Any thoughts on a 740TT

Dealer here has a local welding shop put new flighting on those bubble up auger and balance them. Used to be less than half the cost of a claas part.

The cylinders can bend a shaft but it a lot less common in the narrow body’s. Sunnybrook is a good upgrade I’m told but there is nothing wrong with a OEM one. A slightly used one that has been taken out would be alot cheaper route to go.

Always lots of little things to change on the machines every year but it’s way nicer to do preventive maintenance than fixing during the nicest part of the day. There are a few idler bearing we change every couple of years just because. Have had them go out on us and almost start a fire.

Don't think you would regret money spent on the sunnybrook components. I have no direct head-to-head experience but did have the Claas enclosed cylinder in a 780 and it worked good but I do a lot of pea and soybean seed production so that requires running cylinder at some pretty low speeds and the extra weight of the Sunnybrook is really nice for that. This 750TT I just bought has new rub bars on a Claas cylinder and stock impeller, I was going to do the Sunnybrook impeller and run stock cylinder for a year to see but now am second-guessing myself on that.

One thing that I always like to get the mechanic to do is put the rear concave clearance below the stock spec(which is 7MM front and 4MM rear). I like it around 2MM rear if possible to force that grain out when needed and take pressure off the rotors. Couple falls ago when I had my demo of a certain other brands new model(read between the lines here) we were doing a solid 80% of the capacity of that machine with less grain out the back while cutting lower in some tough wheat conditions. Basically running power limit all day and I credit a properly set up machine for throwing well under a third of a percent loss. I have had a machine where the concave was out of whack and it was nearly impossible to set.

Talked more with the sales guy (used to be a combine tech) and suggested rather than throw the dollars at the cylinder, I should do the SB impeller instead. I had already had him price in the sunflower knife kit so with more discussion the sensible plan seems to be the SB impeller and delete the sunflower knife kit and let them put a used stock Claas cylinder in. So think this is how I will go. I don't want to go crazy doing mods without ever running a machine but since everything is apart the labor will be no charge. Can contemplate other stuff as years go by.

This unit has one of those Arnold Innovations hydraulic cylinder reverses. When first looking at the machine the sales guy said these units do create the potential to use the reverses and perhaps overstress some components. Leads to speculating that perhaps the reverser did do something to the cylinder. Combine doesn't look beat up at all but perhaps a nasty pile of kochia and a guy too eager to reverse it without any other work to loosen the plug and so could lead to some damage. Don't know. Would depend on what is the weakest link - the reverser or the combine components.