New Holland North America says its new generation of self-propelled windrowers are faster, more powerful and more efficient than previous machines in the commercial-scale hay and forage space.
The Speedrower 1 series builds on the company’s previous series, the Speedrower Plus, with higher peak horsepower, field speeds of up to 32 km-h and transport speeds to 48 km-h. It’s topped off with a 567.8-litre fuel tank.
Horsepower — more of it, and more efficient use of it — was a primary target in the development of the Speedrower 1, says Jordan Milewski, New Holland’s self-propelled windrower product marketing manager. He calls the series’ high-end, 308-h.p. Speedrower 301 “the most powerful windrower in the marketplace today.”
“We’ve gone to a hydraulically driven reversing fan that’s variable speed, so it’s going to better manage the engine’s temperature … while consuming less horsepower. You’re saving more of that available engine power to do other things like drive down the road, pull a hill or cut down a big heavy crop.”
The Speedrower 1 lineup features four models, ranging in peak horsepower from 161 to 308. In addition to their 32 km-h field speed, each model can reach transport speeds of 48 km/h.
The result is a 10 to 20 per cent speed improvement over competitive windrowers, New Holland says, crediting its SensiDrive drive-by-wire system, which bypasses mechanical controls in favour of digital command of ground drive pumps and wheel motors. It was introduced in the Plus series to improve power and driveability in tough conditions.
“We’ve taken what we’ve built on with the Plus series and we’ve expanded that from the standpoint of power and efficiency and precision,” says Milewski.
Data collection
A core feature of the Speedrower 1 is New Holland’s relative yield monitoring system, integrated with FieldOps.
That system produces real-time maps based on the header load as it moves across the field. The resulting data enables operators to make in-cab decisions such as ground speed adjustment in lighter crops and cut quality management in heavy forage.
The data is captured and stored in FieldOps for later comparison across fields and seasons. This information is meant to help producers work through their agronomic decisions such as irrigation management, nutrient planning and pest scouting.
Although FieldOps has been used in combines for crops such as canola, it’s new to the hay space, says Milewski. It offers a snapshot of field data that otherwise would disappear with the harvested hay crop.
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Producers tired of juggling tech subscriptions may be interested to know that FieldOps connectivity is included for life on all Speedrower 1 models.
“Making it basically lifetime connectivity means that they can get their information and they don’t have a reoccurring headache,” notes Milewski.
Calibration control
The AutoFloat header flotation system is also new to the 1 series. It continually monitors and adjusts header flotation pressure to produce more consistent ground pressure and reduce the manual adjustments prevalent in the Plus series.
It also addresses another common problem with header flotation: stress on the header arms as the header is tilted forward, away from the machine.
“As you’re working through a range of tilt, it doesn’t get exponentially heavier as you cut low,” says Milewski.
The system also offers operators more control over calibration. An icon-based interface is used to make the header heavier or lighter depending on geographical factors such as wet spots.
“For me, personally, it’s a win because with the old system, the operator would have had to have remembered pressure readings and then, after going back to the original setting of the machine, basically re-inputting those original pressure values.
“In this case, when conditions return to normal and you want to run at a normal header ground pressure, you simply hit a reset button and it just goes back to the calibrated value. Easy peasy.”
The Speedrower 1 series is compatible with Durabine Plus disc heads and Haybine sickle heads. However, its improved compatibility with Saskatchewan’s Honey Bee WSC draper headers will likely play a large role in Western Canada sales, says Milewski.
Although the WSC headers also fit with the Plus series, he says the external control box the company paired it with proved to be a hard use case for farmers.
“The functionality of that Honey Bee draper head is now fully integrated into the tractor, back on the multi-function handle where the operator wants to have it,” he says.
Milewski believes there’s a particular place for the four-cylinder Speedrower 161 on some western Canadian beef operations.
“It doesn’t get a lot of fanfare because it’s the little machine in the fleet, but four-cylinders — from a draper standpoint — are important in Western Canada,” he says, emphasizing the 161’s upgrade to a variable displacement header drive pump meant to improve sickle draper cutting performance.
“It also means that machine can now have a 13-foot disc header on it, which is a good opportunity for some of the smaller beef producers out there that want a windrower, but 16 feet is just too much for them.”
The Speedrower 1 series is now available for order through New Holland dealers with deliveries expected to begin later this year.
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