# Deere 328 knotting issues



## Leeroy (Aug 19, 2013)

The baler in question is a friends. I will be looking at the manual tomorrow but wanted to ask for advice here.
This baler is around ten years old maybe 5000 bales or so. Great shape makes nice bales, but will start missing knots, mostly on right side. A lot of times it will miss 4-5 and then be okay again, then back to missing some, over and over.
I baled a small field with it last year and it was very frustrating. I thought I'd be able to straighten it out as we run a '61 NH 270 hayliner that we have always solved any issues with ourselves. Maybe that is of no use, but seems like knotters are fairly similar.
I will report back list of new parts dealer has thrown on, tucker fingers ,twine discs , and knife arms look new.
Will also inspect knots closely today. Sisal twine-9000. I think someone suggested plastic/poly twine might solve this issue?
I will check twine tension as per manual, it felt like to much to me. I did look at manual online, and as far as I can tell all knotter adjustments were correct. Tripped them manually a few times. Did not check timing but will do that as well.
Again,does this erratic back and fourth point to anything?
Thank you,Lee


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## snowball (Feb 7, 2015)

If everything looks good and the adjustments are correct may I too suggest try'n the plastic twine .. alot of times that seems to help the problem.. the other thing is check when it starts to miss tie is he pulling a wagon behind ? and how full is the wagon ( if so ) when the miss tie's start .. as JD didn't make the knotter frame quite strong enough not to flex a little when pulling a wagon behind on that series baler the 327 and 328 have those issues .. it sound like you know what to look for .. good luck .


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

Where are the knots failing? An accurate description of where on the twine and what else of a knot is on the twine will help in a diagnosis of whatever it is causing the problem.

Pictures would be good too.

Thanks.


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## mike10 (May 29, 2011)

To expand on Coondle's question.

Is there a loop on one end of the twine when the knot is not tied. In other words, is there a knot on one end of the twine and not on the other end? If so which end of the twine is the loop. The one on top of the bale or the end coming up the front of the bale.

Is there no loop on either end?

Is the knot formed but broken below the knot?

Does the knot hang on the bill hook?

Do the knots that don't fail look like they are made properly? Twine ends cut clean, bow knots, ragged looking knots?

Are there black spots on the twine?

Is the twine that has the missed knot shorter than the twine on the tied side?


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## Leeroy (Aug 19, 2013)

I'm hoping to check closer on knots today. I don't recall what the knots were doing last year.
No-there is not a wagon used but that is good to know for future reference.
Thanks for all the suggestions!


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## Gearclash (Nov 25, 2010)

Many moons ago my dad bought a new 328 and after some use and a lot of frustration JD replaced one knotter. All was good after that, and we pulled wagons behind the baler, too.


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## Flacer22 (Oct 31, 2009)

I had the exact same problem last year and a little this year. Coondel is the man to ask as he is much more informed then I am but I will give you what we were able to do to make our problem go away for most part.

First I'll second plastic twine my 328 even with sissal bill hooks still likes plastic better than sissal. It also prefers high strength plastic say 170 to 190 I've even run 210 ties better than with standard 130 9000.

Our problem was related to Tucker fingers we had to adjust them and clean out entie knottor frame section as some times randomly the Tucker finger trip arm would catch and not tuck the twine resulting in 4 or 5 random bales not tied. It would then finally trip and start to tie again. The culprert to this was a bad trucker finger return spring and to much hay chaff built up in box. The problem also resulted in a single knot loop on long side of string over top of bale and nothing at all on short side string.

I'd also suggest taking knottor guard off and walking behind Baler as it runs and watch it make each knot that was ultimately how I caught the problem.

P.s my right side knottors Tucker fingers is out of spec with what manual stats is correct but it work this way ever john Deere tec agreed the manual was a little off when it comes to Tucker finger adjuatments


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## Bazooka (Sep 17, 2013)

Leeroy said:


> The baler in question is a friends. I will be looking at the manual tomorrow but wanted to ask for advice here.
> This baler is around ten years old maybe 5000 bales or so. Great shape makes nice bales, but will start missing knots, mostly on right side. A lot of times it will miss 4-5 and then be okay again, then back to missing some, over and over.
> I baled a small field with it last year and it was very frustrating. I thought I'd be able to straighten it out as we run a '61 NH 270 hayliner that we have always solved any issues with ourselves. Maybe that is of no use, but seems like knotters are fairly similar.
> I will report back list of new parts dealer has thrown on, tucker fingers ,twine discs , and knife arms look new.
> ...


Tucker fingers would be the first thing I'd check. Make sure they are perpendicular to the needle slot just before they snap back into the home position. After you adjust them, cycle the knotters to be sure the tucker fingers don't make contact with the needle.


