Heavier hay bales, less downtime and a baler twine that can handle the pressure in the field. Sounds like a fodder contractors dream, right?

For up to 30 Australian hay contractors and producers, that has been the reality as part of R&D trials for Tama Australia’s latest product innovation, Impax Twine Technology.

No stranger to R&D, Tama commenced global trials for the development of Impax well over three years ago.

An instrumental member to the twine product development team was, Tama Oceania regional technical manager Darrell Butler.

He says with the concept of heavier duty balers coming into the crop baling market, traditional twine technology was becoming too thick, meaning operators were experiencing a lot of downtime fixing broken twine and knotter components.

“It allowed us to rethink the technology. The result of this ‘rethink’ was Impax. A thinner, stronger twine capable of increased knotter performance. It provides less downtime, less maintenance, a more workable twine, hence the tagline ‘Total workability’.

“It provides peace-of-mind for hay producers because it reduces the risk of failed knots, has less twine breakages – if any – and all this means more bales per hour and more money in the operators pocket,” he said.

Contributing to Tama’s efforts in sustainability, the carbon footprint of Impax twine is also reduced due to the thinner twine resulting in less plastic in the product.

More than 200,000 bales across Australia have been produced using Impax technology during the past three years.

Over in Wagin, Western Australia, hay contractor John Thomson has been baling hay for over 25 years. Operating a fleet of eight-string Krone balers as Big Bale Company, Mr Thomson started trialling Impax twine two seasons ago.

“It’s a big improvement to what we were using,” he said.

“We’re having much less trouble in the field with Impax twine which is a real benefit to us. Every minute in the paddock is very important that we’re not stopped fixing broken twines.

“With Impax, the consistency of tension is very good across the whole bale, because of the twine flexibility you get a very consistent tension right across all the twines that stops the outside twines from snapping.

“It’s a fantastic advantage to have twine that doesn’t break. Previously, up to six per cent of bales produced ended up with broken strings. Now with Impax twine, it’s down to less than one per cent.”

Mr Thomson said he also enjoyed the increase in density they found because of Impax Twine. “Density is very important because it allows us more weight on the truck and less bales in the paddock. We are probably getting an extra 10 percent density.”

“The operators like the Impax Twine, they spend less time filling the machine and it gives them less trouble.

“We’ll be using Impax twine throughout all our machinery, there’s no comparison with other twine. It’s been incredibly successful.”

Impax twine from Tama Australia will be available for the 2023 baling season.