Talking Gear Tuesday EP22 catches up with Cal from Newells Contracting near Forbes NSW...
of Broadacre Contracting
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Legends, welcome back.
If you have not read last week’s yarn on the New Holland CR11, go do that first.
Episode 18 is here, and this week is the other half of the story.
The red half.
Need a harvest contractor?
If you need a harvest contractor in Tungamah, Cobram, Numurkah, Nathalia, Shepparton, Benalla, Euroa, Violet Town, Wangaratta, Yarrawonga or anywhere across north-east Victoria and the Murray corridor, give Dillon at Broadacre Contracting a call on 0439 300 380.
We will do everything we can to solve your problem straight away.
Whether it is headers, chaser bins, trucks or a full paddock-to-silo operation, we connect growers with verified contractors who run quality gear and actually deliver.
If you want to see the New Holland CR11 specs and how this comparison started, go back and read the CR11 article first.
Then come back here.
Because this is the other side of the Bourke Harvesting next-generation header story.
Righto, let us rip into it.
The Case AF10.
For this episode of Talking Gear Tuesday, we are back with Matt Bourke from Bourke Harvesting.
Last week we covered the New Holland CR11.
This week it is the Case AF10.
Same fleet.
Same harvest contractor.
Same conditions.
Different colour.
Different rotor philosophy.
Bourke Harvesting is one of the only contractors in Australia running both machines side by side.
What they are telling us here is one of the most honest real-world CR11 vs AF10 comparisons available anywhere in the country right now.
As Matt Bourke puts it:
“The difference between twin rotor and single rotor has been night and day. With the AF10 and CR11, the gap is a hell of a lot closer.”
That line is the whole yarn.
Not colour wars.
Not brochure talk.
Real-world harvest contractor feedback from a crew that has both machines in the same fleet.
In this episode, we jump into the Case AF10 with a Bourke Harvesting team member.
First impressions?
Impressive.
Very impressive.
The capacity of the thing is frightening.
They had it running well.
The automation runs well.
They were pushing it, trying to get the most out of it.
At the time of the in-cab yarn, they were averaging 57.3 tonnes per hour in a 2.7 tonne crop.
That means they were getting over about 21 hectares an hour.
57.3 tonnes per hour.
21 hectares an hour.
The cab is good.
Quiet.
Very quiet.
Good chair.
Heated seats, air-conditioned seats and a back massager.
As the boys said, you have to get a red one to get a good seat.
Coming off driving 8250s, the difference is frightening.
You would not be doing 21-plus hectares an hour in an 8250 with a 60ft front on.
That is for sure.
The Case AF10 is leaps and bounds ahead of the older flagship machines.
The in-cab features are unreal.
The screens are easier to use, and there are little features like time-to-grain-tank-full.
Two minutes.
That is pretty cool.
When we posted this Talking Gear Tuesday episode on Broadacre Contracting’s Facebook, there were comments around the 57.3 tonnes per hour figure.
Firstly, as people, when we hear something and it has a negative frame to it, we often instantly divert to a negative assumption.
That can lead to negative comments and negative interactions on social media.
I do not know human psychology, but I feel I can say this.
Since social media was introduced to us, I feel we have lost a lot of responsibility.
People make comments and quote things without taking responsibility for what they have done.
It almost comes across like there are no consequences.
It really is interesting.
I have come across so many people who know it all, and the unfortunate part is that they do not.
I do not.
We do not.
We are forever learning and understanding.
The day you know it all is the day you start to die.
I am going to move on here because I am already on a Dillon tangent mission.
The reason I bring it up is this.
Yes, 57.3t/hr in an AF10 might sound similar to what a Class 9 can do in certain conditions.
But no.
It is doing 21 hectares an hour, stripping 57.3 tonnes in an average-yielding 2.7t/ha crop.
Generally, a 1,200ha farm I used to work on at Corowa would take about 14 days.
Let those numbers sit for a second.
Put this AF10 in the paddock, and by the time harvest has started, it could be over.
Disclaimer: if you need to get away from the wife, or the lovely wife needs to get away from you for a few days, do not buy an AF10 or CR11.
Matt Bourke said the flagships treated them phenomenally.
They have been great machines.
Super easy to work on.
User-friendly.
But he was under no illusions.
They needed an increase in productivity.
Especially in the south, some of their clients wanted to move to 18m controlled traffic and increase productivity.
The CR11 and AF10 were the easy answer to that.
Two things jumped out at me here.
The first thing is 18m controlled traffic.
Our website, the Broadacre Contracting directory, has had over 350,000ha of header jobs come in to strip crop.