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## gearhartfarms82 (May 10, 2015)

This is a very fun topic with the John Deere Balers. As mentioned above all our things to also check but there's two things I would check first one would be the control for the Tucker fingers the rod that the linkages attached to those can become tweeked, in doing so you can never get the Tucker fingers adjusted properly and it will be sporadic and missing on the tie cycle. The second thing is where the control Rod comes back to home and get chaff build up in it and prevent to come coming back completely that area is got the feeder fork behind it and constantly feeds chaff into that area. I ran into the same issue before ended up replacing both knotters adjusting Tucker fingers within specs and Baylor would still miss sporadically once I pulled that control rod out put it on the table and realized it was not square and true I went ahead and fixed that issue once I fix that issue Knotting problems disappeared that was around 40,000 bale ago.


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## Darnebi75 (Jul 13, 2015)

replace any springs that are on the knotter,especially the spring that controls the tucker fingers. having knotter problems baling straw, followed the baler, replaced the spring on tucker fingers and it hasn't missed. Whoever said to replace all springs on your baler, yearly is a great idea.


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## Leeroy (Aug 19, 2013)

Thanks everyone, as far as I know the baler in question is back to tying and it was basically cleaning up the knotters well. As suggested the tucker fingers were the culprit, not returning home consistently.


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## bglz42 (Oct 5, 2009)

Glad you got it solved. My 328 has been extremely reliable, rarely missing a knot. The only time I had issues was when the chaff built up around the knotters. I started carrying a leaf blower into the field with me, and would blow it out every 200 or so bales. Solved the issue...


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

I think thats a bit overkill unless you put a lot of bales through. I've got something approaching 100,000 bales on my 348 with all original springs except needle stop.

My 336 I can't imagine the number of bales on it as it looks to have 5 times the wear of the 348 on every part of the machine. It has some new springs including the tuckers but many originals elsewhere.

I think that needle stop spring might be the most important. Changing springs now, you might have a good US made spring on there and be pulling it off to put a chinese part that may fail faster than what you had. Haven't been impressed with some of JD parts lately.



Darnebi75 said:


> replace any springs that are on the knotter,especially the spring that controls the tucker fingers. having knotter problems baling straw, followed the baler, replaced the spring on tucker fingers and it hasn't missed. Whoever said to replace all springs on your baler, yearly is a great idea.


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## Josh in WNY (Sep 7, 2010)

Glad to hear that you solved your problem. I'll point out one other spot that I've seen problems in case anyone else pulls up this thread looking for help. Our 336 was missing ties constantly and we finally noticed that one of the bolts holding the needle yoke to the side of the bale chamber was loose. This was letting the needles move around and not drop the twine in the twine disc correctly. Tightened that back up and readjusted the needles and the problems went away.


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## Bazooka (Sep 17, 2013)

Josh in WNY said:


> Glad to hear that you solved your problem. I'll point out one other spot that I've seen problems in case anyone else pulls up this thread looking for help. Our 336 was missing ties constantly and we finally noticed that one of the bolts holding the needle yoke to the side of the bale chamber was loose. This was letting the needles move around and not drop the twine in the twine disc correctly. Tightened that back up and readjusted the needles and the problems went away.


Good find Josh, on any baler it is a good idea to look over the things that are important in getting that twine to the right place at the right time, BEFORE starting to wrench on the knotters. I've fixed a lot of balers tying problems without even touching the knotters.


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## clowers (Feb 11, 2011)

i have a 328 and it started having issues with sissel twine. I used 3 boxes of 130 plastic and the only bales I broke were due to my square not between the balls coming loose. 10 boxes of 190 plastic came last week. If it ever rains again here in east Texas, maybe I can try the 190 before frost.


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## Coondle (Aug 28, 2013)

clowers said:


> i have a 328 and it started having issues with sissel twine. I used 3 boxes of 130 plastic and the only bales I broke were due to my square not between the balls coming loose. 10 boxes of 190 plastic came last week. If it ever rains again here in east Texas, maybe I can try the 190 before frost.


I too encountered square (reef) knots joining twine balls together coming apart, particularly with plastic twine.

My solution is to tie the same knot as the baler does. It will not slip and does not foul in the twine tensioners or needles.

The knot is made by laying the two twines together in the same direction with the ends even, make a loop and pass the ends through, pull tight and if necessary trim the ends to about 3/8 inch.

After a bit of practice you can tie the knot without needing to trim the ends.


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## clowers (Feb 11, 2011)

Coondle said:


> I too encountered square (reef) knots joining twine balls together coming apart, particularly with plastic twine.
> 
> My solution is to tie the same knot as the baler does. It will not slip and does not foul in the twine tensioners or needles.
> 
> ...


I will try it


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