MORTLACH, Sask. – When the Hicks family looked into upgrading harvest equipment, it found the cost of a new combine hard to swallow.
“We’re running a couple of old combines and we thought it would be nice to have something with the newer technology,” said Lloyd Hicks, who farms near Mortlach with brothers, Doug and Danny, and nephew, Kurtis.
“We’ve got two old 1983 Massey 860s. They’re still good combines. They do a real good job, they’re versatile, they’ll combine anything. But they don’t have all the bells and whistles like the new ones.”
Read Also
VIDEO: Green Lightning and Nytro Ag win sustainability innovation award
Nytro Ag Corp and Green Lightning recieved an innovation award at Ag in Motion 2025 for the Green Lightning Nitrogen Machine, which converts atmospheric nitrogen into a plant-usable form.
Running two combines with four people works out about right. But Hicks said as the combines get older, so do the operators.
“There’s always something to fix on those old girls and it’s harder to get around and fix them all the time. We figured we’d try one (new combine), switch off operators during meals and run longer hours. It would probably do as much as both the other ones, with less stress,” he said.
News of MachineryLink coming to Canada caught their attention and Hicks made some calls. MachineryLink has offered a combine lease service in the United States for the past six years and was making the move north.
The Hicks family chose to lease a Case IH 2388.
“I don’t see how you can justify a $350,000 combine. It doesn’t make any sense to have it sit there and use it for maybe a month all year. This machine has probably been working since May,” he said.
As part of the lease, the farmer is expected to supply his own header for the combine.
“If you had a MacDon or a HoneyBee, you can get adapters for each combine. But we’ve bought a 30 foot 1020 International that can be either a flex or a rigid header, with pickup reels. It’s pretty flexible. It’ll do just about all we need except picking up swaths. But we haven’t swathed much in the past few years.”
If there are crops that need swathing, Hicks can revert to the Massey combines with the pickup headers.
He also noted he could make a deal with neighbours that have the same combine, to trade headers or do some combining for them in return for use of their header.
Hicks expects to put 150 to 200 hours on the combine this year, harvesting lentils, peas, malting barley, spring wheat, oats, flax and canola.
“We’ve got a fair bit done now (Aug. 21). The winter wheat is all done. But if it works out good, next year we’ll try to get the contract moved up a couple of weeks, say Aug. 15. And if we see the crops coming in sooner than that, we’ll get in touch with them and see if we can bump it up a little,” he said.
“The other thing you can do is, if we get ours done and there’s still crop out, we can use the machine for custom work. There’s no restriction. It’s however long we want to use it.”
Hicks said the contract states the family can use the combine for a minimum number of hours and it’s a fixed rate for that number of hours.
“There’s a lot of flexibility in the plan. Say we had 150 or 200 hours this year and didn’t use them all. We can carry them forward to the next year.”
Because it’s early in the harvest season, Hicks isn’t sure how the equipment will be used on their farm this year since it depends on the weather and manpower available.
He’s not sure how the acres per hour will compare between the two older Masseys and the new Case IH.
“That’s difficult to say. Every year is different and even every day can be different. It depends on how much moisture there is in the crop, green weeds. After this year is done, we have a rough idea of what the old ones would have done and see how that compares with what this one will do,” said Hicks.
“It gives us a chance to get the latest technology without having to lay out a quarter million dollars or more. The new technology lets you do yield mapping, online moisture monitoring. These combines have all the bells and whistles on them.”
Hicks said the new combine has good straw and chaff choppers and spreaders. There’s no problem getting residue spread across the width of cut. The Hickses direct seed crops, so proper residue handling is important for next year’s seeding.
Hicks said the original contract was for the machine to arrive Sept. 1, but this year was unusual because he could have used it much earlier.
“As it is we’re getting it just about two weeks earlier than the contract. We’ve been working with them intensely for the past week and a half. They brought this machine from Kansas.”
Hicks likes the way the contract manages bad weather.
“It’s based on the actual hours the thresher is turning. It’s not engine hours. When we’re moving from one location to another, it’s not running up hours. And if it rains, the thing can sit there and it doesn’t cost us a dime.”
Another advantage is that the combines are approaching the end of the harvest run when they cross the Canadian border.
“We’re the end of the line. When we’re done with it here, the season’s pretty well over. So the end date isn’t a hard and fast rule in our case. I’d imagine down south they’d have a limited number of days, but it all depends on the weather,” he said.
Hicks planned to monitor how the lease works. He can see a time when he might sell his combines and rely on MachineryLink combines for his harvest.
“I sure do. If it works well and the price stays reasonable, I don’t see any reason to have your own machines,” he said.
“With the old combines, fixing them means they may break down in the field. How much does that downtime cost you? It depends on what the season turns out like. Maybe it wouldn’t cost you anything to lose a day or two. But it might cost you three grades and be very expensive.”
Eugene Toth, Canadian regional sales manager with MachineryLink, said Hicks is the company’s first customer in Western Canada.
“I’ve had a tremendous amount of interest. I’ve just been doing some newspaper advertising and it’s generated quite a few calls. There’s lots of tire kickers but lots of serious lookers, too. There are guys that have been waiting for something like this to come along for a while,” said Toth, who is based in Lacombe, Alta.
Toth said the Hicks family signed up early this year and was lucky to get an early date on the combine.
“Because of our late start and the availability of the combines, we’re not going to have that many in Western Canada this year. Next year there will be a significant increase,” he said.
“The combine availability we had this year, most was Sept. 1. That qualified guys from Saskatoon north, which is a limited amount of guys. I’ve got a couple of combines going in around Edmonton and another going into the Peace country after Sept. 1.”
Hicks said everything on the combine is under warranty.
“I think ultimately it’s going to save us money. The only thing you have to do is carry ingestion insurance. If you pick up a big rock, that’s no fault of the combine. So we carry insurance for that. The rest, if something breaks down, we phone the local dealer,” he said.
“Part of the contract is, if the machine is down for 48 hours, then you get another combine. It would likely come from the local dealer, but who knows? But they say they’ll have a combine for you in 48 hours. That’s worth some money right there.”
If the MachineryLink idea catches on, Hicks said he could see this going on with tractors, air seeders or other machinery.
“My original thought was to partner with a farmer in, say, Colorado. They’re usually done before we are. We have a 2388 and he has a 2388. We put ours on a trailer, go down and get him cleaned up, put them both on a trailer, back we come and do ours. That was an original thought I had a few years ago. Then this came along and it made sense to me.”
