George Moate - Tillerstar

[Theswede]

I am growing onions on land that might not be the typical vegetable land. It is light clay with much stones in it. This season we destoned with a Kongskilde Stonebear but that still was not enough... we had 4 people manually sorting out stones on the harvester and they barely got the stones out at 1 km/h in 1,5 meter beds.

For next season I have used the Stonebear again but I have also put alot of time into finding other solutions. One is the Tillerstar from George Moate. It looks like it might be the ideal machine for me. The only problem is that I can not find any pictures or movies when it is used in stony land. The salesman says it will be no problem at all, but I guess we have all heard that before.

So I was thinking there has got to be some people on here with experience of the Tillerstar. I will attach a couple of pictures for you to look at and I will be very happy if you share any info or thoughts!

Also info on running costs and wear on the machine would be nice!

 

[Colin]

Just get a grimme destoner job sorted
Destone at 3 to 5kph, not problem on harvester, tillerstar doesn't get a good review on stoney ground. You would need a set of ridgers as well, I assume you get a lot of frost so soil will be quite easy to work in Spring. Where are you in Sweden?

 

[Theswede]

Just get a grimme destoner job sorted
Destone at 3 to 5kph, not problem on harvester, tillerstar doesn't get a good review on stoney ground. You would need a set of ridgers as well, I assume you get a lot of frost so soil will be quite easy to work in Spring. Where are you in Sweden?

I like the idea of the Tillerstar... if I could get just 7-8 cm of topsoil it would be fine for my onions and if I got another 5-7 cm without that much stones in I would benefit from it for alot of years.

Plan is to have onions, brown beans, spring wheat with undersown grass. That would give me like 6 years of troublefree farming if I can use only my Carrier XL for cultivation.

Why does the Tillerstar not get good reviews with much stones? Is it because it cant bury the stones deep enough or is it something else?

I live in south east Sweden on the island just of the coast. We get a bit of frost each year but usually its not extremely cold during winter.

 

[Colin]

It doesn't get good reports for potatoes but that is seperating up to 300mm it maybe ok as a stone burier on a whole field basis. But if you got a wet harvest you'd probably get some mixing and have to do it again. The only crop on your list that really needs proper destoning are the onions, the rest you could maybe cope with just rolling to push stones down so as not to cause problems. What area of onions are you doing? A cheap destoner would be £10000 here maybe.

 

[Theswede]

It doesn't get good reports for potatoes but that is seperating up to 300mm it maybe ok as a stone burier on a whole field basis. But if you got a wet harvest you'd probably get some mixing and have to do it again. The only crop on your list that really needs proper destoning are the onions, the rest you could maybe cope with just rolling to push stones down so as not to cause problems. What area of onions are you doing? A cheap destoner would be £10000 here maybe.

Hopefully it could work for my needs then. It is not that many Tillerstars around is it?

You are right about the onions being the only crop needing destoning but it is just that we put alot of time and effort into stones each year and if this could work we would minimize that time! Rolling alone doesnt help much usually, only if I already have used the Stonebear. Of course there will be really wet years where I will have to plough instead of cultivating with the CXL but we usually have it really dry out here.

For the moment we will be doing around 30 ha a year.

 

[Theswede]

Anyone else with any info on the Tillerstar?

 

[Flat 10]

No sorry. But I can see that those stones would be an issue with onions!

 

[Norfolk Olly]

We used to run 2 triple bed machines on onions, gone back to destoning

 

[Theswede]

We used to run 2 triple bed machines on onions, gone back to destoning
View attachment 601194

Ok, why were you not satisfied with the Tillerstar?

 

[Tealo]

We rent our onion land out to someone using a moate and seems ok but the plant and crop in the heavier patches doesn't seem to do very well. Seems chemical residue is also an issue. They subsoil in front but can't do to much in front of the moate as it likes untouched land.

 

[Norfolk Olly]

Ok, why were you not satisfied with the Tillerstar?

the main factor is that we still had to run 6 destoners for potatoes and other veg, now we destone the majority of the onion land through the winter. Also they struggle with land that is heavy or has a high stone content in my experience, a good concept on certain soil types and conditions but not as adaptable as a destoner