SIMON RPNA AUTOMATIC LEEK HARVESTER

Economical leek harvesting with just the tractor driver!

Simple mechanism means reliability with long life. Low running costs.

The SIMON RPNA leek harvester requires only one man to operate it; the tractor driver! The success of the machine and its automatic cage filling system is the sheer simplicity of the design, offering low running costs, excellent reliability, with minimal inputs required from the operator.

The tractor mounted harvester features an extra long pick-up belt arm to allow more time for the double shaker system to disperse soil from the roots during the lifting process. An enhanced automatic height control is fitted as standard, and the lifter features SIMON’s latest 'J type’ clean running waterproofed idler roller mountings.

New rotating nylon brush torpedoes lift the leaves, helping to smooth crop intake. Standard equipment also includes adjustable hydraulic topping discs to remove excess leaf as required, while the option of rotating rubber cleaning fingers is offered at the upper part of the lifting arm for additional root cleaning.

From the lifting belts, leeks are presented to the cross conveyor by specially designed guide fingers, followed by a rotating horizontal ‘levelling wheel’ on the front of the conveyor that ensures the crop is evenly distributed. The complete cross conveyor assembly moves left and right as leeks are accurately layered in the hydraulic fork mounted cage, at the left side of the conveyor, a short belt facilitates the layering process. Filling of the cages is computer controlled by an on-board processor to make operation as simple as possible.

Cages are specially designed with an opening side door to accept the conveyor filling system, and each has a capacity of around 350kg trimmed leeks. It is envisaged that purchasers will buy a few sample cages with their harvester, and have more of these made up locally to reduce costs. Typically each cage takes around 5 minutes to fill.

The first RPNA automatic leek harvester in the UK has been sold to a Lancashire grower and can be seen working by arrangement.

DOWNLOAD YOUR SIMON LEEK MACHINERY BROCHURE

SIMON brochure leeks 07.pdf (2.52 MB)