Harvesting machine for stalk crops having a stepped cutting blades

摘要

A harvesting machine for harvesting corn and similar crops on stalks has at least one circulating endless conveyor for engaging a crop, wherein the endless conveyor forms a crop feed area for feeding the crop to an inlet opening of a processing device for further processing the crop. The endless conveyor has a lower cutting plane for the crop with outwardly extending conveying and guiding elements and at least one cutting blade arranged below the conveying and guiding elements. The cutting blade has a stepped configuration and, viewed in a running direction of the conveying and guiding elements, has cutting segments. Each cutting segment has a cutting edge and extends at a slant outwardly relative to a circulating path of the conveying and guiding elements. The cutting blade has cutting segment steps positioned between two neighboring ones of the cutting segments, respectively.