Tractor-Mounted "Stripper" Combine Ready For Market

Tractor-Mounted "Stripper" Combine Ready For Market COMBINES Miscellaneous 25-1-11 A stripper combine that FARM SHOW first reported on 14 years ago may soon make it to market, according to a Montana company that's now developing the "low-cost" machine, which it calls a Turbo Harvester. The machine was designed and patented by legendary inventor Cordell Lundahl of Logan, Utah. Lundahl's best-known invention is the Hesston Stakhand but he has come up with many other patented machines. They include the Lundahl "Auger Mower" which cuts hay and forage using an auger equipped with cutting teeth. To develop the stripper combine, Lundahl worked with Deere engineers in the 1980's. When Deere decided not to go ahead with commercial production of the unit, rights to the invention reverted to Lundahl. At the time FARM SHOW first reported on the machine in 1986 (Vol. 11, No. 5), Lundahl told us no one could believe how well it worked. "The machine is simple, with only a few moving parts. It mounts on a tractor and we can harvest at speeds up to 14 mph," he told FARM SHOW. A relatively new company in Montana, Technological Solutions International (TSI), licensed the technology from Lundahl. It demonstrated a working prototype to farmers at a field day last fall, mounted on a JCB Fastrac tractor. TSI is in the process of building a factory to produce the new stripper harvester. The Turbo Harvester is about the size of a conventional grain head. An up-front brush, fitted with heavy nylon bristles, bends grain stalks backward into a row of round metal discs that strip heads off the stalks. The discs spin at high rpm's, throwing grain and chaff back into a rotating separator screen. The screen allows grain to fall into a paddle conveyor and drops chaff out onto the ground. Grain is then conveyed back to a trailing wagon. What makes the design different from other stripper headers developed in the past is that a high percentage of grain is separated as it's stripped from the stalks. The rest of the grain is threshed as it's augered past separating screens on its way to a load-out auger. At a time when conventional combines sell for more than $200,000, TSI hopes to market a 32-ft. wide model for about $46,000. They also plan to build 16 and 24-ft. wide models. TSI engineer Jim Helfrich says the company expects the Turbo Harvester to be popular with both large and small farmers. In addition to the new harvester, TSI is also working on other innovative harvest equipment, including a new windrower, a direct-cut chopper, and a big baler that uses air to pick up the crop to reduce leaf loss. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Technological Solutions International, 13786 Hwy 200, Sun River, Mont. 59483 (ph 406 264-5292; fax 406 264-5672).

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