Conservation Agriculture {CA}.....no more ploughs or ploughing

Jim Bullock

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
Jim if the ground has more water than it can absorb then how are you going to loosen wet soil?
Will
You have to wait until it dries out, then loosen it.. Probably months ahead. After 2012 we adopted the attitude that nature would sort out our soils but that was a big mistake, where we ran a Shakerator through in the spring before sp wheat and sp beans yields were 100% greater.
 
Jim. It is not the Uk that buys more than 1.5 million tractors each year and operates 32-million tractors every day.We have sold our tractors in to 15 different countries so as to learn about world farming.UK sells less than 12,000 tractors per year and,in our case,we do have customers in UK that understand why we are the world`s MAIN ......almost ONLY......TRACTOR INNOVATION team in the world.

We tried in 2002 to inform DEERE`s managers that { at ASAE Chicago } that we were the innovative outfit in the tractor world.
We wrote a paper explaining it to them.................it was probably too long for them to bother reading but it was entitled, "Innovation in the Farm Tractor world.....who leads who follows ? "..
As farmers are begining in UK to know,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,CA is on the way and Tony Reynolds sent his ploughs & rotovators back to the FOUNDRY......?? G .

...........
 

banjo

Member
Location
Back of beyond
I hope you don't mind me jumping in here about the trantor. It's a great concept that looks horrible. I would of bought one if the cab had more thought about it and I'm a stock farmer.
There is a market for his kind of tractor, no frills to haul livestock to market quickly and trailer work also moving machinary to distant ground and it seems to be forgotten about these days. After all what stock farmer wants to spend 80 grand on a 50k tractor that goes up and down the road every now and then.
The look of it needs to be worked on and a cab like the small old fastraks would make it look cool, thus sell well.
 

Jim Bullock

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
Graham
I hear what you are saying and if you have read my "Talking Arable" column in Arable Farming you will know that I have been banging on about heavy high powered tractors and kit destroying our soils.
I hope that MF will continue to develop their worldwide tractor series up to 180/200hp because I think it would appeal to many growers.Its a market you would need to get into....
No matter what any ever of us say I think it's very interesting that more people in the world are fed by food produced by tractors like the MF 135 than by Quad-Tracs
I am sorry you will not be at Groundswell as it is going to be a milestone event for CA in the UK.
 
Graham
I hear what you are saying and if you have read my "Talking Arable" column in Arable Farming you will know that I have been banging on about heavy high powered tractors and kit destroying our soils.
I hope that MF will continue to develop their worldwide tractor series up to 180/200hp because I think it would appeal to many growers.Its a market you would need to get into....
No matter what any ever of us say I think it's very interesting that more people in the world are fed by food produced by tractors like the MF 135 than by Quad-Tracs
I am sorry you will not be at Groundswell as it is going to be a milestone event for CA in the UK.
I do agree that the Groundswell event is very important and John Cherry is the kind of man that ,I am sure will present the subject very well indeed .I had the pleasure of seeing some of his WORMS when I visited him to re-assess the paper I presented at the ECAF-Brissels conference..I do wish you all the very best as I feel sure this event is vital as the CA subject is coming of age & has been around long enough to cause serious debate & discussion.Hope all goes well G.
 

Shutesy

Moderator
Arable Farmer
@Graham A.B Edwards if you are serious in marketing this tractor in the UK why when I look at your website can I not even see 1 picture of a Trantor? Why are you not bringing machines to LAMMA, Cereals, or more local machinery shows across the country? I can see you are passionate about your design which is very commendable but other than this thread on this forum how are you trying to get UK farmers interested in the Trantor?
Personally even if I went to full no-till i'm not sure I would want something only weighing 4t or there abouts doing faster speeds than normal tractors with a fully loaded grain trailer pushing it about all over the place, same applies to a trailed sprayer. 14t trailers fully loaded can push 120/130hp tractors about on the road, they are in my opinion safer and easier to drive with 180/200hp tractors on the front like a lot of UK farmers use. Then the tractor is the boss of the trailer. Just my opinion on the matter.
 
