A baling machine includes a pre-baling chamber and a rotative packer/stuffer including at least one retractable and extendable tine including at least one stuffer tine supported on at least a first reciprocable support. The at least one stuffer tine sequentially penetrates, moves in, and retracts from the pre-baling chamber when activated by at least one stuffer activator. The packer-stuffer includes at last one sensor that senses a vector or pseudovector quantity acting on at least one rotative component. The baling machine also includes at least one processor for estimating from the sensed quantity the amount of plant matter in the pre-baling chamber or a related variable, comparing this to a threshold corresponding to desired filling of the pre-baling chamber, and causing the stuffer activator to initiate stuffing when the estimated plant matter or related variable attains or exceeds the threshold.

An agricultural baler including a bale case having a wall portion with an opening for introducing crop material; a plunger disposed moving in the bale case to compact the crop material into bales; a duct for transporting the crop material to the entrance opening; and a stuffer unit operably associated with the duct and including a fork assembly. The stuffer unit includes tines and a drive mechanism acting on the fork assembly. The drive mechanism includes a first drive member configured for a reciprocating motion along a path of movement; a second drive member configured for a reciprocating motion along the path of movement of the first drive member and operatively connected to the fork assembly; and a selectively operable coupling arrangement configured for selectively coupling the second drive member either to the first drive member or to a stationary part of the baler.

An agricultural baler includes a baler chassis and a stuffer mechanism. The stuffer mechanism includes a fork and a motor. The fork is shiftably supported to move along a loading duct during each of a series of stuffing strokes. The fork is operable in a sweeping position, where the fork extends at least partly into the duct, to provide a full stuffing stroke by loading a charge of crop material from the loading duct into a baling chamber. The fork is shiftable by the motor from the sweeping position to a retracted position, where the fork is moved out of the duct. The fork is shiftable into the retracted position for at least part of a respective stuffing stroke where at least some of the charge of crop material in the loading duct is not loaded into the baling chamber.

A baler (10) has a stuffer chute assembly (22) with upper and lower curved walls (44, 46) forming a stuffer chamber (24). A rear portion (54) of the upper wall (44) extends downwardly and forwardly from a baling chamber (12) and a forward portion (50) extends above an inlet opening to the stuffer chamber (24). The upper wall (44) has a plurality of laterally spaced-apart wrappers (52, 56), with adjacent wrappers forming slots (70, 72) extending generally from said crop receiving inlet opening to an outlet opening (48) for cooperation with tines (40) of a feeding mechanism (36). The wrappers (52, 56) are movable relative to the lower wall (46) at a forward end (60) and at a rearward end (66) of the upper wall (44) so as to change a cross-sectional dimension of the stuffer chamber (24). The baler (10) has a forward wall adjusting mechanism (80) for setting a forward end (60) of the upper wall (44) in a predetermined position, and a rear wall adjusting mechanism (110) for setting a rear end (66) of the upper wall (44).

A square baler (30) includes a chassis (32), a plunger (36), and a variable speed transmission (42). The plunger assembly (36) includes a reciprocating plunger head (76) slidably mounted relative to the chassis (32) and operable to reciprocate within a chamber (54) to apply a compressive force against the material. The transmission (42) includes drive (86) and driven components (90) and an endless drive element (98) that drivingly interconnects the components. The driven component is drivingly connected to the plunger head. The drive component is operable to be driven by a prime mover at a drive input speed. At least one of the components has an adjustable operating diameter so that the driven component has a variable output speed.

An agricultural baler system has a plunger, a bale chamber, a pre-compression chamber and a stuffer unit, for moving crop from the pre-compression chamber to the bale chamber. The stuffer unit includes a stuffer fork trigger mechanism, an actuator and a controller. The actuator is coupled to the stuffer fork trigger mechanism. The controller is in controlling connection with the actuator. The actuator is configured to arm the stuffer fork trigger mechanism by moving the actuator between a first position and a second position. The actuator is further configured to be held in the first position and/or the second position with substantially no energy use.

An agricultural baler. The agricultural baler includes a baling chamber including a first segment, a plunger, and a baling chamber. The agricultural baler further includes a controller and a pre-compression chamber configured for gathering crop material, periodically forming a slice of the crop material, and pushing the slice towards the baling chamber into the first segment of the baling chamber. The agricultural baler further includes a slice-presence-detecting sensor disposed in an upper region of the first segment of the baling chamber, the slice-presence-detecting sensor comprising an output operationally connected to the controller. The plunger is configured for reciprocally moving in the baling chamber to compress slices of crop material into a bale. The controller is configured for adjusting a synchronization between the periodically forming and pushing of the slice in the pre-compression chamber and the reciprocally moving of the plunger.

A device and method comprising a large square baler with a pre-comprssion chamber that accumulates hay and moves it into the compression chamber, one or more near infrared specrocopy (NIRS) sensors mounted near the top of the pre-compression chamber, a means to read inputs from the sensors only when the stuffer forks are moving hayfrom the pre-compression chamber into the main chamber and a processor to average multiple readings from the nirs sensors from that inteval.

A square baler comprising a gear box configured to receive power from a rotating power source. The baler additionally comprises first and second drive shaft sections extending outwardly from generally opposite sides of the gear box. The gear box is configured to rotate said first and second drive shaft sections using power from the rotating power source. The baler further comprises first and second reciprocating plungers respectively coupled to the first and second drive shaft sections in a manner such that rotation of the first drive shaft section causes reciprocation of the first plunger and rotation of the second drive shaft section causes reciprocation of the second plunger.

A high capacity square baler comprising a pickup mechanism configured to pick up a single windrow of crop material off the ground. The baler additionally comprises one or more stuffer chutes each configured to receive at least a portion of the crop material picked up by the pickup mechanism. The baler additionally comprises one or more stuffer assemblies each configured to push crop generally upward through one of the stuffer chutes. The baler further comprises a plurality of separate bale-forming chambers each configured to receive crop material from one or more of the stuffer chutes and to form a bale of crop material therein.