Prevent setbacks with pre-harvest inspections – John Brantsen, Vita Plus

By John Brantsen, Vita Plus dairy specialist
The Fourth of July has come and gone, corn has started to tassel, and we are officially in the heart of summer. This means the always-exciting corn silage season in the Midwest is less than two months away!  Although this is a great time for producers to slow down, and maybe take a vacation while the corn crop continues its march toward maturity, you should not forget to properly prepare the equipment for harvest and storage of this year’s corn silage.

By John Brantsen, Vita Plus dairy specialist
The Fourth of July has come and gone, corn has started to tassel, and we are officially in the heart of summer. This means the always-exciting corn silage season in the Midwest is less than two months away!  Although this is a great time for producers to slow down, and maybe take a vacation while the corn crop continues its march toward maturity, you should not forget to properly prepare the equipment for harvest and storage of this year’s corn silage.

Although today’s forage harvesters are technological marvels with the ability to process large quantities of crop at a rapid pace, they come with a hefty price tag.  It can be frustrating and extremely costly when a $200 part breaks and stops a machine worth hundreds of thousands of dollars dead in its tracks in the middle of harvest. Therefore, setting aside time to thoroughly look things over before harvest is time well spent.  

At a minimum, all parts prone to wear and damage should be thoroughly inspected and replaced before harvest, if necessary.  A custom forage harvester in my area said any part that appears to have 50 percent or less of its useful life remaining should automatically get replaced prior to harvest season.  Not every operation needs to go to that extreme, but it does underscore keeping machines running and minimizing down time during harvest.

When I asked the same custom forage harvester what specific items on the machines are most important to evaluate before heading to the field, his comment came back quickly, “We look at absolutely everything.”  Maybe “everything” is a bit of an overstatement, but maybe not either. 

A good way to ensure all the important items on your machine are thoroughly inspected is with a checklist.  This could be as simple as a sheet employees use to check the machine from front to back, similar to the inspection sheet a car dealer uses when giving your car a once-over during an oil change.  With many different forage harvester models, putting a list together tailored to your machine likely makes the most sense versus a generic one-size-fits-all. 

One way to improve inspection efficiency is moving in one direction.  Start in the front of the machine and move toward the back, or vice versa.  This will help eliminate backtracking during the inspection process and make it easier to continue if the inspection is interrupted or if someone else takes over part way through. 

Additionally, recording the pre-harvest inspection findings and keeping a file on each piece of equipment will provide a historical reference from year to year for the condition of each item on the list- how many hours were on the machine, if a part was replaced and who replaced it.  Otherwise, it can be difficult to remember when a belt was replaced or when the gearbox oil was last changed.   

Don’t forget about other support equipment either. Keeping trucks, tractors, trailers and wagons up and running is also critical. 

Lastly, always remember safety when going through your equipment.  Pull the keys and let others know what you are doing when crawling up, over, in and around equipment.