weight.my view is that a 200-hp tractor needs to be about 6 tonnes but the seat needs to be 95% lighter.Suspernding seats is crackers.I have a modern tractor seat from MF Beauvais at home & i am unable to lift it..........in 1975 i could lift at least 20 tractor seats.The whole unsuspended skid-unit is wrong because of its weight......we have been working to create some composite materials in our new tractors & if it is good enough for Airbus & good enough for London buses.......to lighten them ,,,,it is good enough for tractors of the new post ploughing-first KIND G
 
I hope you don't mind me jumping in here about the trantor. It's a great concept that looks horrible. I would of bought one if the cab had more thought about it and I'm a stock farmer.
There is a market for his kind of tractor, no frills to haul livestock to market quickly and trailer work also moving machinary to distant ground and it seems to be forgotten about these days. After all what stock farmer wants to spend 80 grand on a 50k tractor that goes up and down the road every now and then.
The look of it needs to be worked on and a cab like the small old fastraks would make it look cool, thus sell well.
Banjo,......I do agree that the Trantor looks dated & it is designed to carry six people and the driver in comfort.Why......because in overseas countries teams of workers are very important in Palm-oil,sugar-cane & some fruits .......Additionally , we have always considered that to reach the vast market we have aimed at.........global & international......what this means......should we be correct........? .....is that our manufacturing & assembly partners will need to have a GLOBAL distribution network.......this means that if that partner was Claas the style .colour & aesthetics would be green but if it was MF-Agco it would be in one of the colours & style .......particularly the bonnet........of the brand that becomes our partner.Hope this helps to explain our ugliness G....
 
@Graham A.B Edwards if you are serious in marketing this tractor in the UK why when I look at your website can I not even see 1 picture of a Trantor? Why are you not bringing machines to LAMMA, Cereals, or more local machinery shows across the country? I can see you are passionate about your design which is very commendable but other than this thread on this forum how are you trying to get UK farmers interested in the Trantor?
Personally even if I went to full no-till i'm not sure I would want something only weighing 4t or there abouts doing faster speeds than normal tractors with a fully loaded grain trailer pushing it about all over the place, same applies to a trailed sprayer. 14t trailers fully loaded can push 120/130hp tractors about on the road, they are in my opinion safer and easier to drive with 180/200hp tractors on the front like a lot of UK farmers use. Then the tractor is the boss of the trailer. Just my opinion on the matter.
 
Dear Shutesy,You may have seen the way the Chinese behave at the Various exhibition & show sites.They photograph each of those innovations they wish to copy.Copying is,however not only a Chinese disease as lots of other countries also try to learn from what they see.If we were thinking of going to a show it would not be in UK......the market is too small.I certainly spent two days at cereals looking for low-draught direct seeder manufacturers.I am sorry to have to tell you that UK is not our priority market.We do have lots of photographs after 42 years of pioneering design in the FARM TRACTOR arena but ,as others have said,there is a significant difference between the 5-7 tasks in no-till ......always 5 but sometimes some rolling * tine weeding of some vegetables.........when compared to ploughing.the tractors designed for NO till do not have a heavy skid unit & do not need the same kind of engine that PERKINS supplies to tractor makers.these engines are ploughing tractor engines with a duty cycle that is as different as chalk is to cheese .....when engines for CA & transportation are considered......this means a very different duty-cycle for the engines......................Perkins do not make any......yet.G
I think you are,however correct in saying that our website is words.......lots of them.....and not any pictures..We will add some at the next review TQ for your observations G
 
If I narrow my perspective on basically the most important farming job of putting a seed in the ground to make it grow and have in mind that we agronomically have to drill our cereals later in the autumn because of blackgrass and insects matched with my gut feeling of changing weather means more rain when we don`t want it at drilling time ..... then the last thing that would make any good on heavy soils is a heavy trailed drill that needs a heavy strong tractor to get the power on the ground just to pull this drill over wet ground that only needs its weight to have enough penetration downforce in dry hard soil when the hopper is empty !!??!!

