by trucks and get transported to the tomato factory, where they make sauce, juice or dried tomatoes. 

Another highlight of last week was the visit of Yosemite National Park. A very nice landscape and it’s for sure worth to visit the park sometime. Here are some impressions for you..

This week, there won’t be any chopping. We are heading to the headquarter in Memphis for a meeting. On Friday, I am flying straight to Texas to get some corn chopped for the feed lots in the panhandle of Texas.

More about that in a few days. So please check back later in the week.

Regards from California

Benedikt