- Location
- Lincolnshire
Buy it in a returnable IBC and stick it up high, gravity works quite well.
All those gizmos are paid for, refuelling pump and adblue pump are extras too that need to be asked and paid forThis is yet another example of lousy engineering by mainline manufacturers. Why should there be any hassle in filling adblue tanks in the first place? The sprayer manufacturers have bent over backwards to ensure chemicals can be added safely at ground level but a hugely expensive combine still needs labs climbing up steps carrying cans while the cab is filled with all sorts of gizzmos to make the operators job easier!
This is yet another example of lousy engineering by mainline manufacturers. Why should there be any hassle in filling adblue tanks in the first place? The sprayer manufacturers have bent over backwards to ensure chemicals can be added safely at ground level but a hugely expensive combine still needs labs climbing up steps carrying cans while the cab is filled with all sorts of gizzmos to make the operators job easier!
This is yet another example of lousy engineering by mainline manufacturers. Why should there be any hassle in filling adblue tanks in the first place? The sprayer manufacturers have bent over backwards to ensure chemicals can be added safely at ground level but a hugely expensive combine still needs labs climbing up steps carrying cans while the cab is filled with all sorts of gizzmos to make the operators job easier!
Not necessarily. Just about ?all? the combine manufacturers buy in their engines. The engine manufacturers will give them a tight spec on what has to be done. For instance, some engine suppliers will require that the adblue tank is no more than 4m from the engine, on the same plane. If it significantly higher or lower that distance is significantly reduced. So they may not be able to mount the ad blue tank at a lower level. You can combat this with different pumps etc but the engine suppliers don’t allow this.
They could have a second tank at ground level that they then pump up to the other tank, but that just adds cost and they don’t do it with diesel so why bother with adblue?
Then the engine manufacturers are just as culpable.
Go to any trade show and the machinery and component makers will enthuse that they they have just the 'solution' to every imaginable problem, but we all know they don't and this is a case in point. If a combine manufacturer, in partnership with the engine supplier, cannot overcome the issue of high level filling of either fuel or adblue then they are not really trying with the basics and it is probably safe to assume there is a greater margin in messing about adding digital whatnots.
To put it another way, why should the farmer spend 100's of K's on a machine and then have to perform the same routine when it comes to refuelling as their grandparents did 70 years ago?
Where else is there to mount a fuel tank on a combine?
The could but a small tank at ground level and a pump to put it in the main tank. But how many farmers would spend the money on it? Realistically with 2x pumps and control system and 2x tanks and pipe work, that would be £1000 minimum. Why would a farmer spend that on every combine when £5k buys an diesel tank which will fill it where it is now. And more to the point every farmer already has.
Ad blue is here to stay. Every farm will eventually have to have a tank with a pump etc the same as a diesel tank.
You have to climb up to the engine to check the oils etc anyway, is it a great hardship to take a pipe up with you?
How much does a new combine harvester cost nowdays?
Even if it were to add an extra £1,000 to the cost of a £250,000 machine it would hardly be a deal breaker and the manufacturers would sell it as a safety feature, let's face it, they sell all sorts of other bits and bobs which may never get used.
Climbing up to check the oils leaves you with your hands free to hold onto the rails, dragging a pipe with you does not.
I don’t know people don’t do this for diesel eitherWeld a frame on the front of one of the grain trailers. Strap a 200Ltr adblue drum to it. Tip up next to the combine and gravity fill?
I wonder if one of the manufacturers offered it as an option how many people would tick that box.
You can tie a tope to the top of the steps with a loop in it. Climb the steps safely then pull the pipes up after you. Simple, easy, and safe.
Err, as I've said, we've just clocked up about 2000 hrs between 2 machines in the last 4 months.
200 l drum on back of ute & a hand pump. It's not hard . . .
Admittedly the adblue tank on the strippers is at ground level just in front of the rear axle, but if you look at an equivalent JD combine ( S690 / S780 ) , or any combine, obviously an adblue tank can't go there. TBH - I don't even know if the big JD combines even run adblue. When the first CS690 turned up here a few years ago, at the time they were the only JD Ag machines in the country to run adblue, but apparently some other JD machines do now ?
Anyway, to fuel up any of the large US made JD combines of the last 20 or more years, you've had to climb a ladder with the fuel hose to access the fuel tank. I don't see the deal with doing the same with an adblue hose & a hand pump ( as I said with the cotton strippers, we were only pumping 50 - 60 litres every few days ). At least an adblue hose would be a lot light & easier than a 32mm diesel hose . . .
TBH - in over 30 yrs of grain farming, I've never seen a combine that you could fill the diesel tank from ground level . . .
I find it a little strange that when I question the whole thrust of digital technology I am looked askance at, to say the least. But when I suggest that hugely expensive combines are dragged into the 21st century by enabling ground level refueling people are quite happy to contiune with the ancient routine of heaving pipes and cans up aloft.