A BELT DRIVE FOR DRIVING THE HEADER OF A COMBINE HARVESTER

In a combine harvester (10) according to the invention, the driveline for driving the moving components of the combine header (1) comprises a belt drive (21) mounted laterally with respect to the feeder housing (11). The invention is related to combines equipped with a feeder housing that comprises a movable cradle frame (20) at the front, configured to receive the header, so that a controlled movement of the cradle frame may be imparted to the header during a harvesting run. The belt drive is configured to transfer the rotation of a first drive axle (22) that is part of the driveline, to the rotation of a second axle (23) to which the drive axle of the header can be coupled. According to the invention, the belt drive comprises two pulleys (25,27) which are maintained in a common plane regardless of the movement of the header relative to the feeder housing. To this aim, the pulleys are rotatably mounted in a longitudinally extendable bridge structure (30), and the pulleys are coupled to the first and second axles through couplings which allow a misalignment between the pulleys and the axles, for example through universal joints (35,36).