Comparison of pick-up balers for fodder harvesting.

This thesis for bachelor degree focuses on a comparison of pick-up round balers, one with a variable bale chamber (baler John Deere 580 with cutting) and one with a constant bale chamber (baler Krone Rond Pack 1250 MultiCut). The two balers were compared in respect to the quality of cutting, bale density and haylage quality. Other compared parameters included capacity, costs of baling, packaging, loading and transport of baled fodder, analysis of costs per 1 kg of fodder and simple analyses of investment and operating costs. The quality of haylage was better for the JD 580 baler and it was classified as excellent. The baler Round Pack 1250 produced better values of bale density: 221.09 kg.m-3 for hay, 428.57 kg.m-3 for haylage and 173.46 kg.m-3 for straw. Hourly baling capacities were 8.12 t.h-1 for hay and 11.55 t.h-1 for haylage. The baling costs were 104.2 CZK.t-1 for haylage and 210.36 CZK.t-1 for hay. The costs per 1 hectare were 376.6 CZK and the costs per 1 kg of haylage and hay were 0.539 CZK.kg-1 and 0.606 CZK.kg-1 respectively