We have spent the last three years building relationships and shaking hands.
As I have said before, I have spent time around Coonamble, Clermont, Emerald, Gurley, Moree, Merredin and all corners of Australia.
That travelling helped build the start of the Broadacre Contracting network because we were already known in all corners.
Out of all that work, there have only been a couple of jobs specifically asking for 18m, or what most of us call 60-foot fronts.
The work that comes through is generally 3m and 12m controlled traffic.
That is 3m spacings and 12m / 40-foot fronts, with many growers allowing 45-foot fronts cutting at 40.
So is this the first little insight we are going to see of a shift to 18m?
With bigger machines coming in and Australian grain yields being what they are, is 18m going to become the new 12m?
I have watched videos of other cropping countries running the AF10 with a 45-foot front, but I do not think we could achieve the yields they are getting.
We can run this gear on 40, 45 and 50-foot fronts, but it has been shown that the 60-foot front really gets these machines to peak capacity.
The second thing is Matt putting this out:
“Under no illusions, we needed an increase in productivity.”
Matt is not buying these machines because they are shiny and new.
He is buying them because his clients have probably asked for it.
The growers more than likely drove this decision.
If that is factual, that is client-led investment.
In the CR11 yarn, I dived into the business structure and success of Bourke Harvesting.
I feel like we just gained another insight into why they have maintained relationships for 30-plus years.
Every business has key little details that lead to the big reveal of what makes them good at what they do.
This is one of those details.
The 18m controlled traffic point deserves its own section.
Most broadacre growers and contractors have lived in the 12m world for a long time.
Forty-foot fronts.
Three-metre tracks.
Keep the system simple.
But now we have next-generation combines like the Case AF10 and New Holland CR11 that want to be fed.
A 40ft front will not get these things humming in Australian cereal conditions.
A 50ft front might be closer.
But the 60ft MacDon FD261 is where the conversation gets serious.
If these machines are the future, then 18m controlled traffic might not be a fringe idea for long.
That does not mean it will suit everyone.
It will not.
It depends on paddock size, paddock shape, trees, turning room, storage, cartage, chaser bin capacity and whether your whole farming system is ready for that kind of machine.
But the question needs to be asked now, because the gear is already here.
I asked Matt what the real difference is between the two machines.
His answer was simple.
The AF10 is a single-rotor machine.
The CR11 is a twin-rotor machine.
In the past, when you compared single-rotor and twin-rotor machines, the difference was night and day.
Twin-rotor machines would blow the single-rotor machines away.
As an example, your New Holland dot series machines against your flagship Case or your John Deere S Series were just a higher-capacity machine.
But with the AF10 and CR11, although one is single rotor and one is twin rotor, the gap is a hell of a lot closer.
The AF10 has a cross-flow shaker system, so you are not relying on two rotors to spread the chaff across the shaker pan evenly.
The shaker is doing that work for you.
The gap is a hell of a lot closer than what it has ever been.
Done.
Simple.
I could nearly leave the section at that.
Honestly, these guys know their headers.
I could spend years in the shed with Matt, and I would never get close to his knowledge.
I do not want to be part of the single rotor versus twin rotor debate.
I do not think Matt does either.
I do not really think us Australians are big debaters, especially in cropping anyway.
When I have conversations with people, we generally agree every bit of gear has positives and negatives.
At times, you do come across the real die-hard colour guys, and that is fair.
If their dealer is looking after them and the colour they are die-hard for is the one, then there is no issue.
But the issue comes when die-hard colour guys cannot see the positives and negatives of the other colours on the market.
At some point, one colour is going to do something so impressive that it will be a better option than what you are die-hard about.
At the same time, one colour will make a mistake they will be remembered for forever.
That is how the game works.
Everything has a negative and a positive.
If we all see that, we are all good.
I am not going to sit here and amp up the rotor debate.
What I will say is this.
Everyone is progressing in a serious manner, so the question is simple.
Do you want to run a single rotor or a twin rotor?
The R&D and the investment have now been made over many years to give you the choice.
Manufacturers giving you an almost equal choice between two different philosophies is impressive.
For the 2025/26 harvest, Bourke Harvesting tried the next-generation machines in big broadacre areas in the north.
Matt said that was terrific.
They were every bit of two flagships, with minimal inefficiencies around trees and turning.
The feedback from clients there was phenomenal.
They could see it as the way of the future.
They also went to south-western Victoria and tried the machines down there with the 18m fronts.
That was a gamble again.
They were not sure how it would go with turning and different paddock obstacles.
But in the bigger, bulkier crops down there, the machines worked really well.
Feedback was again phenomenal.
