For osr or if my trusty spade shows up shallow compaction, yes. It als depends on how wet it is at depth. I'm hoping that over time as the soil structure improves I'll be able to reduce the depth to the point that I can park it up & no till with a lot less steel/hp. I'm only doing my first full harvest with strip tillage so there is work to be done yet. The tractor has a CVT gearbox, so throttles back once it has got to the cruising speed of 12 kph. Much faster than that and the soil thrown from the tines & A shares is harder to level with the batter boards on the back. It's amazing how the soil types and power needed change across a field. The chalk is easy working but the clay cap on the hill tops is brutal.
Claydon drill
- Thread starter cornishking
- Start date
- Location
- North Coast of Cornwall
i understand what you mean, the leading tine works far better than i imagined for what looks like a bent stick!!
Philippa Wright spoke at our local Monitor Farm about tine depth and width. A straight tine is only effective at between 5 and 8 times its width, any deeper and it simply smears a slot. The lesson I took away for my DTS was to look at the width of the tine as it wears not just the length. Just because you can go faster in year 2 doesn't mean you are doing a better job!
Sodding autocorrect!
Yes, 8" but depending on conditions as little as 5", he said it simply isn't possible to accurately predict which it is.
- Location
- North Coast of Cornwall
Depending on how wet the soil is
- Location
- North Coast of Cornwall
Wish I could go that fast!!
We used to drill at 12 kph, slowed down a bit now, drill does a better job n makes rolling a good bit easier(essential to roll cereals well after hybrid) n also leaves a better finish. front tine doesn't go in more than 4 inches for cereals , drop it right down for beans(better unrolled in our experience). I'm not convinced the leg does much more than create a drainage channel.
Leading discs for drilling into cover crops let them do the hard work of removing compaction n breaking those dirty pans from years of soil abuse with ploughs n subsoiler style machines.
Brisel we can put our tractor on it's knees with 215 hp up front on some of our land that's on a 3m drill ...
Leading discs for drilling into cover crops let them do the hard work of removing compaction n breaking those dirty pans from years of soil abuse with ploughs n subsoiler style machines.
Brisel we can put our tractor on it's knees with 215 hp up front on some of our land that's on a 3m drill ...
Wouldn't it be better to use a proper subsoiler where needed, rather than using the drill to subsoil. I've always thought of these type of systems as needing less power and fuel and could be used on farms with relitively small tractors.
after the first year, surely you should be just ticking the top as shallow as you can go.
after the first year, surely you should be just ticking the top as shallow as you can go.
- Location
- Oxfordshire
Have you got on well with the front discs ? I was considering buying a set for my hybrid. Do they have depth adjustment, it looks like there is 2 depth holes to choose from, only problem is I don't have stone release protection, (but plenty of stones) would they cope without it ? I suppose the shearbolts would still work.
I also find over 9-11 kph there is too much soil throw and seeding depth is less accurate.
in my opinion the subsoiler creates more problems than it can ever fix, cover crop roots down 20 plus inches do a lot more good at a lot less cost. strip drilling doesn't really work by scratching on the top in my opinion
the front discs work well there are two holes on there we only ever use the bottom hole that's the only depth adjustment, our drill is stone protected so cant really comment on how they would work on a shear bolt drill.
totally agree on the speed issue
I agree with this. Subsoilers heave up the natural structure & basically reset what we're trying to do with the minimum of movement at the top, just enough to create a good root zone without killing all the worms. The leading leg at 6" moves about 2/3 the topsoil depending on the stones in the profile. I do subsoil where muck heaps have been & the occasional deep tramline rut but since moving to this system the ruts aren't as deep as before under min till/ploughing.
Juke - are you finding the structure & rooting better at depth even though it is taking so much power to pull through? What do you do to decide what depth to run the legs?
Yeah the structure n plant rooting is definitely improving all the time so is the worm population,
I think our current rotation is also helping to improve things no end. The good old spade comes out for a dig around to see what's happening also to be fair, as a rule we are only growing a first wheat that's the only winter cereal this time except one 20 acre field that needs some tlc, (hasn't recovered from 2012 yet ) that's going back to winter barley this time to get a monster cover crop in next summer ...
Everything else is spring cereals or beans be that winter or springs they act also as our compaction busters along with the cover crops..
I should also add we have different cover crops for different fields and their requirements, really excited to see our latest mixture going once we manage to get it in the ground , we have also undersown some spring oats with white clover n yellow trefoil that looks promising too.. not much science to it just the inner rhino n the desire to show the neighbours how to farm properly.
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beefandsleep
Member
- Location
- Staffordshire
Does the claydon system suit barley with its lower tillering ability compared to wheat?
I'll let you know soon enough when it stops raining! Winter barley with the Claydon sown using 7" A shares & the twin boot seed splitter (6" spacing to the next band of seed) yielded the same as min tilled stuff sown with a Vaderstad Rapid drill at 12,5 cm spacing (5") apart.
Alot cheaper to put in the ground too I'd imagine