Shouldn`t we rethink our vehicle concepts coming to the conclusion that something like the tool-carrier tractor-concepts from the mid of the last century wasn`t that bad ?? Putting seed, fertilizer and anything else on the lightweight-tractors frame, driven on 4WD modern wide tyres with as low pressure as possible and having the toolbar with the seed openers bolted rigid to the frame, enabling it to put only as much downforce on the openers as even needed and only as much pressure on closing wheels as wanted if wanted at all in the wet and having every excessive kilogram on driven wide tyres - shouldn`t that make it possible to drill at times and in conditions when our forefathers used to drill with MF135-type tractors with sometimes making a mess because of poor tyres, but they rarely made a damage to the soil because of it`s lightweight.
As said, only looking at drilling - I agree that we need different concepts for different jobs but what would be wrong to add weight to the tractor when we need it at carting heavy trailers by loading some of the stuff on the tractor frame, like the Unimog-concept ?? I`m always amazed when a lightweight Unimog with 24to-trailer comes to the farm it seems he can hardly pull the empty trailer, but after loading 4to on the Unimog he is boss of the full trailer.
 
Dear Shutesy,You may have seen the way the Chinese behave at the Various exhibition & show sites.They photograph each of those innovations they wish to copy.Copying is,however not only a Chinese disease as lots of other countries also try to learn from what they see.If we were thinking of going to a show it would not be in UK......the market is too small.I certainly spent two days at cereals looking for low-draught direct seeder manufacturers.I am sorry to have to tell you that UK is not our priority market.We do have lots of photographs after 42 years of pioneering design in the FARM TRACTOR arena but ,as others have said,there is a significant difference between the 5-7 tasks in no-till ......always 5 but sometimes some rolling * tine weeding of some vegetables.........when compared to ploughing.the tractors designed for NO till do not have a heavy skid unit & do not need the same kind of engine that PERKINS supplies to tractor makers.these engines are ploughing tractor engines with a duty cycle that is as different as chalk is to cheese .....when engines for CA & transportation are considered......this means a very different duty-cycle for the engines......................Perkins do not make any......yet.G
I think you are,however correct in saying that our website is words.......lots of them.....and not any pictures..We will add some at the next review TQ for your observations G
 
If I narrow my perspective on basically the most important farming job of putting a seed in the ground to make it grow and have in mind that we agronomically have to drill our cereals later in the autumn because of blackgrass and insects matched with my gut feeling of changing weather means more rain when we don`t want it at drilling time ..... then the last thing that would make any good on heavy soils is a heavy trailed drill that needs a heavy strong tractor to get the power on the ground just to pull this drill over wet ground that only needs its weight to have enough penetration downforce in dry hard soil when the hopper is empty !!??!!

Shouldn`t we rethink our vehicle concepts coming to the conclusion that something like the tool-carrier tractor-concepts from the mid of the last century wasn`t that bad ?? Putting seed, fertilizer and anything else on the lightweight-tractors frame, driven on 4WD modern wide tyres with as low pressure as possible and having the toolbar with the seed openers bolted rigid to the frame, enabling it to put only as much downforce on the openers as even needed and only as much pressure on closing wheels as wanted if wanted at all in the wet and having every excessive kilogram on driven wide tyres - shouldn`t that make it possible to drill at times and in conditions when our forefathers used to drill with MF135-type tractors with sometimes making a mess because of poor tyres, but they rarely made a damage to the soil because of it`s lightweight.
As said, only looking at drilling - I agree that we need different concepts for different jobs but what would be wrong to add weight to the tractor when we need it at carting heavy trailers by loading some of the stuff on the tractor frame, like the Unimog-concept ?? I`m always amazed when a lightweight Unimog with 24to-trailer comes to the farm it seems he can hardly pull the empty trailer, but after loading 4to on the Unimog he is boss of the full trailer.
 