They also ran the machines in droughty conditions with minimal yields and still got really good capacity out of them.
Going forward in droughtier years, Matt said you will still be able to get plus 20 hectares an hour out of these machines with the 18m MacDon FD261 fronts.
A lot of that comes more from the MacDon side of it than the header itself.
It is not all about needing big bulky crops to warrant these machines.
You can load them up with the 18m front as well.
Everything and everywhere has its place.
Just like me as an individual and Broadacre Contracting as a business, we have a place, but we also have opportunities to be in a place.
That involves time, effort and a lot of resources.
We invest and put the time in to be an option for opportunity.
I feel that is the same with everything.
That is why hearing Matt’s experience around where these headers worked is important.
I could make a decision based on where I think they will not work.
In theory, and more than likely, they will not work there.
But on the other side of the coin, they very well may.
Will someone read this in 15 years and be blown away because what they are running then is much bigger again?
I do not know if I want to dive into that question too deeply.
If I do, I will need to stop, sit down and have a solid think about it.
What I do know is machine manufacturers are not building for today.
So if you are from the manufacturer side and reading this, feel free to fill me in.
For growers around north-east Victoria, Cobram, Numurkah, Shepparton and within a decent distance of Tungamah, I imagine Matt would be more than happy to have a yarn if you wanted to understand how these machines are working.
Bourke Harvesting is on socials, and they are the type of crew worth following.
Matt gave us the complete honest perspective.
They are not going to be for everyone.
Initially, they will not be for everyone.
It will take time to evolve, like all things.
If you have a lot of turning, paddocks with a lot of trees, or you are spending significant time out of the crop, those things are going to hold you back because it is inefficient.
I agree.
“They are not going to be for everyone” is as honest as you can get.
The initial outlay of the machine is scary.
There is no question about that.
But if you can reduce two machines into one, they do not cost double the purchase price.
I understand the cost interpretation.
I see it a lot.
Growers using the Broadacre system often do it because they want to put a certain part of their business under contractor operation.
By doing so, they can put capital elsewhere.
There is so much to unpack in this section, and I feel like I could unload the whole truck here.
But I will touch the sides enough so you are not thirsty by the end.
Pricing is an issue across the board.
The price of gear, the price of parts, even the price of buying a bottle of water.
But the price of the service does not always follow the same trajectory as everything around us.
The grain we are stripping goes into a price-set market.
Because of that, we are forced as a sector to find efficiencies.
So although gear is expensive, does the price justify a return on investment?
Matt gives a good base point.
Reducing the number of machines and staff.
Then you can go down the rabbit warren from there.
Grain loss.
Weather risk.
Harvest speed.
Quality downgrades.
Operator shortages.
Finance.
Chaser bins.
Fuel.
Repairs.
Dealer support.
There are so many angles.
But not all of them apply to everyone.
Each to their own.
Your mind should be breaking down what does and does not work for your business.
This is another issue people will have initially.
When these machines are running at capacity, they essentially need their own chaser bin chasing them.
You could probably get away with one really big bin for two machines in the right paddock setup, but for the best part, and depending on field size, keeping grain away is another issue.
A wet year right now might seem a long way away, but I am sure it will rain again.
Matt said it will be a great thing to see these machines at full capacity in a year like that.
It will put a lot of faith back in people when the pressure is on.
I quoted back to Matt:
“Even if they just park two bins at each end of the paddock and you have these two things just smacking it off. As quick as the grower can blink, you are done.”
That is my pitch for these machines in one sentence.
As quick as the grower can blink, you are done.
A wet year.
Almost all of us have been around one.
If you have not, it looks a bit like this.
Have a chew, get a sample, take it into GrainCorp and get a test done.
If the moisture is down, then we can go.
But when we go, headers are stripping, and then one goes down.
As one goes down, the chaser bin is trying not to break open the surface while getting over to the header so it can unload what is in the box and crawl out of where it has sunk.
While that is happening, there is a good chance another header across from you has gone down.
So the chaser grabs what the first header had, then attempts to reach the other header and do the same thing.
If it manages that, it takes the grain to the mother bin so it is not fully loaded and sinking.
But a lot of the time that does not work, and the chaser bin goes down.
Then the grower generally has an old articulated tractor on duals that has sat in the paddock for five years waiting for its moment to shine.
Its purpose is simply to pull gear out.
Out she comes.
Sink, rinse, repeat.
It was wild for us at Trangie in the 2022 harvest.
Every day the rain hit, we sat idle for three days, got another two days in, then it rained again.
Having a New Holland CR11 and a Case AF10 on tracks with 60ft MacDon fronts, and one bin parked at each end, might be what allows us to really smack it off before the rain hits or before the second front comes over.
