Combine Straw Chopper Chops Stalks Behind Corn Picker

Combine straw chopper chops stalks behind corn picker COMBINES Accessories 12-6-8 "An old straw chopper removed from a Deere 30 combine, mounted on wheels and pulled upside down behind my 2-row corn picker, works great to chop stalks as I pick corn," says David Gergen, Granville, Iowa. Gergen mounted the 53-in. wide straw chopper inside a frame made from 3-in. sq. tubing and equipped with wheels from a Kools silo blower. He fastened 8-in. long flaps made from rubber belting on the rear and sides of the chopper to reduce dust. A gearbox salvaged from an Owatonna windrower mounts on the picker to drive the straw chopper via a 160-in. drive belt that runs from a 12-in. pulley on the gearbox to a 9-in. pulley on the straw chopper. The gearbox mounts inside a frame which is welded to the picker's axle, just ahead of the husking bed. Two 9-in. pulleys from a New Idea 315 corn sheller mounted on the back of the gearbox run side by side, each driving a 72-in. belt running off the main gearbox. A 3-in. flat pulley with two bearings lifts the large belt over the axle and under the husking bed. Three bolts attach the straw chopper itself to brackets welded onto the back of the 8-row husking bed of his New Idea 324 corn picker. "The straw chopper is activated when I engage the pto to power the corn picker. The knives run at about 2,500 rpms," says Gergen. "I used this home-built stalk chopper on 100 acres of corn this fall, pulling it with a Deere 4010 tractor and it worked great, even on green stalks. The only problem was that it missed some of the low, bent over stalks. If I did it again I might reverse the straw chopper so the knives rotate backward instead of forward to pick up these stalks." Gergen spent about $300 to build the straw chopper. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, David Gergen, RR 2, Box 150, Granville, Iowa 51022 (ph 712 727-3325).

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