Oh my lord

[SilliamWhale]

Should have bought a Claydon, you can replace all wearing parts with a lump hammer.... Add in two adjustable spanners and you could strip down and rebuild it!

He's probably got a chisel plough in the nettles!

 

[Green oak]

50k 4m any extra spec on it? Asked my local john Deere man for a quote but not come back yet.

 

[Simon Chiles]

I've only gone and done it, new 750a ordered this afternoon. Cannot wait to start experimenting.

BB

You'll be OK. I often say that to be successful at dd all you need is big bo**ocks. Anyone who gets his wife a thank you card and a passion fruit for valentines day very obviously has testicles the size of Jupiter!

 

[Niels]

Why isn't John Deere pushing sales of the 750A drill? Will it sell itself or don't Deere actually want to sell a lot?

 

[Shutesy]

Why isn't John Deere pushing sales of the 750A drill? Will it sell itself or don't Deere actually want to sell a lot?

I think @Clive had a good answer to this question a while back. Id guess its something to do with JD preferring to sell big tractors etc in the UK as theres still the demand and likely more money in it for them. 750A means smaller tractors and less of them if everyone went down that route?

 

[Niels]

Ah good it isn't just me believing in that conspiracy theory then

 

[Clive]

Ah good it isn't just me believing in that conspiracy theory then

I think is more than conspiracy theory - it's just good business for JD

they have been here and seen all this before in South American markets, seen what happens to tractor sales and profits as a result

However they also are smart enough to know that when the tide does envevutably turn that having a well established product is worth a lot of marketing

 

[Northdowns Martin]

Seems like a useful thread to ask the question, would I be a fool to purchase a JD 1590 grain drill? From what I can gather it is a 750a box drill instead of air delivery.

 

[moretimeforgolf]

Seems like a useful thread to ask the question, would I be a fool to purchase a JD 1590 grain drill? From what I can gather it is a 750a box drill instead of air delivery.

Just take the plunge Martin ....you know you want to!!

 

[Niels]

I think is more than conspiracy theory - it's just good business for JD

they have been here and seen all this before in South American markets, seen what happens to tractor sales and profits as a result

However they also are smart enough to know that when the tide does envevutably turn that having a well established product is worth a lot of marketing

Hasn't the same happened in North America? Or are we getting the impression everyone over there is no-tilling and strip till drilling and yet they don't?

JD have a full product range for the America's, Australia etc.. Russia if you like. Europe gets neglected as we are relatively small, highly specialised, very demanding as we want max. result on fewer acres. JD have the 750A and at Sima are showing a precision drill. Is it a sign of things to come? Must be. Look at New Holland, Agco etc.. they are all showing direct drills. Hopefully this fashion won't go down the wrong way. MF had a very very strong line up of drills back in their hey days. Hopefully they have some of the old drawings and reports left! Might come in handy.

 

[beardface]

Not quite sure how you add quotes on this, but @Niels having done a grain harvest in America id say it's all our impression and perception.
There's still a large amount of chisel plough style cultivation done in the main cereal growing area of the Midwest, be it rightly or wrongly. There's still a lot of big tractors too (and cheap £150,000 on conversion plus import costs for a quardtrac sound good?) around out there with 200 hp being the general size of yard tractor. Also most kit was minimum 8 metres plus, with only 3 of that folding .
Direct drilling and no-tilling seemed to be mainly based around forward thinking farmers in the south trying to farm themselves out of a distinct lack of water, or Northern farmers making use of widespread winter kill of grass weeds to sow into clean seedbeds post round up.
Weed resistance was a growing problem and cultivations ,sometimes up to 6 or 8 passes, were the main stay of weed control, a bit like harrowing for wicks etc. here in the 70's.
Machinery build quality was something I liked as was finishing tool design etc.
Was surprised by the large numbers of single disc John Deere drills over triple disc and also saw a few hoe type drills, but disc favoured moisture.
Straw harrows were a lot heavier built and seemed to do a good job too.
On a whole I was amazed at the lack of precision agriculture, i.e. Vari rate etc. used as they invented GPS. Seemed to be its only use was making straight lines with little overlap for the big equipment, even saw some on loaders .
On a whole made me proud at how advanced we are here in Britain and how quickly were taking on new technology, and IMHO I think we should concentrate more on designing and building reduced, direct, strip and no-till equipment aimed for our soils and climate rather than trying to use equipment designed for American climates. If anything canadian built stuff would be more of a stepping stone for us as they have far more rain and potentially wetter drilling conditions on a whole.
Just my observations and opinions

 

[Clive]