Dear Hartwig.....our approach to design is to direct our attention to ALL of the WORK TASKS in Ca-No-Till.......not JUST drilling........................we think there are always five tasks & in some soil conditions & for certain vegetables ....sometimes two more.
Let us try to be holistic in our approach to farm tractor design.......& therefore conduct ALL of the tasks that the TRACTOR is Involved in.
The tractor design for pulling trailers is very different from creating a PLOUGHING-first & Rotovating tractor.for ALL of the farmers work tasks.
Farmers need to understand WHY this is BEFORE they. think about EACH of the 5-7 CA-work tasks.

It is when the farmer is PREPARED to study ALL of the work tasks in CA that he needs a particular kind of high-speed Light in weight TRANSPORT-Focused tractor & not a plougher.

This cannot be done before the farmer examines his complete ANNUAL calendar of WORK-Tasks.......as he moves from the older ploughing system in to the very different CA-system [See ECAF conference paper Brussels ,the last paper,April 2014].

The need for this kind of PLANNING tool for farmers is also used by the French firm Gregoire & this needs to be looked at alongside the crop-rotation planning system that is a key part of no-till.
The WTA report is available as well as the ECAF paper from [email protected] .....free of any charge.....should you or others be interested in the way PLANNING AHEAD has to be a serious part of the NO-till {CA} farming system
. I hope this helps .Thank you Graham.
 
I do think your view about the Unimog is interesting as this was the forerunner to the MB Trac which was much slower & more AGRICULTURAL whereas the Trantor has always had a very important hitch-point under the SEE-ABLE [from the driving position.....not like the "long way back" hitch of the MB-Unimog" } and independently-suspended hitch so as to reduce the oscillations from the Trailer`s drawbar.The 3-point linkage of the TRANTOR is both -see-able & suspended.
This was achieved by a large LEAF-Spring in the lateral position on the SERIES one Trantors & an Accumulator, on the Series 2 mark one Trantors. Power Farming showed this in the excellent magazine [ ruined by Farmers Weekly interference] which was published by NORMAN LUCAS in a "Meet the Trantor " article in APRIL 1978.
{we probably have this article on our computer system if you would,or others wish to see it?}.
My personal opinion is that the military Unimog was never a well-designed Ag-Implement focused product range & our Keynote address [presented at ARAI-SIAT in PUNE India covers the history of LAND-Rover [in its Ag-focused ,central driving position time when a PTO & 3-point linkage were evaluated at Silsoe ] explains the various designs from 1946 onwards to 2009,when published..{this is certainly on our computer system if you, or anyone else, is interested}.
Your point on photographs on our website is useful as we have produced a Series of PDF-Style brochures .....listed on the website,,,,,which have dozens of photographs on each of the 8 pdf-brochures...........Our olde-fashioned approach to READING is much less popular than those "YOUNGSTERS" that seek to have TWITTER-like brief & short blogs.
The design & development,over 42 years is not easily explained or indeed PROPERLY explained by TWITTERING.......studying engineering design & development for Agriculture .......is not sensibly done by the narrow thinking that pervades our profession.The subject of farming & the implications of change that the NO-till farming system encourages is not easily TWITTERABLE.............there is a need for a deeper understanding of the combination of Engineering,Zero-Tillage,Farm Transportation & the need to UNDERSTAND why engines designed for PLOUGHING are NOT the same as ENGINES designed for TRANSPORTATION.[ Perkins Engines still struggling to understand the no-till farming system & why the DUTY-CYCLE is so different when PLOUGHING is changed to TRANSPORTATION & Zero-Tillage work ].......which ,of course has no Ploughing in it........& is why The Trantor concept makes practical common sense & is clearly ,now,part of the future in worldwide agriculture,
I would be pleased to forward you a wide variety of real photographs if you would be happy to receive them in regard to the 3 world markets they are addressed towards
1-LIVESTOCK O& GRASSLAND applications
2-Municipal Authority tractor operations e.g snow clearance,motorway mowing etc
3-The pictures of relevant no-till work tasks that for farming efficiency need to change the ploughing tractor in the TRANSPORTATION direction
Additionally,there is a PDF brochure [illustrated] that explains WHY a ploughing-first tractor [32 million used per day] is inappropriate & badly-designed [cost of fuel,price of too-high hp etc] for the mew system of CONSERVATION AGRICULTURE {CA} which many farmers call no-till but which is a GREAT DEAL more than just "DIRECT-DRILLING"......indeed I would say that entering the No-till system through Direct Seeding is very foolish & ,from a soil-health pint of view one that usually fails to plan far enough ahead & fails to consider crop-rotation.......& ALSO lots of those Drills DISTURB the soil much more than makes sense to soil-interested ,worm-producing farmers.G
 
