Robotic milking

yin ewe

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Co Antrim
What happens in the event of a power cut or routine line work by the electric company? Does anyone install backup gennies?

Normally hire a gennie for routine work and have got away fairly well with breakdowns as it's never off too long. Big storms on a Saturday brings me out in a cold sweat, could be a long wait until Monday morning.
 
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Scholsey

Member
Location
Herefordshire
Just a pto genny here, no issues with a4s but apparently a5s are picky on backup power

my m2s are always alarming due to power fluctuations in bad weather, especially if a section of the grid gets knocked off guess it causes a voltage drop, if the a5s are bad aswell must be the actuator controllers that are senstive. Not got a gene here but got 3 numbers I could ring and switch gear ready to wire one in, 6-7k for a electric big governed 100kva gene seems steep considering I not used one for the 5.5 years we been going in new set up.
 

TheRanger

Member
Location
SW Scotland
my m2s are always alarming due to power fluctuations in bad weather, especially if a section of the grid gets knocked off guess it causes a voltage drop, if the a5s are bad aswell must be the actuator controllers that are senstive. Not got a gene here but got 3 numbers I could ring and switch gear ready to wire one in, 6-7k for a electric big governed 100kva gene seems steep considering I not used one for the 5.5 years we been going in new set up.
100A three phase PTO generator with regulator for £2000. Worth it for peace of mind? It would probably pay for itself after having to hire one in on short notice for a couple of weekends?
 

upnortheast

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Northumberland
100A three phase PTO generator with regulator for £2000. Worth it for peace of mind? It would probably pay for itself after having to hire one in on short notice for a couple of weekends?
Got our diesel one 15 years ago as the bottling plant needed 3 pH to run pasteruiser and seperator. Since we got a 3ph supply 6 years ago the biggest issue is remembering to make sure the battery remains charged so it starts on the odd occasion when mains go down. Would probably replace it with a pto one when it needs replacing. - for the above reason.
 

Spear

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
North Devon
Invaluable when the phase converter dies. Always a bank holiday and when the power drops 7 or 8 times in a day.
Full auto start big enough to run house and farm. Was only £4500 new 7 yrs ago. Less than the wiring and switch gear needed to connect it.
 

keepherlit1#

Member
Livestock Farmer
Hi, new to forum.Looking for informatiom/experience/advice of anyone who went down the secondhand robot route.Milking 50/60 cows and have a major decision to make on what way I farm going forward .Thanks.
 

nonemouse

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
North yorks
Yes, as the other two above have said, try to stretch the budget to two, will make start up easier and give spare capacity if you have a breakdown. Pick your brand of robot on what local dealer support you can get, and how well you get on with that dealer. All of the 3 major players in the robot market (lely fullwood Delaval) make robots that do the job fairly reliably.
 

Sid

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
South Molton
Yes, as the other two above have said, try to stretch the budget to two, will make start up easier and give spare capacity if you have a breakdown. Pick your brand of robot on what local dealer support you can get, and how well you get on with that dealer. All of the 3 major players in the robot market (lely fullwood Delaval) make robots that do the job fairly reliably.
Most 🙊 robots milk cows.

Back up/servicing is key
 

Rossymons

Member
Location
Cornwall
Had a very interesting discussion with someone earlier today about cow visits, milking permissions, refusals etc or as they called it "robot aggression". Now there will be some farms where more human interaction occurs than others - this could be cows over fed, building design or whatever else.

But every herd will have certain cows that get higher milking visits, higher refusal rate, quicker entrance and exit times and less hesitation.

If there was a genetic link to this "aggressive" trait would it be something that breeders would be interested in along with other friendly traits such as milking speed, teat length and position?
 
sorry to interupt the flow.
I am wondering if anyone would hazard a guess as to the value- even as spares of my 2009 merlin 2. I missed the opportunity to get it sold in early 2020 and covid lockdowns didn't help much. ! I was wondering if it would sell as a start-up bot as i still have compressor, vac pump etc all still run. Not got the firmware but that can be got.. bot has been left on to keep damp out of electronics and was in good working order when we moved to my now not so shiney shed in oct 2019.
 

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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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