Not quite sure how you add quotes on this, but @Niels having done a grain harvest in America id say it's all our impression and perception.
There's still a large amount of chisel plough style cultivation done in the main cereal growing area of the Midwest, be it rightly or wrongly. There's still a lot of big tractors too (and cheap £150,000 on conversion plus import costs for a quardtrac sound good?) around out there with 200 hp being the general size of yard tractor. Also most kit was minimum 8 metres plus, with only 3 of that folding .
Direct drilling and no-tilling seemed to be mainly based around forward thinking farmers in the south trying to farm themselves out of a distinct lack of water, or Northern farmers making use of widespread winter kill of grass weeds to sow into clean seedbeds post round up.
Weed resistance was a growing problem and cultivations ,sometimes up to 6 or 8 passes, were the main stay of weed control, a bit like harrowing for wicks etc. here in the 70's.
Machinery build quality was something I liked as was finishing tool design etc.
Was surprised by the large numbers of single disc John Deere drills over triple disc and also saw a few hoe type drills, but disc favoured moisture.
Straw harrows were a lot heavier built and seemed to do a good job too.
On a whole I was amazed at the lack of precision agriculture, i.e. Vari rate etc. used as they invented GPS. Seemed to be its only use was making straight lines with little overlap for the big equipment, even saw some on loaders .
On a whole made me proud at how advanced we are here in Britain and how quickly were taking on new technology, and IMHO I think we should concentrate more on designing and building reduced, direct, strip and no-till equipment aimed for our soils and climate rather than trying to use equipment designed for American climates. If anything canadian built stuff would be more of a stepping stone for us as they have far more rain and potentially wetter drilling conditions on a whole.
Just my observations and opinions

Maybe the yanks have just seen past the fools gold that 99% of precision farming its ?

personally the only use of GPS that I can honestly say has had a positive return on my bottom line is driving in straight lines precise widths reducing overlap, and in some specific years VRA N, I've tried most things

 

[SilliamWhale]

Seems like a useful thread to ask the question, would I be a fool to purchase a JD 1590 grain drill? From what I can gather it is a 750a box drill instead of air delivery.

box drills are good. not so easy for small seeds though. USA import or EU?

 

[beardface]

Think there's only 3 real uses for it 1. RTK to reduce fuel, chemical and fert and get trams in the right place, 2. Vari seed rate (crops look far more even and consistent for it), 3. Vari rate fert (surely placing more in places that need it and less in areas that done must reduce tonnes used and inevitably cost?).

As for yield mapping think it's a waste of time, only takes mapping equipment to bugger up one year or a couple of extreme weather events to make it look like complete nonsense. Only farmer we cut for that used it was using it for making irrigation maps and seeing how water rates affected yield. So unless there's someway of yield mapping potatoes or veg then I can't see it being much use here. Also any farmer worth his salt knows the areas that produce more than others on his farm, and in our experience it's usually large variation in soil type. So a dig with a spade and soil testing would be far mor useful in this instance.

 

[Northdowns Martin]

no box drills is good. not so easy for small seeds though. USA import or EU?

US, small seed box fitted, obviously limited to 3m.

 

[SilliamWhale]

Not quite sure how you add quotes on this, but @Niels having done a grain harvest in America id say it's all our impression and perception.
There's still a large amount of chisel plough style cultivation done in the main cereal growing area of the Midwest, be it rightly or wrongly. There's still a lot of big tractors too (and cheap £150,000 on conversion plus import costs for a quardtrac sound good?) around out there with 200 hp being the general size of yard tractor. Also most kit was minimum 8 metres plus, with only 3 of that folding .
Direct drilling and no-tilling seemed to be mainly based around forward thinking farmers in the south trying to farm themselves out of a distinct lack of water, or Northern farmers making use of widespread winter kill of grass weeds to sow into clean seedbeds post round up.
Weed resistance was a growing problem and cultivations ,sometimes up to 6 or 8 passes, were the main stay of weed control, a bit like harrowing for wicks etc. here in the 70's.
Machinery build quality was something I liked as was finishing tool design etc.
Was surprised by the large numbers of single disc John Deere drills over triple disc and also saw a few hoe type drills, but disc favoured moisture.
Straw harrows were a lot heavier built and seemed to do a good job too.
On a whole I was amazed at the lack of precision agriculture, i.e. Vari rate etc. used as they invented GPS. Seemed to be its only use was making straight lines with little overlap for the big equipment, even saw some on loaders .
On a whole made me proud at how advanced we are here in Britain and how quickly were taking on new technology, and IMHO I think we should concentrate more on designing and building reduced, direct, strip and no-till equipment aimed for our soils and climate rather than trying to use equipment designed for American climates. If anything canadian built stuff would be more of a stepping stone for us as they have far more rain and potentially wetter drilling conditions on a whole.
Just my observations and opinions

I agree with all you say apart from the highlighted bit simply because I don't think it makes any difference where the machine is put together. I get more rain than a lot of UK farms and use a 750, its neither here nor there.

 

[SilliamWhale]

US, small seed box fitted, obviously limited to 3m.

