X9 Combine exceeds expectations!

During Harvest 22 the Ben Burgess team paid a visit to Honingham Thorpe Farms to find out how they were getting on with their new John Deere X9 Combine. We spoke with farm manager Harry Harrison to hear his thoughts on John Deere’s 100 Tonne Combine.

“We have thoroughly enjoyed our new X9 Combine. Its reliability and output have far exceeded our expectations. It is a remarkably efficient machine in litres/tonne of production and has been a pleasure to operate. The technology is there to back up all the machine’s features giving accurate results, feedback and live telemetry that can be relied upon day after day throughout the season. Servicing and daily maintenance are both enjoyable features. There is certainly an increase in daily checks surrounding the header, specifically compared to any of our previous machines but this is hardly a surprise when you consider the amount of moving parts on it.

The best feature of this machine is easily the output. The tonnes per hour are far higher in all crops and all scenarios we were exposed to this season. Yes, this Harvest was very dry but we started in hardly fit barley with slightly green straw through incredible green rape stems. We were not exposed to wet conditions or even really a damp morning.

We decided to purchase this machine after 17 years with others brands, for a multitude of reasons really. Financially we were in a good position for a fresh deal. Concerns over back up, pricing and reliability of previous brands, combined with a growing and favourable relationship with Ben Burgess, so all in all a little bit of everything really, but I was concerned over the switch having not managed to Demo the machine first on home soil.

I am fairly sure we met with most of the Ben Burgess sales team throughout this process but as with previous deals the experience was all good. Our expectations were met and the machine has performed as it was sold. The service provided by the Ben Burgess team is second to none. Overall we are very happy with all of the elements of the purchase and if things continue as they have done this season we will remain happy.

It was just a refreshing harvest for us this year. To say there is difficulty with acquiring parts, we did not suffer or struggle. There was always something available either that day or the next or a suitable replacement was provided in a very timely manner. Communications with the Ben Burgess team where always on point. One of the most significant differences however that I am not convinced with yet, is having to call on Ben Burgess for threshing related questions. This is no way supposed to be a criticism of the team but instead that it does seem right to me to be calling them in the middle of a repair or something along those lines with a threshing improvement question or something like that.”

Combine operator Luke added, “I like everything about this machine. The cab layout and the 40ft HDX Header really stand out as the favourite features to me. We use JD tractors and all of the screen and equipment is the same in the combine as it is in the tractors, except for a few extra buttons. In any combine they’ve all got the same features but this combine has smashed our expectations with its performance. It’s a well-rounded combine. Before this machine we had a Massey Ferguson and a Claas Lexion 780 and without hesitation I can say I prefer this one. It’s the next level to all our other combines.

We’ve been using the machine for about a month and we’ve nearly finished already! I’ve done 940 hectares in under a month, that works out to about 2,400 acres. I imagine we will spend more time on the road then we will be combining. In fact we have nicknamed this as ‘one farm a day’ as that’s how efficient it is.”