One season on with the merger – a fad or the way forward?

Over the course of the past 12 months, interest in the concept of grass mergers has really gained traction in Irish machinery circles. One operator who took a serious interest in the concept was Cork-based Jim Good. Jim was the first Irish contractor to purchase a Kuhn grass merger, namely the Merge Maxx 950.

As the grass harvesting season nears a finish, we travelled to Mallow to catch up with Jim and have a closer look at the machine in action, but more importantly find out his thoughts on both the concept and the machine after putting several thousand acres through it over the course of its first season.

Previous system

To keep his three self-propelled foragers moving, Jim was previously rowing up silage using two four-rotor and two twin-rotor rakes. However, it is widely known that no matter what brand of rake you use, they can pose issues twisting grass and gathering stones and debris, all of which brings about challenges for machinery.

After encountering his share of stone-related damage to foragers over the years, Jim felt that the concept of a merger could help to reduce downtime while offering a more professional service to his clients.

“I find rakes very slow,” Jim said. “When you are under pressure and forced to drive them on, all you are doing is digging into the ground and further contaminating the crop. I wanted a machine that could gather grass quicker and produce a nicer, more even swath.”

The concept

The concept of merging swaths of grass using belts has been around for years. This method is most commonly used on trailed and butterfly mower units grouping swaths of grass. However, until now, the go-to tool to group grass after mowing has been the rake.

Larger trailed mergers have been on the market for some time. They’ve been mainly used to carefully lift and move delicate Lucerne crops such as alfalfa. There was never a demand for mergers in the grouping of grass until recent times.

Narrower working widths and higher buying costs than rakes are the main reasons why mergers haven’t taken off in Ireland for grass. Having said that, smaller front-mounted 3m mergers have become more common in recent years for turning straw, largely down to their delicate handling capabilities at higher speeds.

Why Kuhn?

Jim looked at various different brands over the course of last autumn and into the spring of this year. He explained that his decision to go to Kuhn was based largely on two factors.

“In the end, it was between a Reiter and a Kuhn machine. Kuhn was far more keenly priced than any other machine I considered. Secondly, Kuhn has an established dealer network here in Ireland. Backup is everything in this business. The Kuhn importer, Cork Farm Machinery, who also run a machinery dealership, is based nearby. When it came to a machine such as a merger which most people have very little knowledge of, a local dealer with backup and parts was very important to me,” explained Jim.

The workings

Mergers lift the crop on to a belt conveyor, which moves and deposits the swath into the desired location. The Kuhn merger featured can deliver the crop to the centre, left or right side, or central and to one side, simply by alternating the direction of the belt conveyor.

The Merge Maxx 950 featured uses two pickup reels. These are each centrally split, and encompass five tine bars which run on a cam track system. The grass is picked up, guided by a crop roller and fed on to the hydraulically driven rotating belts. Both the pickup and belt speed can be altered independently.

Each pickup unit is spring-suspended. Four adjustable springs allow the pick-up unit to travel within an angle of +/-10° and have a vertical travel range of -20cm/+30cm to help adapt to uneven terrain.

The two pickup units run on four height-adjustable articulated skids. Skid-height adjustment is centralised and altered by a crank handle positioned at the rear of each pickup unit.

To avoid any excessive hydraulic requirements, the Kuhn merger features its own integrated hydraulic unit which drives the pickups and the belts. Jim runs the machine at 750rpm on the PTO, which on a John Deere 6150R has a fuel consumption of around 15-16l/hr.

“It is a shame it is not equipped with a steering axle. It would leave nicer corners for the forager,” said Jim. However, he noted that the merger pulls quite well behind the tractor and offers a smooth ride on the road.

However, it is a wide machine for transport. The lift arm linkage system on the merger includes dampers which help to prevent jolts being felt in the tractor.

Pros and cons

“I was driving the forager one day for a few hours before the usual driver took over. As I was walking across the field to where the jeep was parked, I came across a sizeable stone sitting on top of the ground. That’s when I said to myself the merger has just saved me enough money to cover half its yearly payments. If that field was rowed using a rake, the stone would be in the swath and god knows the damage and downtime it would have caused to the harvester.”

On the down side, he noted that if the grass is damp and if tines are missing, the grass will choke the machine. Similarly, if merging and not bringing the entire of the outer swath, it can lump and block the merger. Like any machine, the operator needs to know its limitations in the various conditions.

As regards output, Jim explained: “In similar conditions, the 9.5m Kuhn merger will match the output of the 12.5m four-rotor rake, if not surpass it.

The merger can work at speeds of up to 20km/h in good conditions (average 12-13km/h), whereas the rake is much more limited on forward speed, probably at 8-9km/h. The output of the merger is averaging around 12-13 acres/hr. However, we have achieved up to 20 acres/hr in ideal conditions. Merging swaths from both directions into one central swath (approximately 15m or 50ft) does work, but it takes time. The merger would need to have started well in advance of the forager.”

Jim has used the machine in both grass (hay and silage) and straw. He noted: “The merger will undoubtedly produce a lovely fluffy swath of grass for the forager, much nicer than the rake. But obviously this varies on the conditions. After getting used to the merger, my driver hates to see the rake coming.”

With the current weather conditions greatly impacting the harvest, Jim has put the merger to good use in straw. “We’re typically moving two swaths at a time, turning and moving both off the damp ground, in turn fluffing up the bottom half of the swath. It’s a great job to dry straw.”

Day-to-day running

“Mechanically, the machine has performed well over its first season. I’ve had the one driver on it and he hasn’t been ringing me with any issues. That’s what I want. From an operational point of view, it’s very straightforward to get a feel for it. The control box allows you to set the delivery system, the direction of the belts, work/transport mode and has an hour meter. When you lift the pickup units at the headlands, the system disengages so not to interfere with the headland swaths.”

“It lasted for the entire first cut on the original tines and we had to start replacing some as we got into the second cuts. The plastic bands mean it’s very easy to change the tines. There are quite a few grease points throughout the machine but they are all fairly accessible. The motors that drive the belts could maybe do with a little more power when it comes to handling heavy wet grass,” said Jim.

Verdict

“It’s still early days. The merger is not the be all and end all, but I like it and will continue to run one next year. It leaves a nicer swath than a rake, but still not as good as a swather mounted on a mower. But it’s as good as what can be expected.”

“Will it stick the Irish conditions? Come back to me in three or four years’ time and I’ll tell you then. So far I do think there will be higher running costs to a merger than a rake. We contractors will always be looking for bigger and stronger machines. The merger works, but it’s very expensive for what it does.”

“Four years ago, I was using two 30ft rakes, last year I was running two 45ft rakes, and now I have one 45ft rake and the merger. There’s a lot of money tied up nowadays in rowing up grass. I do like the Merge Maxx 950. However, it’s only really gathering three ledges in one pass. I think the newly introduced Merge Maxx 1050 could be the go to model for contractors running foragers, but ultimately this will all depend on the price.

“Overall, to be fair, the merger did exactly what it was supposed to- less stones, less clay and less debris coupled with a nice even swath.”

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