Herbert Ruge mit der ersten Serienmaschine der Baureihe Big Pack 80-80. Krone Foto

Spelle, July 2010 – After benefitting from 16 years of dependable service, contractor Herbert Ruge from Odderade near Heide in Northern Germany recently returned his first Big Pack baler to Krone, where the 80-80 series machine was built in 1994, since when it has baled more than 333.000 bales, 75% of these from silage.

Herbert Ruge is enthusiastic about the life-time performance of his Big Pack and attributes it to the machine's excellent engineering and the exemplary after-sales service provided by Krone. Says Herbert Ruge: "With this company you will always get hold of someone who bails you out when you are stuck – even in the dead of night on weekends." The high degree of customer satisfaction is also revealed by the fact that Herbert's son Andreas who is now running the farm decided to invest in a new Big Pack 890, which brings the number of Krone big balers on the farm to four.

Krone Big Pack was introduced to the market at Agritechnica 1993. The baler that is now returning to the factory was the first series production machine that rolled off the assembly line in 1994. It featured the BigCut cutting system with three knives. At the time, Krone was the world's only manufacturer able to produce tandem-axle big balers that also featured a cutting system. The historic press is now on show at the Krone Museum.