The MacDon Difference
R
obert Lowers of Easton, Illinois has been farming for as long as he can remember. His father, Tom Lowers, started from scratch when he began farming in the early 1970s. Robert and his brother, Ryan, eventually took over becoming R & R Lowers Farm after their father passed away. In 2010, the Lowers began to hear about draper heads and the benefits to owning one. At the time, their father had a 2388 combine and a conventional flex header, and they decided in 2012 to trade for a 7120 combine and a 30-foot 2162 MacDon draper head. Robert says he noticed how the MacDon cut beans better than their previous head right off the bat, and he was impressed with the lack of shatter and head loss he saw. “After running a MacDon, we did not even consider another brand,” says Robert. “It did an amazing job.” Robert remembers the first day he ran the MacDon. His salesman, John Coers, was out helping him set it up and teaching him how to run it and it was about 6:00 p.m. when he got started cutting beans on his own. Before he knew it, he saw dew
shining on the field and realized it was midnight. The header was still feeding evenly, he had not slowed down any, and he was still running just as easily as he had earlier that evening. Since then, there have been many instances where Robert has been able to start harvesting earlier in the day and end later at night. He likes that he is not as limited to a certain window of time each day when cutting beans, as he had been in the past. “I have been able to cut a lot of tough beans that my conventional header would have never been able to do,” says Robert. After running the 2162 for several years and being pleased with the results, Robert decided to upgrade and trade for a MacDon FD75 in 2018. With the FD75, he has noticed a difference in yield when working in less than desirable conditions. Last year, he had a field under water at three different times throughout the year. Although the beans had a lot of pods on them, they were only a foot tall and he was not expecting that field to make over 10 bushels an acre that fall. However, he was quite
13 · Central Illinois Ag · www.centralilag.com
surprised at how well the MacDon was able to pick up the crop and pull in the beans and they ended up exceeding his expectations. Throughout the years, Robert has been pleased with his MacDon and cannot imagine running any other brand each harvest. He is also glad to have been a Central Illinois Ag customer for so long and to have John Coers as his trusted salesman. When Robert’s father found out that he had cancer and only a month to live in October of 2013, John reached out to him immediately and asked if he and Ryan needed any harvest help. He ended up sending them a second combine and head to run to finish up harvest that year, which meant a lot to the Lowers family and is a gesture that they won’t soon forget. “John has been good to us,” says Robert. “He is a honest guy and we are lucky to get to work with him.”
Robert Lowers
