Mechanical Bagger For Big Round Bales

Mechanical Bagger For Big Round Bales CROP STORAGE Round Bale Silage 7-6-36 One man working alone with a tractor can "stuff" about three dozen big round bales into one 200 ft. long sausage-type plastic bag with the just-introduced mechanical bagger invented by Iowa farmer Willis Glenn, of Olin. "It has no moving parts so there's nothing to wear out or maintain,"' says Glenn who feels the machine's most outstanding feature is it's low price tag. "It retails for right at $1,500, which should make every owner of a big baler sit up and take notice. This low-cost machine, coupled with the big baler you already own, is all the major equipment you need to put up top-quality hay and silage ù for just a fraction of what it costs to put up haylage and silage the conventional way with costly choppers, upright silos, unloading wagons and other expensive equipment." Glenn has lined up a manufacturer to supply factory-folded 6 1/2 ft. dia. bags 200 ft. long and made of 4 mil. material. The folded bag slips over the round metal bagging ring and unfolds automatically as each big bale is moved into it by the bagging machine. Here's how Glenn's patented (pending) new bagger works: Using a spear-type big bale mover on your tractor's 3 pt., you spear a bale and back it into the round 6 ft. dia. ring of the bagging machine. When the 3 pt. is lowered to set the bale down inside the ring, it automatically hooks onto the tongue of the bagging machine (see photos). You then drive the tractor forward about 5 ft. to pull the machine forward. As you do, the bale stays inside the bag. You then raise the 3 pt to unhitch and go get another bale and repeat the process until, without having left the tractor seat, you've stuffed about 35 big bales into a single plastic bag 200 ft. long. The machine will bag whatever type of bale you feed into it, whether dry hay, high-moisture hay treated with a preservative, or long stemmed big bale silage. "We've already had a lot of interest from companies that market hay and silage preservatives. They forsee all kinds of possibilities for incorporating our new low-cost bagger into their hay and silage-making programs," says Glenn. Another key feature of the new bagger is the ease of moving it from job to job. The big metal ring bolts together in sections and can be easily taken apart and, along with the machine's other few parts, placed into the back of a pickup. "All of the components break down into small pieces for easy one-man loading into a pickup," explains Glenn. "In operation, the machine moves on skids so there are no wheels or running gear to bother with. If you want to use the bagger for different diameter bales, you simply add or take out sections to adjust diameter of the metal ring accordingly." Cost of the 4 mil plastic bags (6 1/2 ft. in dia.) which Glenn markets is right at $150 per 200 ft. roll. It comes folded and ready to slip onto the outside of the bagging machine's metal 6 ft. dia. ring. "We think 4 mil plastic is heavy enough for bagging dry hay. The stems may poke a few holes here and there in the plastic but this shouldn'tbe any problem since the primary aim is not air tight storage but simply to protect the bales from rain and snow. With 5 ft. wide bales, we can stuff 35 to 38 into each 200 ft. bag, which figures out to a cost of about $4 per bale for the plastic for one time use," Glenn points out. "We're also offer- ing heavier 6 and 8 mil plastic, and with single or double layers, for oxygen-free bagging of big bale silage." For more information, contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Willis Glenn, Olin, Iowa 52320 (ph 319 484-2327).

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