illinifarmer1 - 10/31/2023 08:39

With all the talk about how a tandem disk compacts soil and high-speed disks and vertical till implements don't seems similar to the marketing pitch that was made when draper heads first became popular. Local farmer bought a Macdon platform and boosted that he leaves no soybeans in the field with it. Well, you can drive by his fields each fall and he has a nice cover crop of soybeans in them. Vertical tillage implements have more weight per blade than a tandem disk in order to get the blade to penetrate, how can they not compact the soil if they weigh a lot more, and each blade has more down pressure on it ?

Maggies - 10/31/2023 21:25

Increased angle does not penetrate more less angle does. The disk blade smearing ground at the bottom of the blade is what creates the compaction when the soil dries. Same theory as sidewall compaction with a corn planter. Tillage compaction is not from packing ground it’s from smearing sideways.

twraska - 11/2/2023 17:08



You’re wrong

Maggies - 11/2/2023 18:53



Ok please explain though, people will take you serious then.

twraska - 11/2/2023 19:18



Read the post from drester, he is correct.

Maggies - 11/2/2023 19:56



I don’t know if any agriculture disk that reverse the angle on the disk so the convex side is in the ground and is packing their fields? When construction companies want to pack ground around here they use a packer?

Not saying construction companies don’t have a disk like this maybe in your area they do but farmers don’t. On our excellerator vertical till disk you can adjust the gang angle from 5-1 degree. If you want to sink it the deepest you put it at 1 degree. Dragging a knife straight will penetrate easier that dragging it sideways. My 2 cents from personal experience with multiple different tillage tools and agronomy trials

twraska - 11/2/2023 20:36



Go look at a Rome disk. Secondly, I thought that a VT was not a disk.

DRester - 11/2/2023 20:49

I started running a tractor and pulling a disk on our family farm about 1952. Since then I have got a master's degree in Ag Engineering, passed the professional engineer's exam and spent about 15 years designing disks for a farm equipment manufacturer.

Disks with 26 - 36" dia. blades have a pretty deep concavity. You normally run 30 - 36" blades with a 25 - 30 degree cutting angle. If the angle is reduced to 10 - 15 degrees, you will be running on the convex or back side of the blade.

The photos show some of the disks my company designed.

DRester - 11/2/2023 21:23

I did not realize Kewanee was making disks with 36" blades. I would appreciate your posting some photos of your disk. You might want to check the concavity of the 36" blades and the cutting angle to see what I am talking about.

During the past 20 years some contractors have started using large power tillers to mix layers of soil and incorporate additives. They have also switched to large 4-wheel drive farm tractors to pull disks.

DRester - 11/2/2023 21:23

I did not realize Kewanne was making disks with 36" blades. I would appreciate your posting some photos of your disk. You might want to check the concavity of the 36" blades and the cutting angle to see what I am talking about.

During the past 20 years some contractors have started using large power tillers to mix layers of soil and incorporate additives. They have also switched to large 4-wheel drive farm tractors to pull disks.