That is the scenario where these machines could pay for themselves in a single day.
One day of saving a crop from weather damage could be worth more than the premium you paid over two Class 8s.
Matt mentioning tracks is important too.
These machines on tracks reduce ground pressure significantly.
In a wet year or on soft country, that can be the difference between getting in the paddock and sitting on the road watching it rain.
We talked about logistics challenges in the CR11 yarn.
The Coonamble example.
GrainCorp queues.
Four-hour truck turnarounds.
In a wet year, all of that compounds.
These machines on tracks, with the capacity to smack it off in days instead of weeks, might be the answer to wet harvest pressure.
For growers around Trangie, Warren, Nyngan or anywhere in central west NSW where wet harvests are a reality, give Broadacre Contracting a call on 0439 300 380.
Broadacre Contracting operates a verified contractor directory that connects growers directly with harvest contractors across north-east Victoria, the Murray corridor and all major cropping regions in Australia.
Here is how it works.
You post a job on the Broadacre Contracting website.
An instant alert goes out to verified contractors covering your region.
Your phone rings.
Direct contact between you and the contractor.
We do not take commissions, we do not get in the middle of your pricing, and we do not broker the deal.
We cover harvest contractors across Tungamah, Cobram, Numurkah, Nathalia, Shepparton, Benalla, Euroa, Violet Town, Wangaratta, Yarrawonga, Mulwala, Finley, Berrigan, Jerilderie, Tocumwal and anywhere else in Australia.
Whether you need a standard harvest crew, a contractor with chaser bins and trucks, or someone running the latest next-generation gear, Broadacre Contracting gives you a clearer place to start.
Give Dillon a call on 0439 300 380 from 6am to 9pm.
We would love to have a yarn about what you need.
These resources may help growers and contractors watch the episode, compare the next-generation machines, understand the AF10 and CR11 specs, and find harvest contractors.
If you are looking for a harvest contractor around Tungamah, Cobram, Numurkah, Nathalia, Shepparton, Benalla, Euroa, Yarrawonga, Mulwala, Finley, Berrigan, Jerilderie or anywhere across the Murray corridor, Broadacre Contracting gives you a clearer place to start.
Watch the Bourke Harvesting AF10 yarn, read the CR11 comparison, browse harvest contractor listings or post a tender so verified contractors can see the job and contact you directly.
The Case AF10 is Case IH’s next-generation Class 10 combine harvester. Case IH Australia lists the AF10 with a 775hp C16 engine, a 20,000L grain tank and a 210L/sec unload rate. It is the largest single-rotor combine Case IH has produced.
The Case AF10 is a single-rotor machine, while the New Holland CR11 is a twin-rotor machine. Both are next-generation combines with major power and capacity. Matt Bourke explains that the gap between single rotor and twin rotor is now much closer than it has been in previous generations.
In this Talking Gear Tuesday episode, Bourke Harvesting was averaging about 21 hectares per hour and 57.3 tonnes per hour in a 2.7t/ha crop. Real results will depend on crop, front, conditions, operator, logistics and paddock setup.
Bourke Harvesting is a three-generation, 50-year harvest contracting business based in Tungamah, north-east Victoria. They run both the New Holland CR11 and Case AF10 in the same fleet, making them one of the most interesting real-world comparison operators in Australia.
Matt Bourke says the AF10 and CR11 were every bit of two flagships in broadacre conditions. Reducing two machines into one may also reduce staff requirements, fuel, maintenance and moving parts, but the decision depends on the business, country, logistics and crop conditions.
The main things that can hold the AF10 back are short turning country, trees, time spent out of crop, initial purchase cost and grain logistics. When the machine is running at capacity, keeping grain away with chaser bins, trucks and storage becomes critical.
According to the Bourke Harvesting yarn, the AF10 still achieved strong hectare-per-hour capacity in droughtier conditions with lower yields. A lot of that comes from the 18m MacDon front helping keep material feeding into the machine.
The AF10 could be very useful in wet years where capacity, tracks and getting crop off quickly matter. If the machine can get in and keep moving, it may reduce the number of weather delays and help protect crop quality.
Call Dillon at Broadacre Contracting on 0439 300 380. Broadacre connects growers with verified harvest contractors across Tungamah, Cobram, Numurkah, Shepparton, Benalla and the broader north-east Victoria and Murray corridor region.
Talking Gear Tuesday is Broadacre Contracting’s video series where we sit down with growers, contractors and ag operators to yarn about gear, businesses, risks, lessons and the real stories behind Australian agriculture.
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