When you think of round baler combi machines, a few names instantly spring to mind such as McHale, Krone and Lely. One name that certainly doesn’t is Göweil. The Irish Farmers Journal caught up with James and David Bryan who are the people behind the Cork-based business Bio Plant & Agri Ltd, which is responsible for bringing the first one of these machines into Ireland.

James and David come from a farming background growing up on the family farm milking 120 cows on 180 acres in Kinsale, Co Cork. There are three boys in the family and, as one stayed at home and looked after the cows and farm, James and David set up the agri-contracting business in 1990.

Speaking about setting up the business, James tells me: “I always loved machinery and, with my brother looking after the farm, I started working with a neighbour doing baling and wrapping.

“After a number of years, I bought the baler and wrapper off him when he retired. That was the start of it really.”

The machines in question at the time were a RP125 Welger baler and a Tanco wrapper. Since then, James has had nearly all makes of balers over a 25-year period, including Welger, Claas, Vicon, Deutz, Orkel and McHale.

“I make 10,000 bales a year on average and try to update the baler every three years if possible,” explains James.

So why a Göweil? “We travelled to Agritechnica and saw the machines on the stand and got talking to the sales representatives. We had been in the factory a few years previous looking at a maize baler which we were considering buying at the time and were very impressed with the build quality and heavy duty components in the machine.

“The new baler wrapper combi has taken a lot of the parts and designs from the maize machine and put them into a grass baler, which was really the major selling point for us. We came back to Ireland to arrange finance, but by the time we had it all in order, as it was their first year making this model machine, they were sold out, so we put the order in for the 2016 season and took delivery of the G1 and G5040 Kombi in April.”

So let’s take a closer look at the machine itself.

Pickup

The Göweil has a pendulum-type pickup, as it is suspended in a central position, which gives it a swivel range of 150mm, allowing it to follow ground adaptations and also compensate for any unevenness in the terrain.

The pickup is camless and consists of six rows of tines spaced at 51mm, ensuring it cleans the ground even in heavy wet grass, according to James. With a working width of 2.2m and large conveying screws on the sides, raked 30ft swarths are no problem and also help make a more uniform bale, as the pickup and rotor are kept full.

The pickup is powered by an ASA 80 HE chain and secured by a star ratchet coupling.

A nice feature to the pickup is the plastic bands which allow flex if they come in contact with stones or other foreign objects, while also allowing the tines to strip the grass off easier with less resistance to help improve efficiency.

Up front, the pickup is fitted with two crop press rollers, which help smooth out uneven or lumpy swarths, to provide an even crop flow into the baler.

Rotor

Behind the pickup sits the eight-star mega rotor, which has a diameter of 570mm and is fitted with Hardox welded on rows of tines. The rotor works in conjunction with a small infeed roller positioned in front of it, which just helps pre-compress the material going in to improve efficiency.

The Göweil is unusual because it feeds the material upwards through the cutting system and into the bale chamber. As the cutting unit is positioned above the rotor, changing knives is a lot simpler than in other machines, where you need to get in underneath.

The cutting unit is fitted with 30 twin-cutting edge blades which allow for a cutting length of 35mm to be achieved. The narrow spacing between the rotor tine and knife ensures that the feed is chopped with accuracy and efficiency.

The replacement knife bar allows the operator to carry 60 replacement knives or change the number of cutting knives as needed. A hydraulic bar safety device protects the knives against foreign objects and moves them immediately into their cutting position.

The rotor also features autoflow control (AFC), which allows the hydraulic top door to open and the knives to flip back in the event of a lump or blockage. This allows the material to enter the chamber when the rotor restarts. When the blockage is cleared, the top door then closes and the knives engage automatically.

Bale chamber

At the core of the machine is the bale chamber which is fitted with 18 solid forming rollers constructed of 4mm thick steel and reinforced on the inside. The manufacturer believes the ribbed profile on the rollers ensures adequate compression density and the reliable rotation of the bale.

The chamber itself produces a bale size of 1.2m x 1.25m. The drive is delivered by an ASA 100 HE chain and two ASA 80 HE chains. Two drive rollers with a shaft diameter of 65mm and the additional roller shafts with a diameter of 60mm run continuously on double-row pendulum roller bearings. The design is contractor specification, with long service intervals.

Film and net binding unit

On the Göweil G1, the operator can insert films with a width of up to 1.50m. Binding can be started automatically or manually from the cab. The hydraulically adjustable brake roller ensures that the bale is wrapped tightly during net or film binding.

The brake pressures and the number of layers can be set directly using the program control again in the cab. The baler is fitted with a dual binding unit which essentially means the operator can fit two rolls of film or net into the unit and cut binding time in half as both rolls can work together.

Alternatively, if you are working with various crops in the same day such as straw, hay and silage, then a roll of film and net can be fitted allowing the operator to easily switch from one to the other in a matter of seconds.

Maintenance

As with most machines, the baler is fitted with a fully automatic grease and oil lubricator, which is used to supply sufficient lubrication to all bearings on the rollers and on the rotor while the oil lubricator provides a constant supply of oil to all chains on the bale chamber, the rotor and the pickup, with brushes fitted that spread the oil evenly across the chains.

Wrapper

To the rear of the machine is the twin-arm satellite wrapper. Göweil is no stranger in the Irish wrapper market having previously made universal wrapper units which various different make balers could be fitted into as well as standalone versions.

When the bale is completed in the chamber the rear door opens and the wrapping table moves forward via two chain drives into position under the bale. The bale then rolls out and drops down onto the awaiting wrapping table. Once this is completed, the wrapper moves back into position and the rear door closes to allow the next bale to be formed.

When working on hilly ground, the machine is fitted with four rotating bale guide rollers to ensure the bale is transferred securely into the wrapper. Once there, the twin wrapping arms and the two 750mm film stretching units ensure that the bale is wrapped quickly.

Göweil claims the wrapping process will always be finished faster than the baling process. Two sensors monitor the film and respond when the film has run out or tears. The film monitoring unit is fitted as standard and when a roll of films runs out, the machine will automatically switch to single-film mode, where the feed rate of the wrapping table is reduced to ensure an overlap of 50%. Once the bale is fully wrapped, the film is cut off by two cutting knives before the bale is automatically or manually deposited.

Chassis

Weighing in at 8t empty and with a width of almost 10ft the Göweil is certainly no lightweight. All the components are incorporated on to a heavy-duty tandem axle chassis that is supported on 500/50-17 tyres.

The narrow axle spacing allows the machine to operate in a way that is gentle on the soil and smooth even when you are travelling on the road – this is noticeable as we follow James from one field to the next down a traditional Irish country road as the machine doesn’t bounce around as some rivals do.

Service and reliability

This for me is the biggest factor when buying something away from the norm, you have no dealer support or parts backup as Göweil has no dealer network here in Ireland.

James on the other hand seems unfazed by this: “If I need a part as long as I call the factory before 2pm today I will have it tomorrow, they gave me a full parts book with the machine as well as sending over a technician from the factory in Austria for the first week of silage in order to help make sure the machine was set up correctly and running to its full potential.”

James says the Deutz 165-7 boosts it up to 200hp, burns 100 litres of fuel in a typical day. One factor in this could be the baler’s load-sensing hydraulics, added to the 1,000 eco rpm gearbox.

With a retail price tag of €94,000 + VAT, the Göweil is by no means a cheap machine, but James has justified it quite simply: “I normally change my baler every three years, but with this machine and its heavy duty design I will have no problem running it for five to six seasons, I can easily produce 60-70 bales an hour at an average weight of 850kg.”