Driving impression: Claas has announced its combine fleet for the 2002 harvest, including the launch of a smaller rotary model, the Lexion 470, complete with 1.42m wide threshing system. Here we tuck the Lexion 470 into a crop of rye, and review what else Claas has in store for the 2002 harvesting campaign.
Where out-and-out output tops the priority list, there is only one Lexion to go for – the flagship 480 with its claimed potential for 40t/hr throughputs. For other buyers, however, output may not be the overriding issue.
It is at this latter category of buyers that Claas is pitching its Lexion 470, a combine that still has the claimed capacity to chomp through 35t/hr but packages this capability within a more compact ‘five-walker sized’ body. In short, the 470 represents a 480 Compact.
As well as adding the new model, Claas has taken the opportunity to update a number of features on both of its rotaries. Most of these changes are mentioned within this admittedly 470-centred review.
Up front, for example, both the 470 and 480 come with a range of new hydraulic drive headers, a variable displacement hydraulic pump capable of transferring up to 1,000Nm of torque. Sadly, our test 470 was supplied with the existing conventional drive header, so that we were unable to verify Claas’s listed claims for its new drive system for big Lexion’s:
smooth operation
reliability
instant response to speed adjustment
low maintenance requirement
active reversing system and reel lift-out height increased by 16cm.
Hydraulic reel drive also brings with it new hydraulic rams, available with an optional hydraulic cushion/lock system – standard on the 480 – to reduce the amount of header bounce in transport (folding headers) and when turning on rutted headlands.
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