Helical bar concaves

Re: HELICAL BAR CONCAVES

Hi. I am a mostly small grains and seed grower in western oregon. I have been running helicals for several years now. I have run both the Gorden wireless helicals and the Loewens with the wires. (small wire spaced) I sold the Gordens, though not because they did'nt work, simply because for the small seeds like grass, I needed to keep more of the long straws inside the concave, not outside.

In all likelyhood I will never run a standard concave again. In fact, I was so happy with the helical concept, I took it to the next level. Here's a link with pictures.
http://talk.newagtalk.com/forums/thread-....ghlight=helical

You'll see the pattern concave is one of the Gorden wireless concaves.

Here is a link to my first ever corn harvest, which was last year.
http://talk.newagtalk.com/forums/thread-....light=combining
Even using the small wires and a grain platform header, I got along ok.

It's been my experience that the rotor setup and concave configuration have more to do with rotor loss than actual area. A properly setup 14xx series machine can out perform a badly setup 16xx series.
It's sort of like the no-till vs. conventional till concepts. You cant use conventional till methods to follow up a no-till planting. It will fail. Cover plates are that same way. If you know how they work and how to use them, they are an awesome tuning aid that allows the machine to do things otherwise impossible.

If you wish to visit with someone respected in the combine field, Ron Kile, the guy that builds the KRF rotor flights, is one who loves to visit about machines. He actually took time last harvest to come down to my area and ride with me for a bit in my helical machine. We did a quick kill and he was able to experience just how the helicals work in grass seed anyway. But I digress.

Even with helicals, I would not discount the benefits that can be had using cover plates in the right situation(s).

Re: HELICAL BAR CONCAVES

We have lowen type helical small wire concave in first position standard large wire at 2 and standard small wire at 3. We find this setup allows us to run the concave wider than with the standard three small wires we used previously.The wider concave then gives better straw quality when baling, better sample, less loss and a bit more output ,probablly use less fuel too .
Never done a real trial though were we have compared the two on same field on the same day.
Fitted it over winter about 7/8 years ago in 98 2388 and never wanted to go back, cut wheat barley oats and canola all with the same set up, most improvement in wheat and sometimes think small wire might be better in 2 for canola to reduce loading on sieves.

Bought a new 2388 2yrs ago and put the helical straight in, still in good condition much stronger and heavier than originals, We think it works even better in this combine but again we never even tried the factory option. We seem to be able to run the concave even wider and still thresh, in wheat we can leave most of the chaff on the straw.

Are there any independant trials on helicals out there?