No Stop Forage Harvester

No Stop Forage Harvester FORAGE HARVESTERS Forage Harvesters (31F) 18-6-3 "When harvesting forage we don't need a truck or wagon right beside us all the time thanks to this machine," says Sam Morgan, a Menlo, Kan., custom silage harvester. His self-propelled harvester has a hop-per on back that he can blow silage into when there's no truck or wagon alongside. The flexibility to maneuver more freely in the field means Morgan almost never has to stop chopping silage. Morgan and his father, Willard, and brother, Robert, who comprise Morgan Forage Harvesting, plan to bring their prototype to market in a couple of years. The system is installed on the Morgans' Deere 5460. A "diverter valve" installs in the machine's blower housing, permitting Morgan to switch freely between two spouts - one that blows into the rear hopper and one that blows into a vehicle alongside. "It's unique," Morgan says. When an operator needs to go around an obstacle in the field or when a truck is full, activating the valve from the cab redirects the flow of silage from the unload spout to the "on board" spout into the container. When the operator wants to empty the container, he starts up a webbed belted floor in the bottom of the hopper. It carries silage to a small auxilliary blower and auger that pushes silage out of the hopper into the same spout he uses to load trucks or wagons. You can unload the on-board hopper while continuing to chop silage. "We've got right at 800 hours on this experimental model," says Morgan, "We've been working on the concept since 1984. We're going to do some fine-tuning on this one over the winter. We think it'll be trouble-free by spring." One problem that needs to be resolved is getting the diverter valve, made of abrasion resistant steel plate, to last longer. Another is keeping the weight of the harvester down with all the modifications necessary to install the system. For example, the 8-ft. wide by 4-ft. high by 6-ft long steel silage hopper mounted behind the harvester's cab and above the engine weighs at least 3,000 lbs. Mounting the container, which holds 3,000 to 4,000 lbs. of silage, also required extensive modification on the 5460's frame, further adding to the overall weight of the machine. "We're hoping to get the weight down considerably," Morgan says. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Morgan Forage Harvesting, HC 1, Box 39, Menlo, Kan. 67753 (ph 913 855-2283 or 675-3084).

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