Here is the whole job, in the order we do it in our shops. Blow out and clean every roller, belt gap, the pickup, and the twine or net wrap area until no chaff is packed anywhere. Relieve belt tension and back the density setting off so the belts and springs are not loaded all winter. Grease every zerk with the machine turning slowly so the grease works through the bearing instead of piling up at the seal. Clean the chains and oil them. Walk the pickup and note every broken tine and bent band. Retract the cylinders and coat any exposed rod with grease. Park it under a roof, and bring the monitor and any leftover net wrap inside where they stay dry.
This is the same list whether you run a custom haying outfit or you are a dairy or beef Customer baling your own feed. The machine does not know who owns it, and neither do the bearings.
The part that actually saves next spring is not the cleaning. It is the few minutes with a notepad while the baler is still dirty and the wear is fresh in your mind: which belt has a frayed edge, which chain is stretched, which pickup bearing felt rough when you spun it. That list is what lets you order parts in the fall so they are on the shelf before first cutting, instead of waiting on them with hay on the ground.
Belts are the costliest thing on the baler to replace in a hurry, so start here. Chaff packed between the belts and the rollers wicks moisture all winter and corrodes the roller surface under it, and a pitted roller will chew up every belt you run on it afterward. Open the tailgate, drop the tension, and clean every belt-to-roller contact point, including the back side of the rollers you cannot see from the ground. A scraper and compressed air do most of the work.
With the belts loose, run your hand down each one. Check every lacing and splice for cracked, stretched, or missing hooks, and chalk any belt with edge fraying or a glazed spot where it has been slipping on the drive roller. A marked belt in October is a parts order. The same belt found in May is a day lost in the field.
Back the tension off per your operator's manual. A belt held stretched all winter comes out in spring with a memory, and a belt with a memory will not track straight no matter how you adjust it. Keep the pressure washer away from lacing pins and roller bearings. Water forced into a bearing in October is a seized roller in May, and that roller takes a belt with it.
Grease every zerk with the baler shut off and the PTO disengaged, then run it at idle for a minute so the lube spreads across the race instead of piling up on one side. Shut it down again, pull the guards, and spin each roller by hand. You are feeling for roughness, notchiness, or play in the shaft. Look at the bearing housings while you are there. A blued or discolored housing ran hot this season, and it will not get better sitting in a shed. Replace it now while you can still see where it came from.
Chains next. Scrape off the chaff and old lube, oil them fresh, and look hard at the sprocket teeth. Hooked or sharpened teeth will chew up a new chain fast, so a worn sprocket paired with a new chain is money thrown away. Replace both or neither.
The pickup takes the hardest hits on rough ground, so count tines, check the bands and bars for cracks, and run the cam track and gauge wheel bearings the same way you did the rollers. On balers with a precutter, pull the knives, check the rotor for wear, and tag any knives that need regrinding or replacing. Add all of it to the notepad.
Under roof on a dry floor is the standard. What we see go wrong across Indiana and Ohio is the tarp. Pulled tight over a baler, it traps condensation against bare rollers all winter, and by March the pitting is worse than if the machine had sat in the open. No shed? Leave it uncovered and park it where water will not pool underneath.
Before you walk away, retract the hydraulic cylinders and coat the exposed rods. Pull the monitor and controller to a dry spot in the house or shop. Bring net wrap rolls inside, out of sunlight and off concrete, which wicks moisture into the roll. Set rodent bait in the twine box and around the pickup, because mice find twine faster than anything else in the shed. Block the tires or take the weight off them if the baler sits in one spot until May.
Here is the limit. A thorough October shutdown cuts spring surprises, but it will not catch a bearing about to let go or a belt with one more field in it. That takes a technician with the baler on the lift, spinning rollers, checking lacings, and gauging chain stretch under good light. Treat the shutdown as the first look, not the only one.
The worn-items list from your shutdown is a parts order, so place it now. Belts, lacing, chains, sprockets, pickup tines, bearings, and knives are easier to get in October than in May, when every hay grower in the region is pulling from the same stock and a part that arrives quickly in the fall can take weeks in the spring. Bring the list to any of our stores across Indiana and Ohio or call the parts counter with your model and serial number. If you are not sure a sprocket or bearing is past the line, bring it in or send a photo and we will tell you straight whether it has another season in it. Ask about delivery if the trip is the hard part.
Book the off-season inspection at the same time. We offer mobile maintenance, so ask whether a technician can come to the farm, which matters when the baler is already blocked in behind the mower-conditioner. If you run five or more pieces of equipment, our Full Fleet Loyalty Program returns up to 50% credit on off-season inspections and takes 10% off labor, so inspecting the baler alongside the rake, tractor, and mower costs less than doing them one at a time. Ask your store about any current inspection programs as well; some cover the inspection labor on qualifying equipment when the resulting parts or repair work meets a minimum purchase, and if the baler needs nothing, you pay for the inspection like anyone else. The winter shop calendar fills from the front, and a January slot is far easier to get than a March one.
Call or stop in at your local Koenig store with the model, serial number, and the worn-parts list, and we will quote the parts and get the inspection on the calendar before it closes.