Agricultural baler, agricultural baler system, method for configuring an agricultural baler, and method for baling

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10085382-B2
Application number	US-201615299044-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 20, 2016
Priority date	Oct 20, 2015
Publication date	Oct 2, 2018
Grant date	Oct 2, 2018

Abstract

An agricultural baler including a bale chamber; a feeder duct communicating with the bale chamber for charges of crop material to be transferred from the feeder duct into the bale chamber; a plunger reciprocally moveable within the bale chamber to compress successive charges of crop material received from the feeder duct to form a bale; and a feeder operable within the feeder duct to accumulate a charge of crop material therein and then stuff that accumulated charge into the bale chamber. The feeder includes at least one first tine and at least one second tine, each having a leading face for engaging the crop material. A width of a frontal area of the leading face of the second tine is smaller than a width of a frontal area of the leading face of the first tine.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. An agricultural baler, comprising:
a bale chamber;
a feeder duct communicating with the bale chamber for charges of crop material to be transferred from the feeder duct into the bale chamber;
a plunger reciprocally moveable within the bale chamber to compress successive charges of crop material received from the feeder duct to form a bale; and
a feeder operable within the feeder duct to accumulate a charge of crop material therein and then stuff that accumulated charge into the bale chamber, the feeder comprising (i) at least one first tine comprising a mounting surface, (ii) at least one second tine comprising a mounting surface, (iii) a first plate removably mounted to the mounting surface of the first tine, the first plate defining a first width, and (iv) a second plate removably mounted to the mounting surface of the second tine, the second plate defining a second width dimensioned smaller than the first width;
wherein the first and second plates are interchangeable for selectively configuring a tine of the feeder to be the first tine or the second tine depending on a desired pushing effect.

2. The baler according to claim 1 , wherein the feeder comprises at least two tine bars each having mounted thereon a set of tines, wherein the set of tines of at least one of said tine bars comprises at least one first tine and the set of tines of at least another one of said tine bars comprises at least one second tine; wherein:
each of the at least two tine bars is rotatable about its own axis and about an offset axis;
the tine bars are rotatably mounted on a tine bar holding member for rotation about their own axis;
the tine bar holding member is rotatable about the offset axis; and
the feeder is configured to cause the tine bars to rotate about their respective own axis when the tine bar holding member is rotated about the offset axis such that the tines of the tine bars are caused to move along a path of movement.

3. The baler according to claim 2 , wherein the feeder is configured to cause the tines of the tine bar having mounted thereon a set of tines comprising at least one first tine to move at least along a stuffing movement path and at least one second tine, and wherein the feeder is further configured to cause the tines of the tine bar to move along an accumulating movement path.

4. The baler according to claim 3 , wherein the set of tines of the tine bar that is caused to move at least along a stuffing movement path, comprises first tines.

5. The baler according to claim 3 , wherein the feeder comprises a tine bar having mounted thereon a set of tines, wherein the set of tines comprises at least one first tine and at least one second tine.

6. The baler according to claim 5 , wherein the set of tines that comprises at least one first tine and at least one second tine, comprises a plurality of first tines and a plurality of second tines; and the first tines and second tines are mounted alternatingly along a length of said tine bar.

7. The baler according to claim 5 , wherein the set of tines that comprises at least one first tine and at least one second tine, comprises a plurality of first tines and a plurality of second tines; and groups of first tines and groups of second tines are mounted alternatingly along a length of the tine bar.

8. The baler according to claim 5 , wherein the feeder is further operable to cause the tines of the tine bar having mounted thereon a set of tines comprising at least one first tine and at least one second tine to move through the feeder duct along an accumulating movement path.

9. The baler according to claim 1 , wherein the at least first tine comprises a tine body with the mounting surface having mounted thereon the first plate defining a leading face of the first tine having a frontal area with the larger first width.

10. The baler according to claim 9 , comprising a plurality of tine bodies provided with an arrangement for removably mounting the first or second plate thereon for providing the tine bodies with a leading face.

11. The baler according to claim 1 , wherein the at least second tine comprises a tine body with the mounting surface having mounted thereon the second plate defining a leading face having a frontal area with the smaller second width, wherein the second width of the second plate of the second tine is at least a width of the tine body of the second tine.

12. A baler system, comprising:
a baler comprising:
a bale chamber;
a feeder duct communicating with the bale chamber for charges of crop material to be transferred from the feeder duct into the bale chamber;
a plunger reciprocally moveable within the bale chamber to compress successive charges of crop material received from the feeder duct to form a bale; and
a feeder operable within the feeder duct to accumulate a charge of crop material therein and then stuff that accumulated charge into the bale chamber, the feeder comprising a plurality of tine bodies provided with an arrangement for mounting plates thereon for providing the tine bodies with a leading face; and

a plurality of first plates and a plurality of second plates configured to be mounted on the tine bodies of the baler for providing the leading face of each of the tine bodies,
wherein a width of a frontal area of the leading face of each of the tine bodies defined by the second plates is smaller than a width of a frontal area of the leading face of each of the tine bodies provided by the first plates; and
wherein the plurality of first and second plates are interchangeable for selectively configuring a tine body of the feeder to be the tine body having the first plate or the tine body having the second plate depending on a desired pushing effect.

13. A method for configuring a baler, comprising:
a bale chamber;
a feeder duct communicating with the bale chamber for charges of crop material to be transferred from the feeder duct into the bale chamber;
a plunger reciprocally moveable within the bale chamber to compress successive charges of crop material received from the feeder duct to form a bale; and
a feeder operable within the feeder duct to accumulate a charge of crop material therein and then stuff that accumulated charge into the bale chamber, the feeder comprising at least one first tine body and at least one second tine body;
the method comprising steps of:
mounting on the first tine body a first plate providing a leading face; and
mounting on the second tine body a second plate providing a leading face,
wherein a width of a frontal area of the leading face provided by the second plate is smaller than a width of a frontal area of the leading face provided by the first plate; and
wherein the first and second plates are interchangeable for selectively configuring a tine body of the feeder to be the tine body having the first plate or the tine body having the second plate depending on a desired pushing effect.

14. The baler according to claim 1 , wherein the at least first tine comprises a first tine body and the at least second tine comprises a second tine body, the first and second tine bodies having an equal width.

Assignees

• Cnh Ind America Llc

Inventors

• Rosseel Bram
• Devroe Jeroen
• Liefooghe Dries
• Kindt Dieter
• Vandaele Thomas

Classifications

• A01F15/042

  Plungers · CPC title

• A01F15/101 Primary

  Feeding at right angles to the compression stroke (A01F15/106 takes precedence) · CPC title

• A01D89/002 Primary

  Rotors · CPC title

• A01F2015/102

  the pressing chamber is fed from the bottom side · CPC title

• A01F15/10

  Feeding devices for the crop material {e.g. precompression devices} · CPC title