Portugal Family Farm Orders 9YDB-60 Diesel Silage Baler and Wrapper for On-Farm Maize Silage
A Portuguese family livestock farm ordered one 9YDB-60 silage baler and wrapper with the 18 HP diesel engine configuration for its own maize silage—no reseller, no service contractor, just a farm that wants to cut its corn, bale it and seal it under film itself. The shipped set produces Φ600×520 mm round bales of 90-140 kg at 50-75 bales per hour, weighs 990 kg in a 3500×1450×1550 mm frame, and went out with 5 rolls of silage wrapping film plus a free spare-parts kit: 10 connectors, 2 bearings, 1 chain, 1 sensor and 2 belts.
Below is the complete order as configured, the film-consumption math we ran with the customer before shipping, and why this particular model and power choice fit a small mixed farm in Portugal.
The Farm’s Problem: Preserving Its Own Maize Before the Dry Season
Portuguese mixed farms run on a familiar rhythm: maize and grass grow hard in the wet months, then summer turns the paddocks brown and standing feed disappears. Livestock still have to eat. The owner of this farm had been watching wrapped round bales arrive from larger operators and wanted to make the same feed himself, on his own acreage, without depending on a contract crew.
Three constraints shaped the machine we specified together:
- Family-sized bales. The big Φ900 mm class produces 300-500 kg bales that need a tractor loader and strong arms every time they move. A 90-140 kg bale from a 60-type machine is the size one person with a small grab can place, stack and open for feeding.
- Power where the farm works. Der 18 HP diesel engine option means the baler runs its own power—no pulling a three-phase line to a field shed or stopping work when the grid faults during a hot harvest week.
- Bale, then wrap—same day, same machine. Das ist ein Ballenpress- und Wickelmaschine: the chopped maize goes in, a formed bale comes out already bundled and film-wrapped, so the forage is sealed within minutes of leaving the field. For the quality logic behind fast sealing, see our step-by-step guide to wrapping silage bales.
What Exactly Was Shipped
The full order as configured for this customer—machine, consumables and the free spare kit:
| Maschine | Spezifikation |
|---|---|
| Modell | 9YDB-60 silage baler and wrapper |
| Leistung | 18 HP diesel engine |
| Ballengröße | Φ600 × 520 mm |
| Ballengewicht | 90-140 kg/Ballen |
| Ballengeschwindigkeit | 50-75 pieces/hour |
| Feeding belt | 2500 × 517 mm, belt thickness 5 mm |
| Maschinengröße | 3500 × 1450 × 1550 mm |
| Maschinengewicht | 990 kg |
| Bundling film | 2000 m × 525 mm (one roll bundles ≈330 bales) |
| Consumables & spares | Einzelheiten | Menge |
|---|---|---|
| Silagewickelfolie | 1800 m × 250 mm × 25 µm · 10.4 kg/roll · 1 roll/carton (27×27×27 cm) | 5 rolls |
| Free connectors | Film/belt fastening consumable | 10 Stk |
| Free bearings | Wrapping table and roller positions | 2 Stk |
| Free chain | Drive chain spare | 1 Stk |
| Free sensor | Bale-discharge detection | 1 Stk |
| Free belts | Feeding/sliding belts (2500 × 517 mm frame) | 2 Stk |
The spare kit is deliberate: a family farm cannot afford a dead week in the middle of its own silage window waiting for a part. Chain, bearings, belts, connectors and the sensor are exactly the items that wear first on belt-type machines, and running out of them mid-season costs more than the parts ever will.
The Film Math We Ran with the Customer
Before ordering film, the owner asked one practical question: how many bales will five rolls actually wrap? Here is the consumption table we used—straight from the film specification:
| Wrapping choice | Bales per roll | 5 rolls cover | Storage period |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 layers of film | ≈85 bales | ≈425 bales | ≈6 months |
| 3 layers of film | ≈63 bales | ≈315 bales | ≈18 months |
| Bundling film (before wrapping) | ≈330 bales per 2000 m × 525 mm roll | — | Bale forming stage |
Translated into feed at this bale size, the 5 rolls seal roughly 28 to 60 tons of maize silage depending on layer count and bale density (315 × 90 kg at the conservative end, 425 × 140 kg at the top). The strategy we agreed with the customer: wrap 3 layers on everything he plans to carry past the coming winter—that buys up to 18 months of storage through a second dry summer—and 2 layers on bales he knows will be fed out within about six months. The bundling film works first at ≈330 bales per roll, so a single bundle roll outlasts all five wrap rolls; he ordered spare bundling material with the next batch of film instead of with this shipment.
Why the layer choice matters more than film price is covered in depth in our TZ-55-52 VS 9YDB-55 wrapping machine comparison, and the full material options (rope, net, film) are laid out in the comparative analysis of silage baling materials.
Fitting Portugal’s Silage Window
Maize silage in Portugal is made on weather’s schedule, not the farm’s. The cut is concentrated in a short stretch of late summer, and the forage only keeps its sugar if it is sealed fast. At 50-75 bales per hour, a single day of good baling (call it 8-10 working hours) lays down 400-700 finished bales—36 to 98 tons of sealed maize at 90-140 kg per bale. For a family farm’s own acreage, that turns the whole storage job into a matter of a few days instead of the weeks it would take with bagging or a hired crew’s waiting list.
Chopped material feeds the machine from the farm’s own corn silage making line practice: chop first, feed the baler’s 2500 mm belt continuously, and let the automatic bundling-and-wrapping cycle run. Bale-to-bale, the operator only watches film tension and the discharge counter.
Setup Tips Taizy Sent with the Machine
- Belt tension first. The 5 mm feeding belts do the packing; slacked belts make soft bales that film cannot rescue. Check tension every operating day at startup, and use the two spare belts before wear gets to a failure.
- Grease before you earn. The two spare bearings sit on the wrapping table and roller positions—grease those points on a daily schedule so the spares stay on the shelf.
- Test wrap before the harvest week. Run ten bales at 3 layers and count film used per roll; the ≈63 bales/roll figure should match within a few percent before the real window opens.
- Seal within two hours, always. With the wrap cycle built into the baler this is automatic—just never let completed bales sit uncovered overnight waiting for film changes.
A Repeat Market with Two Different Buyers
Portugal keeps buying Taizy silage machines, and these two orders show why the market needs more than one answer: back in 2022, a Portuguese feed mill took two fully automatic TS-70 baler-wrappers to produce silage for resale to the farms around it, packing 150-200 kg bales at industrial pace. This new order is the other half of the picture—a farm feeding its own animals with 90-140 kg bales, diesel power and a spare-parts kit sized for self-reliance. Same product family, completely different buying logic, and it is the self-use side where the 60-type sits perfectly.
For owners comparing the economics of smaller models, the per-bale cost structure of rope, net and film work is broken down in how much it costs to make a bale of silage, and the machine-level price factors in the silage baler and wrapper price guide.
Talk to Us About Your Own Silage Season
Whether you are a farm making silage for itself or an operation supplying the farms around you, tell us your forage area, the bale weight your handling equipment can take, and whether you have field power—we’ll size the model, the bundling material and the film quantity the same way we did for this Portuguese farm. WhatsApp: +86 136 7368 9272 · E-Mail: Info@taizyagromachine.com · Webseite: taizyagromachine.com.