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The Blower Unit. The blower is a separate device on most cylinder machines. It may consist of spokes fastened to a hub, or it may be a solid plate wheel. About four paddles are located equally around the rim of the wheel or at the end of the spokes. These paddles run very close to the bottom of the blower housing and sometimes wear through that area. If the paddles operate too far from the housing, material will wedge between them and the housing. The material flies off the paddles by centrifugal force at the spout opening.

There is one best speed for your blower; you will find it given in your owner's manual. If you run the blower too slowly some material will pass around again rather than going up the discharge spout. This causes clogging and wastes power.

The blower may be driven from the PTO pulley or from the engine. Pulleys are often used because they offer some protection if the blower clogs. One or two machines use flat belts, but most models have one or more V-belts.

If the blower is PTO-driven, the driving pulley usually has an over­running clutch. This permits the blower to clean out cut forage after you disconnect the PTO shaft and permits you to shift into gear after speeding up the cutting mechanism. The engine drive may have a clutch or a belt tightener to stop and start the blower and the remainder of the machine.

The Discharge Spout. The spout leading from the blower is bent to deflect the chopped material into a nearby vehicle. The extreme end of the spout is equipped with a deflector which helps distribute the forage evenly in the wagon or truck. It is usually operated by a rope that you can reach from the tractor seat.

Most discharge spouts can be swiveled so as to feed to the rear or to the left side; a few can swivel to the right. Swiveling is convenient when you have both trucks and trailing wagons to fill.

The discharge pipe is usually 8 inches in diameter. Extra lengths are available; one machine has a renewable pipe section where the greatest wear occurs.

Axles and Hitches. It may be necessary to shift the weight of the harvester on the axles. For example, if you use a small tractor, you can reduce the weight on the tractor drawbar by shifting the harvester axle. This tends to keep the front of the tractor down.

By shifting the whole machine up and down on its axle you can raise or lower the sickle of your row attachment. The gathering points must run close to the ground to pick up all the cornstalks. But if you lower the whole machine, the sickle may cut too low. So, by raising the machine on its axle, you can still keep the front points down because the sickle is 2 or 3 feet back of the points.

Because the forage harvester is usually a two-wheeled trailing ma­chine, it must have a tongue for supporting and pulling it. When in the field, it must trail at one side of the tractor, usually the right. The tongue can be shifted to permit the harvester to work on uncut land and the tractor wheels to run between rows or on cut hay land. But when you transport the harvester on a narrow road it should trail directly behind the tractor. Then the tongue can be shifted the other way. About six holes are provided so that various degrees of offset can be obtained.

Most machines have a hitch bar at the rear. You attach your trailing wagon at that point. On some models you can adjust the hitch sideways to align the machine and wagon better.

Controls. The forage harvester is a one-man machine, and therefore the controls are close to the operator. A most important control is that which stops and reverses the feeding rolls. You can prevent objects from getting into the knives if you can reach that lever quickly.

Some of the controls or adjustments take some time to make, such as raising or lowering the basic unit on the axle. You need jacks and wrenches for this. And to offset the hitch may require a wrench.

The discharge spout is adjusted by releasing a catch or bolts, then turning the pipe. In most models you can regulate the deflector cap, on the discharge spout, from the tractor seat.

When going over uneven ground or when transporting the machine, you must raise the front of the machine by tilting it up with the aid of heavy adjustable helper springs. This is a heavy job, and you may want a hydraulic cylinder for that control. Such a cylinder is standard equipment on one model.

In some harvesters the height of the cutter bar reel can be adjusted from the tractor seat; on others, at the machine.

The PTO harvester can be stopped from the tractor seat, although with an overrunning clutch drive the blower and part of the other mechanisms continue to turn until their momentum is spent.

The engine-operated machine may be stopped by the engine clutch throwout lever – a belt tightener or a built-in clutch. In either case, the blower will continue to rotate for a while.

You stop and start the feed apron and rolls with a long lever near the tractor seat. This same lever is used to reverse the rolls in some designs. The clutch control mechanism is usually a set of three bevel gears. Moving the lever in one direction gives regular action, moving to a center point disengages the gears, and moving to the opposite direction reverses the feeding mechanism. But the pickup teeth in this case do not reverse; if they did, forage would wind up on the pickup mechanism.

The length of the levers on some machines is adjustable, so you can readily reach them.