Graham
I hear what you are saying and if you have read my "Talking Arable" column in Arable Farming you will know that I have been banging on about heavy high powered tractors and kit destroying our soils.
I hope that MF will continue to develop their worldwide tractor series up to 180/200hp because I think it would appeal to many growers.Its a market you would need to get into....
No matter what any ever of us say I think it's very interesting that more people in the world are fed by food produced by tractors like the MF 135 than by Quad-Tracs
I am sorry you will not be at Groundswell as it is going to be a milestone event for CA in the UK.
 
Dear Jim. I do not read Arable Farmer,largely because FARMERS weekly spends more time and space on BLACK GRASS & fails to report the experience of Tony Reynolds in Landwards.......................Brian Sims articles.......which guide readers to solving the problem of Black Grass whereas the FW concentrates on its existence........as a problem.!!

The No-till system demonstrates that there are very different pests in CA-farming when compared to those in PLOUGHING.

The implication,expressed by Tony & Brian concerns Why Black grass is removed from soils which continue to be directed towards no-till Conservation Agriculture.

Would you mind sending me the article in Arable land magazine ....TQ Graham
 

John 1594

Member
Location
Cambridgeshire
Well, after reading that, am i led to believe that this is simply yet another way of trying to sell an idea that simply never caught on mainstream, i mean there have been quite a few failed attempts to sell the "trantor" idea....going back the last 40 years

none of them have worked to any successful degree.....ask yourself why

its impossible to have your cake and eat it?

Dual purpose machines rarely do either job as well as a single dedicated machine for each task (haybob for example)

i can hardly see many direct drillers trading in thier fendts, John Deeres or (insert preffered brand here) for a trantor

bearing in mind the differece in wheel equipment especially....dont know what the trantor runs on, but its not going to be 650/38s or even 42s is it?

Ground clearance for spraying or fert....next thing it will be suggested to breed wheat that only grows 6" high i suppose

many, many reasons why the wasnt and wont ever be as versatile as a standard agricultural tractor

i await a very long winded reply.
 
Well, after reading that, am i led to believe that this is simply yet another way of trying to sell an idea that simply never caught on mainstream, i mean there have been quite a few failed attempts to sell the "trantor" idea....going back the last 40 years

none of them have worked to any successful degree.....ask yourself why

its impossible to have your cake and eat it?

Dual purpose machines rarely do either job as well as a single dedicated machine for each task (haybob for example)

i can hardly see many direct drillers trading in thier fendts, John Deeres or (insert preffered brand here) for a trantor

bearing in mind the differece in wheel equipment especially....dont know what the trantor runs on, but its not going to be 650/38s or even 42s is it?

Ground clearance for spraying or fert....next thing it will be suggested to breed wheat that only grows 6" high i suppose

many, many reasons why the wasnt and wont ever be as versatile as a standard agricultural tractor

i await a very long winded reply.
 

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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