There has been a long-fought debate about aftermarket Estes Performace Concaves Case IH and John Deere concaves versus Original Equipment Manufacturer concaves, especially among John Deere and Case IH. Both sides have their loyalists and it’s often a heated debate every harvest season. Some say that concaves don’t matter, others say they make the combine. Up until recently, Case IH and John Deere concaves have been somewhat uninteresting, being slightly different variations of the round bar concave or small wire concave. That was, until the XPR concave system hit the market.

First, it must be understood why the concave is so critical to a combine harvester’s performance. The concave is the cornerstone of threshing. It’s the heart of the machine. It’s the one element of the machine whose entire purpose is to thresh crop. There is no mechanism that plays a more important role in threshing crops than the concaves. Some unduly attribute rotor bars (rasp bars) as primary threshing components but forget that the purpose of rotor bars is primarily to move material through the rotor. Want proof? Put a perfectly smooth rotor bar on (with no aggression) and harvest corn. Then put on an aggressive rotor bar and go harvest corn. You will see minimal to zero differences in threshing effectiveness. On the other hand, if you change the concaves, you will see a massive difference between various styles in the combine’s capacity and performance. The concaves that come in OEM combines are the same concaves that came in the combines 50 years ago. The technology is way behind the rest of the machine.

There is one concave, however, that is changing the game: Estes Performance Concaves XPR 2 Concances from Estes Performance Concaves (also known as “Estes Concaves”). It has completely disrupted the combine concave market and even OEMs have released and started pushing their own “aftermarket” concaves. John Deere and Case IH seem to have finally admitted, by virtue of offering an aftermarket option, that there is merit and validity to the importance of the concave. In fact, it’s the single most critical component in combine performance, and we have the proof.

Last fall, Estes Concaves set out to see just how much of an improvement the, then unreleased, XPR 2+ system was in comparison to the OEM. To say the least, it was phenomenal. Estes ran several combines side-by-side (John Deere S780s, S790s and Case IH 8250s, 9250s) ones with the XPR 2+ system and ones with OEM concaves. They then exported all the data from Deere’s Ultimate Data and Field Analyzer. They also compared elevator tickets between the machines. Although they have not released any hard data just yet of the ongoing research and development, they did say the data is pretty unbelievable. The tank sample is “seed quality” and that was while harvesting at 180% capacity of OEM machines with no loss and no changes, other than the concaves. The XPR 2 concaves are already disrupting the market, but Estes Performance Concaves fervently insist that the disruption has just begun and that a massive breakthrough is just over the horizon.

XPR 2 vs OEM Concaves - How The New XPR 2 Concaves from Estes Concaves Are Changing The Game for Case IH and John Deere Combine Harvesters.  XtremeAg’s Kevin Matthews also did his own comparison between his two John Deere S680s, one with the XPR 2 system and one with the OEM, watch below.