# Information needed on a New Holland BR740



## smalltimer (Jul 15, 2011)

We are thinking of purchasing a used 2006 New Holland BR740 round baler. If anyone has any information or knowledge they would like to share about this baler we would appreciate it. If anyone knows about how the monitoring trigger works, we would like to hear about that. What would be a good price for one that is in Good to Excellent condition? We have never owned a round baler, this will be our first one, and it's a big purchase for us, so any advice about this baler would be much appreciated. Is this a good sound baler to start with? The specs say we need a 60 hrs pwr, but for now we have a 55 hrs power, will this be okay?

Thanks again.


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

I have a 2007 BR740A Silage Special and have been impressed so far, it replaced a NH 644. What do you mean by the "monitoring trigger"? If you mean the full bale alarm depending on speed and how heavy the hay is I start to slow down 2-4" before I have a full bale and try to be stopped before the alarm quits sounding. A second or two after the alarm stops sounding the wrapping process starts.

I got mine last spring and ran it with my Oliver 1600 diesel which has 58 pto hp according to Tractordata. However when we did the last major engine overhaul we had em turn the pump up 10% so figure we have roughly 63 pto hp. You certainly won't break the baler with less than 65hp, however you also won't get the full capacity of the baler either. I found if I set the tension to maximun to increase bale weight, I'd run out of tractor and then have to start downshifting.

It also depends on your ground, the lack of horsepower was especially noticeable when climbing any kind of hill. I now run the baler with a White 2-110 (110hp). Baled 25 acres of second today, made 1150 lb bales according to the scale, took 35 seconds to make a bale running at 11mph. Tractor barely got into working range on the water temp gauge.


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## rjmoses (Apr 4, 2010)

Mlappin's point about HP and hilly ground is a good one. Horsepower is more often an indication of tractor weight.

A 50HP compact tractor will get a person into big trouble real fast on hilly ground because it doesn't have the weight on the wheels that are needed for good traction nor does it have the wheel base needed for stability. I have a JD 4710, 48HP, that gets squirrelly real easily. It weighs only 3000 lbs. I would not pull any kind of baler behind it.

My IH 966 weighs about 11,000 lbs and my NH TS135 weighs close to 13,000 lbs. I have been pushed around, gone for a ride on the 966 just pulling a square baler. I have gone for a ride on the 135 with a BR780 big round baler going downhill. (I now bale that hill going down with an empty baler, up with a nearly full bale, in 4 wheel drive.)

My point is HP is good, more HP is better, especially on hills, because more HP usually means more weight which means better traction, better stability, less chance of tipping over, losing control.

The rule of thumb around here is that if a piece of equipment calls for X HP, add 50% for safety.

Ralph


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## Iowa hay guy (Jul 29, 2010)

hp also depends on how tight you wrap it too 
so if you make a really tight brick of a bale and you have hills like i do then it dosent seem so silly that i bale with a 200 hp tractor that weighs 17000 lbs but i get myself into some pretty hairy hills too


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Yup, both previous posts brought up a very important consideration about weight and horsepower, that 1600 weighed is a little over 7000lbs and could handle a light 8 row cultivator _but_ I as well have a few hills I wouldn't even go down with a empty baler on so I'd make a big loop and always made sure to go up that one. With the bigger tractor and another 5000 lbs of weight in front of the baler I don't have much to worry about in either direction now.


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## Tabnavy (Apr 16, 2017)

Don’t mean to hyjack the thread... just purchased a BR740 today. Wanna use it tomorrow unfortunately it didn’t come with manual. Anyone have a operators they can take some pics of the or email?


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