Cheban Michail Vladimirovitch

In the late nineties, when some foreign equipment appeared on the fields there were a lot of myths concerning their durability. I also decided to buy a foreign harvester. It was expensive but I was sure it wouldn’t have any problems for 10 years or so… We wished to pass to prosperous farming units. We bought the harvester Mega-206.

For the first 2 or 3 years Mega was working excellently, but then we had to replace some spare parts and it started to fail. Eventually it is nothing more than a mechanism, safe as it is, we should take care of it but it will break down anyway as working conditions in the field are not friendly.

Our cultivation area has expanded, so, we had to hire equipment from the neighboring farms. So, the year before last the harvester Don 1500� took part in harvesting at our farm. It happened that one Mega, five Nivas and one Don-1500� were clearing a field at the same time. The harvester Don cut 120 tons a day, each Niva cut 40 tons a day. So, I was happy! I made sure thereat: the equipment produced in Rostov doesn’t fail — it’s the credible trade name! So, I took a decision to buy the harvester Don.

When buying Don, I had some doubts: «How soon I will be able to pay off?» I had to call in a credit for the harvester for three years. The harvester had worked only for nine days during the last campaign and I got about half of its value. This year I expect to pay off the creditor.

Now I am going to sell my Mega and to buy another Don. I liked Mega, but its spare parts are too expensive and there is no after sales service for Megas. As there are no spare parts, I fabricated some of them on a lathe by myself and they had better quality than the parts sold by the official dealer. However, the prices of the official dealer are too high, for example, the second speed gear for Mega costs as much as a new gearbox unit for Don. The leading belt for Mega which costs 3600 hrivnas has burnt out three times. Now I wouldn’t like to buy a new Mega, as a new one costs much and those which are sold now are 5 — 7 years, they are sold slightly tuned but soon they begin to fall into pieces.

Economical performance of the equipment

Designation	Units of measurement	Mega-206	Don-1500�
Year of manufacture	-	1998	2005
Purchase price	hryvnas	981 800	381 000
Running hours per season
grain	t	3 400	1 350
Expenses
Fuel consumption	hryvnas	24 960	11 480
Spare parts and maintenance	hryvnas	73 640	3 640
Amortization	hryvnas	98 180	38 100