Robotic milking

[Chips]

Had a tenth lactation cow calve today and when I tried to milk her the robot would not even attempt to attach even though the cups where below the teat ends so after numerous goes I thought here goes , a chance to see how manaual attach works on a fresh calved cow ,as the one I tried on before was mid lactation and teat coordinents already stored . So I guided the arm in with the keypad and pressed start conection , then slid collar up as soon as vacuum pump started and then manaualy connected the cups , this time however it kept scanning while milking for a while and then reverted to the arrow key screen but kept milking , the yield kept going up in the top of the screen but there was nothing against each quarter , because of this you cannot switch the air back on or remove any cups until all four quarters have finished milking , then as soon as I turned air back on it took all four cups off as it thinks it's just waiting for you to press start connection , so I did press it thinking it may now find the teats having let her milk out and at least they would be stored for next time , it did manage to conect to one ,but the cow was getting annoyed now so I just succeeded the milking and the robot sprayed her let her out and put her milk in an empty bucket , Bingo , Brilliant, far better than having to get a portable milker out and wash it all out and although I may have to reset teat coordinents at the next milking if they are a bit far out at least it recorded the milking and seperated her milk and most of all soooo easy

As an aside I see the old BFF is up and running , unfortunetly it will not allow my email address even though it's exactly the same as before when I registered all those years ago , somebody has started a robot thread on there , maybe somebody who is allowed to register should leave a post redirecting them to here or asking if the two sites could be merged , it will be such a shame if we all get split up due to not having the right email addresses . One good thing about the crash is it has reduced the robot threads down to one non brand specific thread , when we had four threads I felt a lot of info was lost when certain threads stopped getting updated and slipped off the first couple of pages , when someone new came along they would probably never discover the older threads

 

[newholland]

Hi chips,

I can log into the old BFF site with old user name and a free email address????!!!!.

One site and one thread is a good idea. Are you and happy cows staying here? or you moving back again?
I put a thread on BFF exactly the same as this one to try and help keep track of where people were / are ?
You decide - you started the original robot thread, so go for it and I will delete this one if needed?

 

[jimmer]

dont know how to put a link but there is a good video on you tube and the song is addictive . very well made video with a nice feel to it.
its called lely lets play

 

[newholland]

It's interesting that this new TFF site seems to have robot people from all round the world posting very quickly - where as BFF must have been much more harsh on who was actualy allowed to join and stopped a lot of users from over the water from passing on information?

Is it better to have information from all around the world - eg this site here?
or a strict, closely regulated thread on the old BFF which makes it difficult for other people ?

I am going to redo my cow pow feeder thread anyhow!. Maybe some big company somewhere did not like people sharing information and closed BFF down?

 

[jimmer]

they must have had a very traumatic experience with their robots to put a ONE SIDED HERRING BONE in

 

[Chips]

Hi chips,

I can log into the old BFF site with old user name and a free email address????!!!!.

One site and one thread is a good idea. Are you and happy cows staying here? or you moving back again?
I put a thread on BFF exactly the same as this one to try and help keep track of where people were / are ?
You decide - you started the original robot thread, so go for it and I will delete this one if needed?

I'll stay here as it says my email address is banned over there , is this because it's a free one or is it me that's banned ??
Edit:
Just retried with a Gmail address instead of a live.co.uk and it worked so anyone struggling with hotmail could try Gmail , authorised it really quick too , real shame to be split into two forums though

 

[jimmer]

i have registered on both with free email adresses after years of getting no luck trying to join bff

 

[happycows]

I'll stay here as it says my email address is banned over there , is this because it's a free one or is it me that's banned ??
Edit:
Just retried with a Gmail address instead of a live.co.uk and it worked so anyone struggling with hotmail could try Gmail , authorised it really quick too , real shame to be split into two forums though

well i have just tried registering on the old bff again. they wouldn't accept me for love nor money a few days ago. they have let me in without a bat of a eyelid now!! that was on a hotmail.com email address. I really like the layout on this forum and i do think clive will keep it on the ball.

 

[Hillbilly]

anybody know how to shut lely wash between cows milking . I'm in a cold barn -20 would like to cut down on the water on the ropes. Use to be able to do it but an update from lely took this option out ,if I could do every 5cows it would help.

 

[Great In Grass]

Called on a farm today, 4 new Lely Astronaut A4's going in and should be up and running by August. He's quite close to me so will try and get some pictures as things progress.

 

[RWSF]

anybody know how to shut lely wash between cows milking . I'm in a cold barn -20 would like to cut down on the water on the ropes. Use to be able to do it but an update from lely took this option out ,if I could do every 5cows it would help.

Depending what version of t4c you may have, Try to go to Data entry, Settings, Milking, Post milking, and under clean milk equipment you should be able to change the wash to "non". I have not actually done this but it should work. One warning is that this could cause mastitis to transfer from cow to cow but if cows are failing then that causes problems also.

 

[RWSF]

Another option to try would be to melt all of he ice off of the strings with hot water then smear some petroleum jelly (ie. vaseline) on the ropes to help shed some of the water this seems like it helps some. Let us know how it works for you in such cold temps as we are not that cold here.

 

[beefyfarmer]

Just a shame that all that archive material is gone (?)

The old material is here
http://web.archive.org/web/20130115233015/http://farmingforum.co.uk/forums/index.php

 

[Hillbilly]

I've used vaseline it helps but still freezes up.I'll try changing settings to see if that works. Were sitting at -4 tonight so freezing isn't a problem write now. Wondering what people out there are paying for maintence costs on the robots?

 

[RWSF]

Sorry to hear that it didn't help. One other thing that I have done on the A3 was to hang some white plastic paneling on the entry and exit gate with plastic wire ties. (basically completely enclose the whole robot when the gates are shut). This really helps hold in the heat in the robot room. I have also done this on the A4 but not as simple to do.

 

[Peter]

Depending what version of t4c you may have, Try to go to Data entry, Settings, Milking, Post milking, and under clean milk equipment you should be able to change the wash to "non". I have not actually done this but it should work. One warning is that this could cause mastitis to transfer from cow to cow but if cows are failing then that causes problems also.

Yes, this works. We found it and were going to try just when you posted. Does do a cup rinse after each cow, but without the extra pull away from the jetters and water sprayed on the outside of the cups. Should help big time in the cold. Hopefully can wait till next winter to put into use.

One of my customers startup from a couple of years ago. She is a big girl.

 

[AWJ26]

Frozen ACR ropes and "Enviroment too cold" alarm already tonight, better now than 3am i suppose. Hopefully vaseline on the ropes and a sheet of parlour board on the outside of the box should do the trick. Glad we have some friends from across the pond to share some tips about dealing with some proper cold weather, not our slightly chilly british weather!

 

[Hillbilly]

Frozen ACR ropes and "Enviroment too cold" alarm already tonight, better now than 3am i suppose. Hopefully vaseline on the ropes and a sheet of parlour board on the outside of the box should do the trick. Glad we have some friends from across the pond to share some tips about dealing with some proper cold weather, not our slightly chilly british weather!

 

[Hillbilly]

I here ya I'm in he U K for another week and glad I bruoght my winter coat. !!! In Hampshire county now heading to Warick by weekend

 

[Foot Doc]

Anyone having problems getting heifers or cows to stand still in a robot check out our website www.soshoofcare.com on NZ Cow Pacifiers. Sold one last week to a farmer who put robots in a few months ago and was having some problems getting heifers to stand still while robotic arm attached cups. Used pacifier and cups went on right away. Even give a 7 day money -back-if-not-happy guarantee!