[hammer]

Hello,

Just thought I would ask this question.
If you could remove a rock trap for small grain and corn harvesting, would you do it?

I have this thought. We had an old 1460 with out RT. I believe it does a better cleaner sample in corn. RT, I think breaks up more cobs.

In small grain I think you could save more straw for livestock baling.

Any opinions to this. Thanks in advance. H

 

[amax]

Hi

None of the machines in our area have rt.
I live in Lousiana ,not many rocks.
Maybe turtles.

Maxie

 

[okpanhandle]

No machines in my area have them, either. No rocks, and very few people are cutting on the ground anyway.

 

[ihc1470]

Since we have run the machine (1470) have not had a rt, but am installing one for next year. It has the stone retarder drum. Cut several acreas of peas and are right on the ground doing that. Been lucky so far but feel it will only be a matter of time before one gets to the rotor. Am going to try the Razor drum in the rt. It looks like it should work well. The original 4 paddle drum I have been told was nothing but a wall of steel. 3 paddle better but still problems. Most 1470 machine around here do not have a trap on them. It is not until you get into the 23xx machines around here do I see many traps. Not really sure why that is. We cut only small grains.

 

[makar]

I dont run cih but this is what i am told, the rock trap will cost you one mph , i think the feeder plugs. A friend pulled his out to combine a heavy, tough fescue crop, was plugging otherwise.

 

[farmertony]

never had one never will no rocks here.

 

[redgreen]

Funny, I have only ever seen one combine here that didn't have one. Surpirsing to see such a big loss in operating speed (1 mph) with the trap. Can't say I have ever had a trap plug on me, in any kind of condition or crop. I had issues with the trap not opening wide enough to get the rocks out though!

I seen a combine a colony had, a 9600, and they put a 8 inch rock right into it, smashed the concave into two peices, tore a couple rub bars out, and wrecked the beater. Along with a bent feeder chain and some misc. stuff, it was wrote off for the season. Thats what happens when a rock trap misses a rock, I couldn't imagine using them with no rock trap at all

 

[okpanhandle]

It's funny how regional things like that are. Until recently almost no machines in my area had straw choppers. Now that they're pretty much standard equipment there are more and more showing up, but the older machines never had them.

I call our 2388 a Western Kansas Special. It's got a standard rotor, single speed hydro, two-wheel drive, no rock trap, no lateral tilt feeder, no chopper... I'm sure I'm missing something else; there are a lot of delete plates on the armrest. It's about as basic as a 2388 can get.

 

[farmerknowsbest]

We run both a rock retarder drum and a stone trap in our 2388 and wouldn't even dream of harvesting any crop with out either. We actually pick more stones with a corn head than the flex head because of muddy fall harvest conditions. Our land is just too stony to risk not having one.

Warren

 

[chickweed]

Dont know how rock traps are built today but on sons 1978 1640 rock trap had couple key stock supported at front an not at rear of trap an would get bent down leaving a lip that material had to go over an caused poor feeding. Lip was right bellow 3 bar beater an we would have to bend key stock back ocasionally.Hopefully that has beeen changed.

 

[homefarmtobydog]

Not a fan of the rock trap.

Had one on a 2166 the bearing went on the beater and it set the straw and chaff on feeder house on fire. Just managed to put it out with fire extinguisher but case ih letters on cab where starting to melt. A very close call!

Running 2388 now without trap but have stopped growing peas to avoid damage from cutting so low. Does feed better without trap

 

[stewart7225]

I would have to agree with what you call the "Western Kansas Special" Only exclusion are the biggest combines of each brand, they are now almost always RWA because of the amount of muddy harvests we have had.

 

[adk247]

both of our machines dont have rock traps but we dont have rocks out here so we dont really need them. one of ours has the stone retarder drum and the other doesnt, the one with out the stone drum seems to feed better in milo and soybeans.

 

[farmerleach]

WOW no rocks, So these mythical places do exist? We have never had a combine that hasn't had a rock trap. I have seen the damage that is caused by missed rocks in both Rotors and Conventional machines, Not pretty or fun to repair. We demoed a R75 a few years back with just a rock door, and that really us realize how often we pick up rocks, most are just small, but small will still do damage.

If you don't have rocks, probably don't need the trap, if you gottem, you should probably have one

 

[okieclayfarmer]

i have mostly sandstone so the big ones were stopped by the front auger and the smaller ones went right on through ,,, up to this point i have only replaced auger fingers

 

[factoryfarmer]

Some of our rocks grow up to waist high and we have plenty of the smaller ones to go around so there's no way we'd be without one.

-Dave

 

[redgreen]

LOL, we got rocks that we farm around and the buffalo used for rubbing their backs on a 100 years ago! Funny thread, one extreme to the other.

 

[adk247]

ya probably the biggest pebble that we find in our field is where its along the road and in the winter where the snow plows kick a a piece of gravel road into the field

 

[parts]

Our customers that have older combines (1400-1600) don't have rock traps, while the newers ones do. Most of the combines have stone retarding drums though. In green steam beans the non rock trap combines seem to feed a little better, but in our area we have some rocks, so anyone who buys a new combine doen't want to risk running a rock through.

 

[okpanhandle]

Every new oil well road is now paved with caliche, so we have a bunch of little white rocks around them. They never get more a few feet away from the road and we cut well off the ground, so they're not a problem.

We don't have problems with the snow plow, but every time the county road grader driver cleans out the ditches he piles up all the weeds and rocks (in areas where the county roads have caliche) into the field borders. There are usually a few caliche boulders living the ditches.