A Sugar Beet Combine Harvester is a type of Vehicle in Farming Simulator 17. This self-propelled machine can perform both parts of the Sugar Beet harvest simultaneously: Cutting the haulms and collecting the beets from the ground. It works very much like a normal Harvester, except it can only harvest Sugar Beets.
Farming Simulator 17 offers only one model of Sugar Beet Combine Harvester - the Holmer Exxact Terra Dos T4-40. It is an extremely expensive machine, but is by far the most efficient way to collect your Sugar Beet crops.
To use a Sugar Beet Combine Harvester, you also need to buy a Sugar Beet Harvesting Header. It will not work without such a header installed.
A Sugar Beet Combine Harvester is not the only way to harvest Sugar Beets: You can also do it using two separate Implements called a Sugar Beet Haulm Topper and Sugar Beet Harvester Trailer. While these tools are significantly cheaper than a Combine Harvester, they are also less effective, and complete the job much slower.
List of Sugar Beet Combine Harvesters[]
Farming Simulator 17 offers only one model of Sugar Beet Combine Harvester. It can be found in the "Beet Harvesting" category at the store.
| Name | Price | Maint. Cost per Day |
Horsepower | Max. Speed (km/h) |
Fuel Capacity |
Crop Capacity |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Holmer Exxact Terra Dos T4-40 | 495,000 | 1,780 | 626 | 40 | 1,150 | 45,000 |
Harvesting Sugar Beets[]
- Main article: Sugar Beet (Farming Simulator 17)
A Sugar Beet Combine Harvester is designed to harvest Sugar Beets from the field. Unlike most other crops, the process of harvesting Sugar Beets is a two-step process, preparing the field and then collecting the beets. A Combine Harvester's advantage is that it performs both of these actions simultaneously. Overall, it works almost exactly like a normal Harvester.
A Sugar Beet Combine Harvester can only collect beets from a ripe field. It will not interact with plants that are still growing, nor with plants that have already withered. Ripe fields will appear as yellow or orange in the "growth" map.
While active, a Sugar Beet Combine Harvester's cutting head collects any ripe beets it touches, whether or not they have already been processed by a Sugar Beet Haulm Topper. If you have a Combine Harvester, there is no need to use a topper on your beet fields first - the Combine Harvester does not care.
The beets are collected into a holding tank inside the Combine Harvester itself. If the holding tank becomes full, the harvester will stop interacting with any more beets. The tank can be unloaded at any time by extending the vehicle's pipe (actually a conveyor belt); If the Combine Harvester detects a valid container underneath the pipe, it will automatically dump beets into that container. This can be done while the Combine Harvester is working, or once it has stopped.
Alternatively, you can manually order the Combine Harvester to dump the beets anywhere you want, creating a Pile which you could pick up later. The game features a special machine (a Sugar Beet Collector) designed specifically to pick up massive quantities of Sugar Beets after the harvest is completed. This method can make Sugar Beets harvests go significantly faster, but requires a bit of extra work.
Comparison with Sugar Beet Toppers/Trailers[]
A Sugar Beet Combine Harvester is a single, self-propelled machine that can perform both parts of the Sugar Beet harvest simultaneously: Cutting the haulms off the beets, and then collecting them out of the ground. It performs the job in a single pass, like most other Harvesters in the game.
This puts it in direct competition with Sugar Beet Haulm Toppers and Sugar Beet Harvester Trailers. Each of these tools can only perform one part of the beet harvest, but they can be mounted together on the same Tractor to perform the job in a single pass.
Each of these two different setups has its own advantages and disadvantages:
- A Topper/Trailer setup is much cheaper. The combined price of the Topper and Trailer models available in the base game is $105,000, not including the price of a Tractor strong enough to use them both at the same time (assuming you don't already own one). Compare this to the $573,000 price of a Combine Harvester and its Header.
- A Topper/Trailer has much lower maintenance. Both tools together cost only $110 per day, compared to $1,860 for a Combine Harvester + Header. This doesn't include the maintenance of the tractor, but then a tractor can be used for many other jobs while waiting for the next Sugar Beet harvest. A Combine Harvester can waste a whole lot of money if it just sits around waiting for you to need its use again.
- A Combine Harvester has a wider collection head. The working heads of the Grimme FT 300 Topper and Grimme Rootster 604 Trailer both have a width of 3.0 meters, compared to 4.0 meters on the Holmer Exxact HR 9 (the only available Beet Harvesting Header in the game). This allows the Combine Harvester to complete the same harvest 33% faster.
- A Combine Harvester works faster. The Holmer Exxact HR 9 harvesting header imposes a maximum working speed of 12 km/h / 7 mph, which is 20% faster than the working speed of a Grimme Rootster 604 harvester trailer. Again, this allows it to complete the same harvest faster.
- A Combine Harvester has greater capacity. It can collect 7.5 times (!) as many Sugar Beets as a Topper/Trailer before it needs to be emptied. This can make the harvest go a lot faster.
- A Combine Harvester is easier to control. It is a single solid machine, with a single header at the front that does both jobs simultaneously. This makes it easier to put the header exactly where you need it. A Topper/Trailer, on the other hand, has one of its headers at the back, behind the tractor - making it harder to put that header in the right place. Furthermore, the Holmer Exxact Terra Dos T4-40 harvester has special steering controls for extra precision.
Overall, the Price and Maintenance Cost differences are probably the most important factors in the early game, when money is short and you do not yet have many Sugar Beet fields to process. This prevents you from needlessly spending massive amounts of money for a Combine Harvester to just sit and wait for the crops to ripen. With the relatively-small investment of $105,000, you can start harvesting Sugar Beets early on - a profitable venture.
Once you can afford the Combine Harvester however, it will make the harvest go much faster, and with virtually no downsides other than the massive maintenance cost.