Small bale piles on pallets
We are producing small bales of dry hay and straw, that are picked straight of the bale track and piled on truck pallets. A special trailer for this is attached to the baling machine. Here a few rounds of baling have already taken place and two piles of bales happens to be in the same picture.
This happens July 6 2014. I made that wagon 1996, when small bales were about to be a disappearing folk tradition down here.
Back of the trailer there is a truck pallet on five prongs. I am placing 6 bales on each layer and working here on the seventh layer so the stack is almost full. A full pack contains 42 bales.
The corner is cleaned too. A pile of pallets should be in front loader forks in order for me to take an empty pallet to the trailer.
The baler Welger AP42 presses tight and tidy square bales, that are piled easily and keep their form. Now we must fetch more pallets in order to continue packing.
When the stack is finished, I'm jumping off the wagon and the driver tips it up hydraulically. The ram is borrowed from the log splitter on his summer vacation.
The trailer is on it's prongs and the hay stack on pallet remains in the field, when the tipped trailer is driven forwards. And I take an empty pallet from a pile on front of the Valmet.
I'm lifting a pallet on the prongs and the trailer is tipped back to baling position. I'll jump along and the baling goes on.
The packets of bales can be transferred with a back fork, where the prongs are about 4 feet or 100-120 cm wide. Here a fork with support for bales to lean on. Sometimes a stack has to be moved away between baling, a curve of the windrow or starting the new field can be the reason.
The packing goes on and work gets done. No clouds in the sky.
The shadows get longer and the windrows shorter. The days work is almost finished and we must think about getting the bales under roof.
In the evening the hay bales are around the field stacked on pallets. The sky is clear, but the bales should be gathered to barn anyway. Often the stacks are collected to form a triple line on side of the field and covered with 10 m wide plastic.
The bale stacks can be transferred for example on pairs one in the front loader and other in the back fork. I've transported plenty with a trailer combination, where in front is a trailer modified from a Bedford lorry with a tow hitch originally mounted for towing artillery around. The trailers are horizontally enough to get those wide forks below pallets.
In that first pile on the right can be seen a bale placed differently on 5. layer. Two bales tie the stack in the middle, it splits without them.
These photos are from year 2008, not so good vintage of hay. The Bedford trailer had 4 stacks and the other 2. That front loader fork has a back support too, so the piles can be leaned back freely.
The Bedford side board was hanged to horizontal position to make the trailer wider.
The piles can be lifted in two layers with the front loader. Those second floor bales must be picked one to one and piled to sides of the barn because of diagonal supports. The barn is also too low near the side walls. The first floor is all whole stacks. The walls are made more impermeable after the photo is taken.
The stacks can be moved close to the side wall using the pallet truck. In the middle lifting with the front loader is the easiest way.
The last pile to the barn. In this James loader the visibility to the fork tips is fairly good. Massey Ferguson 390 suits well for driving inside in restricted spaces. I can see forward quite well under the pallet cause the driver's seat is so low.
The bales are inside, on the left straw bales made in the previous year. The stacks can be tight to get separate if hay has gone lower or I've parked a stack with the loader using force, but usually the piles can be taken away as whole. A better and larger storage would ease a lot I think. Good hay must be cared against humid air, but that 2008 hay was washed up so many times, that we didn't have to worry about that.
At the summer 2022 I made 2 youtube videos and it looks like moving one stack takes about a minute. At first loading a trailer on the field, of course tieing and transporting takes time too. A longer trailer would be more efficient; Couldn't use double trailers because of a tight crossing.
Then lifting stacks in the barn after some cooling.
Straw can be stored outside under the textile cover, that can hale moisture out. It keeps rain out when in about 45 degree angle and gets a grip of bales and lets air flow through so wind don't affect it much. I haven't tied it much here under the trees.
The bales still looked good, when taken in use after half a year storing, have stored longer too. I've dropped some upper corner bales lower to get narrower top. They could be more upright position to keep snow from pressing the cover.
The same strawstack from a direction the piles are lifted with the loader.
The pallets are 125x170 cm and made with a help of a jig. Helps to get the boards and crossbars right when nailed together with impulse nailer. The crossbars are 4x1,5 inch (100x40 mm) or even thinner timber of fast grown wood that is light and don't split easily when nailed.
The lower boards are usually nailed with hammer to let the impulse nailer take a breath. These are 4 inch and not always export quality timber.
Year 2010 we had baled about 30 bales of the aimed 1500 for that day, when the connection rod threw that loosened piston rail on the picker tines. I had some scrap steel stored and made a new rail the next night and we was baling the next day. The ex rail on the baler, even the security bolt didn't break.
The original baler wheel is moved to trailer's other wheel and baler's wheel is now with 14x16 inch tyre. The pressure is lowered below 1 bar to maintain picker's right height. The combination don't sink easily even on wet ground, like it might be here when baled straw in the autumn.
Welger had been pushed over 100 000 tight bales, when I serviced the piston a bit. Many weldings were broke and side plate almost separated, I welded them together. The piston moves on 4 shafted bearings, some don't roll and a tangent has worn off on one. These costed around 200 € per piece in Finland. I cleaned the old ones and made a spare part using a cheaper bearing to the easiest place. Inside the piston direction rail is also a plastic roller on the right. I made a new roll using hole saws. Seems to wear fast cause it's made off PE-plastic. Using the same PE-plate I made also a wiper bit to keep the lowest roller's trail clean. Now about 150 000 bales done and I try to order some rollers for the next season balings.
On the way to give neighbour's Birthday present, tried to wrap it nicely. This was 2014.
I have this grab to lift the piles off the pallets. I've pallets for about 5000 bales and in 2024 we made more. So I emptied about 50 pallets broking one pile, but I'm happy with it. Lifting this way is slow and needs great accuracy, but helps a lot anyway. Clamps were too smooth to hold small bales, so I bolted some angle iron on them. After the photo is taken I've inserted stays on the back of the grab, so the pile can lean backards more safely.