Information on pre-corn harvest combine inspection and tune-ups is readily available — usually concentrating on replacements of wear parts and the need for lubrication and leak repairs.

To get beyond the typical “pre-flight bullet points,” No-Till Farmer has sourced some late-summer and early-harvest checkpoints to put more clean grain in the tank and provide a better residue spread in the path of the combine. 

We’re calling them the 3 C’s for Boosting Harvest Payday: Calibration, Cutting components (1 C) and Concaves. None of the adjustments require much time and few require huge expenditures unless obvious wear parts need replacement. 

The aftermarket parts included in the discussion are only recommended by folks who’ve used, tested and benefited from them.

The Need for Calibration

Marcel Kringe, founder and CEO of BranValt (formerly Bushel Plus, Ltd.), a global leader in harvest optimization technology, says one of the most overlooked, yet most impactful, management practices is measuring harvest loss to fine-tune combine calibration and settings.

According to Kringe, many farmers underestimate the financial impact of improperly calibrated combines and often rely too heavily on factory presets or onboard sensors rather than verifying actual grain loss in the field.

“Factory settings are a starting point, not a precision solution. And built-in sensors often can’t account for key variables like terrain…