The most unique thing about it is, as you indicate, the small size and the fact that it has hydrostatic drive. All of Hesston's production windrowers that were this size had a mechanical drive system. A while back I was talking to a retired person who had worked in Hesston engineering for many years and he remembered this machine and said the project was cancelled due to the high costs and resulting poor business case. Hydro drives are expensive and to have an acceptable profit margin would have resulted in a selling price that didn't correspond to the machine's small size and limited capacity. The machine is also unique in that it has the original "sit beside the engine" configuration but contains certain design features, such as the one-piece rigid frame and single lever joystick control for the hydro, that were in production only on later "engine in the back" models.
A neat fact about this machine is that my father-in-law and another farmer went together and purchased it directly from Hesston after the program was cancelled around 1970. He had always told me about the little windrower that he co-owned and it is neat to now have that same machine in my possession. Most prototypes get destroyed after the test work is done but back then they must not have been as concerned about liability and having one-off machines in the wild that had no parts support.
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