Is it easy to empty? Mine isn't

 

[Niels]

Not quite sure how you add quotes on this, but @Niels having done a grain harvest in America id say it's all our impression and perception.
There's still a large amount of chisel plough style cultivation done in the main cereal growing area of the Midwest, be it rightly or wrongly. There's still a lot of big tractors too (and cheap £150,000 on conversion plus import costs for a quardtrac sound good?) around out there with 200 hp being the general size of yard tractor. Also most kit was minimum 8 metres plus, with only 3 of that folding .
Direct drilling and no-tilling seemed to be mainly based around forward thinking farmers in the south trying to farm themselves out of a distinct lack of water, or Northern farmers making use of widespread winter kill of grass weeds to sow into clean seedbeds post round up.
Weed resistance was a growing problem and cultivations ,sometimes up to 6 or 8 passes, were the main stay of weed control, a bit like harrowing for wicks etc. here in the 70's.
Machinery build quality was something I liked as was finishing tool design etc.
Was surprised by the large numbers of single disc John Deere drills over triple disc and also saw a few hoe type drills, but disc favoured moisture.
Straw harrows were a lot heavier built and seemed to do a good job too.
On a whole I was amazed at the lack of precision agriculture, i.e. Vari rate etc. used as they invented GPS. Seemed to be its only use was making straight lines with little overlap for the big equipment, even saw some on loaders .
On a whole made me proud at how advanced we are here in Britain and how quickly were taking on new technology, and IMHO I think we should concentrate more on designing and building reduced, direct, strip and no-till equipment aimed for our soils and climate rather than trying to use equipment designed for American climates. If anything canadian built stuff would be more of a stepping stone for us as they have far more rain and potentially wetter drilling conditions on a whole.
Just my observations and opinions

Aha so there is certainly some truth in it then! Especially chisel ploughs you can find lots of of Youtube as well. Have seen plenty of cultivators yes. Pretty much the same with the UK really. If you're on here and visit the right places you might think 75% is min tilled/direct drilled yet when you drive through the countryside nearly all is ploughed still very few covers and most winter cereals also ploughed for still.

I saw a graphic recently showing the amount of US farmers using precision ag is actually declining as they can gather lots of information (crop scans and yield maps) but no one there to tell them what to do. Exactly what is happening over here! I have worked for a farm that ran the first MF 36 combine with yield mapping in 1992. Also had yield monitors home made on their Reekie potato harvester and Riecam beet harvester. Collected lots of data, bought a vari rate fertiliser spreader and what happened? Nothing! It took ages to make VRA maps and no one knew exactly what to do. Spend ten fifteen years research the topic and decided to move on as it has costed them so much. They now run RTK on all tractors and auto shut off etc.. on sprayer, spreader, umbilical injector but that's it really.

On a side note, when you say straw harrows are build heavier you mean the frame? As Claydons use the exact same heavy Bourgault tine over here?

Ref. your quote issue: Just hit the reply button bottom right of every post and it auto quotes for you. Can use quote+ if you want more than one user.

 

[dug]

Not quite sure how you add quotes on this, but @Niels having done a grain harvest in America id say it's all our impression and perception.
There's still a large amount of chisel plough style cultivation done in the main cereal growing area of the Midwest, be it rightly or wrongly. There's still a lot of big tractors too (and cheap £150,000 on conversion plus import costs for a quardtrac sound good?) around out there with 200 hp being the general size of yard tractor. Also most kit was minimum 8 metres plus, with only 3 of that folding .
Direct drilling and no-tilling seemed to be mainly based around forward thinking farmers in the south trying to farm themselves out of a distinct lack of water, or Northern farmers making use of widespread winter kill of grass weeds to sow into clean seedbeds post round up.
Weed resistance was a growing problem and cultivations ,sometimes up to 6 or 8 passes, were the main stay of weed control, a bit like harrowing for wicks etc. here in the 70's.
Machinery build quality was something I liked as was finishing tool design etc.
Was surprised by the large numbers of single disc John Deere drills over triple disc and also saw a few hoe type drills, but disc favoured moisture.
Straw harrows were a lot heavier built and seemed to do a good job too.
On a whole I was amazed at the lack of precision agriculture, i.e. Vari rate etc. used as they invented GPS. Seemed to be its only use was making straight lines with little overlap for the big equipment, even saw some on loaders .
On a whole made me proud at how advanced we are here in Britain and how quickly were taking on new technology, and IMHO I think we should concentrate more on designing and building reduced, direct, strip and no-till equipment aimed for our soils and climate rather than trying to use equipment designed for American climates. If anything canadian built stuff would be more of a stepping stone for us as they have far more rain and potentially wetter drilling conditions on a whole.
Just my observations and opinions

Your sentiments are exactly what I saw over 4 harvests in late 90's. A very small number were using notill and quite a few more were using chem fallow then conventional seeding, bit that was generally all in Northern states.

 

[dug]

With regard to comments on precision ag, yield maps are very easy to obtain these days and cost nothing. They at least quantify the variability that many of us know we have in our crops. It perhaps is a piece of the puzzle if we want to search deeper and maybe try to rectify.

Agreed, for vra to be helpful the actual reasons for variability need to be known so the correct inputs can be varied..... And these reasons can change with each different year. So that needs a lot more expertise and specialised spreader, and probably in crop sensors to achieve which is difficult to justify unless a reasonable scale is involved.

But what do some of you people think of variability of soil pH, it's effect on crop production, and the need to try variable lime application?