English
Time for something new
Spring 2013
Most dairy producers would agree that consistency is important in raising dairy cows, whether it's feed, milking processes or equipment. When one of these fluctuates, it can have dramatic effects on the producer's bottom line. So why did one Pennsylvania dairy farmer embrace change and purchase a different brand of wheel loader? Read what dairy farmer Dennis Hissong has to say about his decision to buy a Doosan wheel loader.
Hissong is a dairy producer from Mercersburg, Pa. (pop. 1,574), whose family has been farming in the area since 1946. He's 64 years old and grew up on the farm where the main dairy is today. He's been in the dairy business his entire life. Four brothers, five nephews and a son are shareholders in the family's dairy business, although Hissong says only one brother (Larry), his son (Ivan), and two nephews (Kirby and Andrew) are working on the farm on a day-to-day basis.
"We started with 100 acres and today we own about 1,400 acres for raising crops," he says. "We grow corn, soybeans, alfalfa, wheat, barley and grass hay. We do a fair amount of rotation and a lot of double cropping. We'll plant cereal grains in fall and we'll harvest that as forage in early spring. Then, we'll come back and plant corn."
Much of what is planted is used to feed the family's 860 dairy cows. Hissong says 701 dairy cows are milked three times a day in a herringbone milking parlor equipped with a flush system for cleaning the barn.
Increased demand for milk
Demand for milk continues to rise, although the number of dairy farms has been on the decline in recent years. More dairy farmers are increasing the size of their dairy herds and milk production to keep up with demand. Pennsylvania is one of the top producing states and ranks No. 5 in the United States for milk production. Hissong Farm is one of about 8,500 dairy farms in the state, and the state has approximately 550,000 dairy cows. In all, the dairy industry produces roughly $1.5 billion in state revenue, and much of that money remains in the local communities where the milk is processed and sold.
"Milking has changed a lot from when I was young," Hissong says. "We started with a stanchion barn and about 30 milking cows."
Milking is a 365-days-a-year job; there is no off-season, according to Hissong.
"We have a total of 18 employees on the payroll to help feed and milk the cows," Hissong says. "A dairy cow is something that wants repetition every day. Also, dairy cows are more particular than other animals; they take considerably more attention, particularly what they eat."
A new color: "bright orange"
When it was time to replace an aging piece of equipment on the farm, Hissong considered his usual brands. Then he remembered reading about a different brand, one that was remarkably different in color than what he had been operating - orange Doosan wheel loaders. He says he first became aware of Doosan equipment after he received a copy of DoMORE® magazine in the mail.
"That bright orange color, it stood out," he says, "so I read the articles and I thought, ‘this is not a fly-by-night company.' It showed me that Doosan was a strong company that stood behind its products."
Hissong contacted his local Doosan heavy equipment dealer, Best Line Equipment in Harrisburg, Pa., for more information and to schedule a demonstration. Not long after the first call, the Doosan dealer had a wheel loader at the farm for Hissong and his operators to test.
"We checked out other brands to make sure we had the machine that we thought we'd be happy with," he says, "and we decided on a Doosan high-lift (equipped) wheel loader."
Availability of heavy equipment from his local Doosan dealer was one of the first factors that led Hissong to purchase the 172-horsepower Doosan DL250 wheel loader. A close second was its lift height for loading the feed mixer. The high-lift version of the DL250 has a maximum dump height of 10 feet 8 inches. Once he had an opportunity to drive the wheel loader, he quickly realized many other benefits on the farm.
"The visibility from the cab is particularly good," he says, "and that means a lot, that we can see the cutting edge of the bucket as we're dumping commodities into the high wagon, so you get a feel of how much is actually rolling off of the bucket. We can keep an eye on the scales at the same time.
"We evaluated how easy it is to enter and exit the operator platform or cab," he says. "We also reviewed the ease of access to get to routine maintenance areas, to complete preventive maintenance. We were pleased with the placement of these items on the Doosan wheel loader."
Commodity building
Making sure the dairy cows get the right type and amount of feed is critical to the success of Hissong Farm. Feed for the cows is a Total Mixed Ration (TMR) of corn silage, alfalfa haylage, cereal grain forage, soybean meal and other vitamins and minerals.
"The feed is combined in a mixer to make it difficult for her (cow) to separate the ingredients and pick out what she wants," Hissong says. "The reason it's termed Total Mixed Ration is so that every bite that she takes has everything in it that she needs for that particular bite."
Making sure just the right amount of each commodity is loaded in the mixer is a critical part of the process. A high-lift Doosan wheel loader makes the material-handling process easier for the operator.
"We use the Doosan wheel loader to scoop the forage and minerals in the mixer wagon," he says. "We have scales and a monitor mounted in the wheel loader, right at eye level, so we can see how much we're dumping in the wagon, so we get the right amount. If we get too much or not enough of some of those expensive ingredients, it can change the bottom line drastically in a year's time."
Another important task for the wheel loader is defacing the trench silo where Hissong keeps some of his silage.
"Defacing the trench is something that is very important today to dairymen who have trench silos," he says. "One of the keys for efficiency is to keep the feed as fresh as possible at all times. With a defacer, you actually shave the front of the trench wall to take off just 3 or 4 inches, what you think you'll need for the day. What's exposed to the atmosphere for the next day's feeding is still packed, so the air can't penetrate more than just the surface."
Day in, day out reliability
Because there's little room for error and certainly none for downtime, Hissong depends on reliable equipment, and that's what he received from his Doosan dealer when he purchased the DL250. In just four months, Hissong had already accumulated 500 hours on the machine. He expects the wheel loader to continue performing at its current levels until it gets well above 8,000 hours, when he'll be ready to purchase another new loader.
Hissong says the Doosan 48-Hour Parts Guarantee was something that contributed toward the purchase, too, knowing that if something did happen to the machine, Doosan would stand behind its product. "The fact that we need to use the Doosan wheel loader every day of the year, is very important," he says.
In addition to the parts guarantee, Hissong believes in using only Doosan parts from his local dealer, saying it's a very important aspect of properly maintaining the machine, to use manufacturer-provided parts such as filters and fluids.
The Doosan wheel loader works in an environment where there is a lot of dirt, dust and debris. It's important for the wheel loader operators to keep an eye on the cooling package and regularly clean it.
"Some of the material that we feed the cows is light, fluffy hay and straw," Hissong says. "Depending on how windy it is, we'll get large chunks of debris over the grill. It's convenient to reverse the cooling fan and blow that off. It's as simple as pressing a button inside the wheel loader cab."
Doosan wheel loader operators can manually reverse the cooling fan by pressing a button, or set it to automatically reverse based on preset time intervals: 30, 60, 90 or 120 minutes.
When reliable equipment is needed on a daily basis, dairy farmers like Dennis Hissong trust Doosan wheel loaders to meet their expectations.
