Self propelled air seeder | PowerTrak uses power from the tractor’s P.T.O. and transfers it to the drive tracks on the cart
Most farmers would scoff at the idea of a 1,000 bushel air cart pulling their tractor and 80-foot drill out of the mud.
But not Jeremy Hughes.
Hughes made history in a funny sort of way in late April while seeding in wet conditions near Estevan, Sask.
He was using a John Deere 9560R to pull a prototype 80 foot Sprinter drill and a 1,000 bushel prototype air cart called the Seed Wagon 1000, both from Horsch Anderson.
“I was seeding away, out in the field by myself. I drove into a slough and the tractor went down hard,” said Hughes, sales manager for Horsch Anderson.
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“I put it in forward and it just spun out. I put it in reverse and it just spun out again. So I’m stuck out there with this prototype rig … and all the engineers are in South Dakota.”
But Hughes had one thing going for him. The giant cart was mounted on big 36 inch x 88 inch tracks from Elmer’s Welding in Altona, Man. While Elmer sells only non-driven tracks, the Horsch Anderson engineers had fitted them with big, beefy hydraulic drive motors at the rear of the assembly.
Hughes had not yet used the new PowerTrak option, but this seemed the opportune time to give it a try. After all, prototypes are built to be broken. When the engineers see where it breaks, they make that part stronger.
“I put the tractor in neutral. I kicked in the p.t.o. to get the dedicated pump flowing and warmed up. Then I put the PowerTrak into the reverse mode,” he said.
“There’s a boost function on the PowerTrak monitor in the cab. And that really makes this a short story. I pressed the button for boost and it pulled me back out of the mud hole. That’s all there was to it. That was the first time I’d tried the hydraulic drive and it worked just great. That’s what it’s there for.”
Hughes said the PowerTrak is not intended for full-time use, unless the field is muddy enough to merit it. The operator would normally run in the off position until he sees he’s going into a soft spot.
Then he activates the pump to get the flow up and punches the boost button. Thirty or 40 seconds later, he’s through the wet stuff and back into the normal seeding mode.
Hughes said the auxiliary pump is the same as what is used on Lexion combines. It transfers 250 horsepower to the rear hubs of the modified Elmers tracks. The two drive motors are the rotary style from Poclean. He said they are the same as those used on four wheel drive combines in Europe.
While auxiliary hydraulic drive on trailers and carts has been available in military and industrial applications, Hughes believes this is the first time it has been tried on a North American agricultural trailer.
He said the concept is simple. If you’re down and stuck in mud, you don’t need all your tractor power to run your drill. If you harness that extra power with a big auxiliary pump and transfer it back to the drive tracks on the cart, you can use it to pull all three implements out of the mud.
“But that’s not what the engineers had in mind. The way it’s really supposed to be used is to keep you from getting stuck in the first place,” Hughes said.
“If you’re seeding around a pothole or you see a soft spot coming, that’s when you engage the PowerTrak. The idea is that, with the rubber tracks providing some push, it will keep you going without getting stuck. Now think about this. How much time will that save you in a really wet spring. I think the answer is lots.”
Farmers who have seen the prototype Seed Wagon with PowerTrak speculate that installing drive on the cart will make the entire rig push out in the turn.
“I can understand the concern, but we have never experienced it, even making big arc turns around potholes or tight turns in the headlands.”
Hughes said one of the features that makes the PowerTrak work so well is the control box that lets the operator dial up the pressure he needs. He said the operator can feel from the seat of his pants when he has the right amount of pushing power.
Because of the weight of a 1,000 bushel cart, engineers decided the Seed Wagon 1000 should be built only with tracks. They felt tires would be too risky.
Each of the four poly tanks are 250 bu. A smaller fifth tank can be added for canola or granular inoculant. Each tank is independently mounted with its own set of ISOBUS compliant scales, which can be viewed in the cab using the JD GS3 system.
“We did variable rate this spring with two products. We used the John Deere GS3 for that,” said Hughes.
All tanks can be variable rate, he added. The loading conveyor’s positioning and speed are controlled from the cab.
The wagon can be either tow-between or tow-behind. The air system can handle either single or double shoot.
Hughes said there is no definite price yet or target production date.
The drill Hughes was pulling that day in April was also a prototype, called the Sprinter. The design addresses one of the biggest drawbacks of independent parallel linkage drills: complex hydraulics.
“The prototype we’re working with is 80 feet wide. It has 80 openers, but they are managed by only 10 hydraulic cylinders so each cylinder controls eight openers. But each opener is still completely independent of the others,” he said.
“We have two cylinders and 16 openers on each wing. Each shank is mounted on a rock shaft connected to a bar. When we want more down force, we retract the cylinder and it pulls back on the bar and twists the rock shaft. It acts like a torsion bar and makes the opener engage with more pressure in the soil.”
Hughes said using a rock shaft with torsion mounted shanks eliminates most of the pivot points, bushings, grease points, wear pads, hoses, cylinders and pins. Sprinter uses oil filled bearings on the packer wheels and fertilizer bander blades.
“Other drills of this style can take three to four hours just for grease servicing alone. The Sprinter takes all of 15 to 20 minutes for grease service.”
In its current prototype form, the Sprinter has five folds and three ranks with front mounted fertilizer banders on 24 inch spacings. Shanks are on 12 inch spacing.
Sprinter is designed and built in Germany, originally for the Eastern European market. The prototype was shipped to the Horsch Anderson plant in South Dakota for testing on the northern Great Plains.
“We’ll have more units for testing next spring and possibly a small batch for the retail market.”
For more information, contact Hughes at 605-298-563 or visit www.horschanderson.com.
