ITS BIGGEST forage wagon yet will front the Strautmann stand at the forthcoming Agritechnica Show, in Hanover, Germany, later this month.

Three new Magnon wagons make up the range. With a loading capacity of 42m³, 46m³ and 52m³, these will completely replace the Terra-Vitesse models.

They feature the unique ‘Flex Load’ pick-up system, alongside an ‘Exact Cut’ knife bank and hydraulically pivoting front panel, providing maximum loading and harvesting capacity.

The new pick-up system, instead of steel tines, has a 2.25m wide ‘Flex Load’ reel which uses plastic fingers arranged in six V-shaped rows. Using polymer components, rather than steel, provides a greater degree of flexibility and durability which enables the pick-up to better handle uneven terrain, argued Strautmann.

Steel stripper-bands between the plastic tines are positioned low to ensure optimum crop flow and reliably prevent the grass from wrapping and blocking, and there is no contact between tines and strippers for smoother running and less wear. A tine change needs just one single screw undone.

The chopper unit features a cutting edge on both sides of the blade, which have a rapid-trigger protection function, which automatically retracts them from the crop channel if a foreign object is detected. They then return automatically to work.

The Magnon continues with Strautmann’s unique and well-proven continuous flow system (CFS) which ensures grass is spread evenly across the full width of the rotor and knife bank, irrespective of the condition of the swath. The wagons also have a new hydraulically pivoting head-board to achieve optimum compression of the load, which means that the Magnon is more compact than its predecessors, but has a larger load capacity.

The pivoting headboard also aids in unloading along with the chain-and-slat ‘walking’ floor which has four low-wear chains, each with a rated breaking-strain of 13 tonnes.

All have hydraulic suspension, with the 430 and 470 models fitted with tandem axles and the flagship 530 model has an extra set of wheels, taking maximum axle loading to 30 tonnes.