As you said, you can speck combines massively now so it’s hard to compare. However, I would say a redekop chopper on the 8240 would completely revolutionise that part of the machine. Even chop for the width of the header, you can speck it if you want a wide kit for bigger headers, and a much finer chop too. As for the beater shafts slipping in the feeder, I’d ask your dealer to have a look at the beater gearbox, they’re rather common to wear the splines away on the stub shafts In the box, ultimately this wears the splines on the beaters. This is most probably the reason for slip. Expensive repair but definitely worth doing, partly because it’ll increase efficiency but mainly because you don’t want to be losing drive mid way through harvest! If you’re looking to increase straw capacity when rowing up, for bales etc, then I’d suggest changing your rasp bars to 28mm on the whole length of the rotor. It won’t revolutionise the straw but certainly will help.

The one reason I went with two Deere 70 machines vs two 7120 combines was mostly dealer support in the end. Everyone in my family was open to an IH, but in the end it fell threw. A huge deal breaker for us was the wiring and the engine bay access. As you mentioned in the video the case would get filthy especially in dirty dry conditions such as we face in Texas. The Deere’s are always clean, though it is kind of a hassle to push up on that lever, pull out the ladder and then drop it compared to the case. I feel that both brands in the engine bay have easy access to most of the day to day things. Now before I go any farther I don’t know to much about these IH machines except for running some older machines so you could very well say I am biased. That was another reason we went to Deere again was because we were comfortable with it and someone who is comfortable with an IH can understand that. It’s not just which brand is better in some things or dealer support, but also how much you know about the machine. For an example, my father can practically tear apart a Deere and rebuild it, but not so easily with an IH. In the end it all boils down to three things, improvements made, dealer support, comfort.

BTW In my opinion hydraulics drives are not always superior. AGCO did that with the Massey and went away from it because they bleed more power and lose a lot of efficiency over time as they wear. I'm mainly speaking of the rotor drive.

Great job being un biased. I was wondering which is better at lost control? Also monitor calibrations? I've only ever run much older IH 1420, 2366, and old Gleaners. I like how simple and easy to maintain and repair the IHs are.