Bale While You Rake With New Side-Mount

Bale While You Rake With New Side-Mount HAY & FORAGE HARVESTING Balers (6) 6-1-36 "Everything I save is pure profit," says Albert Johnson, of Erhard, Minn., inventor of a side-hitch for rakes that lets you rake hay into a windrow that feeds directly into a trailing baler, eliminating one trip through the field. Johnson, a farmer-inventor with other products on the market, first built his hitch in 1969 at a time when he was custom-baling flax straw for combine crews. Since then, he's used the same hitch every year on his own farm for baling hay, or for custom work. He'd like to find a manufacturer to mass produce the hitch. Meanwhile, he says he's set up to supply the hitch to interested FARM SHOW readers. It mounts on the front end of the tractor. A hydraulic cylinder telescopes the hitch arm to adjust for varying field conditions. While the hitch itself raises and lowers from field to road position, it is not designed to hoist the trailing rake into the air forroad travel. The rake must be hitched behind the tractor, or put on a trailer if the roads are not wide enough to pull it down the road on the side hitch. Johnson uses a standard 5-wheel, ground-driven Farmhand wheel rake. "The hitch is designed for wheel rakes not side delivery or other rakes that need more support. On-the-go adjustment lets you adapt to heavier or lighter crops. One big advantage of the rake is that the windrow doesn't have time to settle because you're baling right behind it so there's less loss," says Johnson. He adds that he hasn't attempted to modify the hitch to round balers but feels it could be adapted by modifying the baler hitch. For more information, contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Albert V. Johnson, Rt. 1, Box 87, Erhard, Minn. 56534 (ph 218 495-3150).

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