Horsch Co4 with granulated fertilizer

[JDJ]

Had been missing the opportunity to place fertilizer especially when drilling spring barley. For 3 or 4 years we mixed seed and fert but it took a lot af time and often i was a problem to get the seed rate high enough. Quoted the danish Horsch dealer for a 4 meter Sprinter with fert but the price was way more than i wanted to spend on.

So i decide to upgrade my 2001 Co4.

Drill before we began:

Found a Kuhn front hopper at a local dealer, prew owner upgraded for the new model. I can take over 2000 kg of fertilizer, but normally we don't fill more than 1000-1200 kg in. The fan was driven by the front pto, but my 6930 don't have that,so it's driven by the 4th spool now.

Bracket for pipe, easy to take off.

Homemade bracket for Kuhn 20 port distributor. The red pipe is from an old grain mill.

Last year we used 6" GEN openers. This year we change to the new 4" model because we have at lot of stones.

 

[JDJ]

Family photo

Added some extra xenon light on the front hopper, so now i can see what i run over in the dark.

The controls. Got so tired of the Accord computer jumping in tramlines when drilling headlands so added a littel switch to put it in "manual"

Drilling cover crops (Terragold Mix)

Thats all for now. Will post this years mods later on.

Jacob

 

[JDJ]

Wheat drilled with 6" GEN, 1 September, photo taken mid October.

This year with 4" GEN 400:
Spring barley Quench 275 plants /m2 drilled mid march on light soil, photo taken 7 april.
There was mustard as covercrop after spring barley.
81 kg N in pig manure injected a week before drilling and 26 kg N placed at drilling. 107 kg nitrogen in total that's all we are allowed to give spring barley on light soil here in Denmark.

 

[marco]

What kind of prices are the 6 inch and 4 inch boots?

 

[mad contractor 3]

Tidy job there,crops look well also, are you all relatively flat in Denmark

 

[Dockers]

Makes our Seedhawk look dead simple, Fert. down the front leg, seed down the rear leg.

K.I.S.S.

 

[benferg]

Nice work on the conversion did you have to buy different boots to handle the fert?

your points wouldn't last long here in our soils, like the look of yours!

 

[JDJ]

What kind of prices are the 6 inch and 4 inch boots?

Please ask @SorenIlsoe
Traded in the used 6" for the new 4" models.

Tidy job there,crops look well also, are you all relatively flat in Denmark

Thank you. All winter crops is locking good here in Denmark this year, the weather was almost too dry in the 2013 season. So its a real pleasure compared to 11 and 12.
Denmark's highest point is 170 meters. In some areas (out west and south) is flat as pancake. Here we have 30 ha fields level within 1 meter, and 4 km away we have 5 ha fields that are 60 meters above sea in one end and 90 in the other.
The soil is very different around here:
First photo: Less than 5% clay.
Second photo: 60% clay
its the from the same 30 ha field.

And then we have rocks, and we have at lot of them. from basket ball size up to Morris mascot size. :-(

Jacob

 

[JDJ]

New GEN 400 : And they have passed the stone test

Always wanted a following harrow to level out the weelmarks from the drill on light soil. But the price for a new one:
So build one myself:

And for road transport:

Barley looking good: But i think i had too much speed on the fan since the 2 rows has become one band instead. Tried to lower fan speed on one field, but the longest of the tubes began to block.

 

[JDJ]

Update on the spring barley, pictures taken in week 25 while applying last fungicide ( prothioconazole, tebuconazole and epoxiconazole)
It's a has been too dry and the spring crops is suffering from this, we got some rain yesterday but not too much.
We will start to harvest winter barley in week 28.

 

[JDJ]

Spring beans, they are not wery tall but cannot figure out if it's because of lack of water or phosphate



In this one pass I turned off the pk fertiliser, they are a bit lower and the colour is a lot different irl.

 

[SorenIlsoe]

Spring beans, they are not wery tall but cannot figure out if it's because of lack of water or phosphate
View attachment 54568
View attachment 54569

In this one pass I turned off the pk fertiliser, they are a bit lower and the colour is a lot different irl.
View attachment 54570

The last picture looks very interesting! How much P&K was supplied in the field?
Has it received slurry the years before? How are the soil analyses in that field?
Could you take a sample of the treated and untreated in harvest to be analysed for protein level, because this would be interesting as P is very important for protein production.
Regards Soren

 

[JDJ]

The last picture looks very interesting! How much P&K was supplied in the field?
Has it received slurry the years before? How are the soil analyses in that field?
Could you take a sample of the treated and untreated in harvest to be analysed for protein level, because this would be interesting as P is very important for protein production.
Regards Soren

Hi Søren yes its interesting, there was placed 250 kg PK 0-4-21 Mg,S,Cu, BB. So its properly less than recommend.

The field is had slurry in the last 8 years (its rented land)

The analyses:

RT : 5,7
PT: 5,8
KT: 11
MGt: 3,5
JB: 4

On our own land witch had slurry for 30-40 years the Pt is between 6-9


Jacob.

 

[SorenIlsoe]

That is very high values!
The question could therefore be: is it the micronutrients in the fertilizer that makes the difference???? Especially S?

 

[JDJ]

Yes but high numbers are very common in this area, there has been produced lot's of pigs for 2-3 generations.

Next year I'm planning to plant beans on some recently bought land with P numbers from 3-4, so maybe I need fertiliser with extra protection for next year?

 

[JDJ]

Went to drill 4 plots at the Danish optitill trails. Think my work was pretty good in the wery wet conditions. All the other machines was shiny and new and with 2-3 people from their sales rep to show ther best and try to get some drills sold. And from a visual view some of them definitely did a lot worse than me.
And then there was me and my 13 years old Co 4 put in the middle of it all to show that you don't need 300 hp and a expensive drill.
To be continued

 

[Kaad]

Looks good Jacob, I'm sorry that I couldn't be there today, but we are drilling 24/7 and we have to drill our own fields if the weather permits

Even though I'll be there to show the Mzuri I agree on the fact that many of the drill salesmen believe in very deep cultivation prior to drilling - is it really needed?

Hope to be participateing next year again

 

[SorenIlsoe]

Great Jakob!
I heard that you could drill in stead of Peder. Thats very fine, because I know you are an exellent farmer and very interested in what you are doing, and therefore you do the job well.
Nice to see the trials and how the old CO machine can do the same or better yields than these new tech drills at +50k £........

 

[Case man]

Family photo
View attachment 40293
Added some extra xenon light on the front hopper, so now i can see what i run over in the dark.
View attachment 40294
View attachment 40295
The controls. Got so tired of the Accord computer jumping in tramlines when drilling headlands so added a littel switch to put it in "manual"
View attachment 40296

Drilling cover crops (Terragold Mix)
View attachment 40313
View attachment 40314

Thats all for now. Will post this years mods later on.

Jacob

Do you do headlands first or last with that drill?

 

[JDJ]

Do you do headlands first or last with that drill?

Do them last normal, I use the gps to mark where to lift the drill so it's easy to do it accurate.