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Driftless SW Wisconsin | Chad,
I was in the field with AS recently and at least the field we were in had NOT had a super coulter or any other tool in there. Frankly we were clearing a much better, cleaner path than you show in your picture.
I was with another customer in WI having trouble recently - terrible seed placement etc.
He was running 3 coulters first on a cart, one down the center one about 4-5" either side of the row. immediate attached was his planter with a JD single disc fertilizer coulter then our unit mounted trashwheels and Curvetines in the back.
I have never seen so many coulters on one machine in my life! This is is first season with 3-coulter cart ahead of his planter.
We were in very heavy wet clay with lots of bean abd 2 yr old corn stalks.
Allthose wavy coulters up front were just hairpinning and mixing all this residue into mud and we just could not pull it out with the Trashwheels. Finally we raised the 3-coulters out of the way so we were only using the JD single disc + our Trashwheels and the Curvetines.
The single disc fert coulter cut the residue without hairpinning or mixing up a residue/mud "soup".
The seed placement improved, there was a nice clean strip and the residue was between the rows not all mixed in just ahead of the planter.
All those aggressive wavy coulter devices just ahead of the planter may serve a useful purpose in some soils and moisture levels. however in heavy residue and heavy wet soils I think they are making life more difficult than it needs to be. They were bring up mud that was better off left untouched where it was. The driest, fittest soil you have in these conditions is on the surface, why bury it or mix it with mud and residue???
Please take a look at Marc's strips. There is another customer on the east side of the same town as Marc just south of you who is running an 8-row Pluribus also. Please check with AS. I do not think he uses a super coulter. He has some very high residue levels.
The fall super coulter I am thinking of is in the Groton area with a different 20" customer. The customer I am thinking of runs his in cornstalks in the fall, not ahead of planting in the spring, as I recall. We have worked with him for years. He has the same 2003 setup you do.
How about ou try a small field doing nothing ahead of the planter - just plant - and see how it comes out.
The 23-24" toolbar height is about what I expected from your parallel link photo. The 300 number - is that pounds of down pressure ( I hope!) and not 300 psi of air pressure. 300 lb of down pressure sounds about right. It is also taking every bit of weight on that planter. I am glad to here it is level across its width.
Harvesting 20" beans that have been notilled between 20" cornstalks with a cutting platform (with a std 3" knife system!!!) generally takes care of much corn residue when it runs thru the combine chopper IF you leave much of the corn stalk standing after corn harvest. Here again the whole thing is a SYSTEM. If you somehow leave most of the stalks on the ground it forms an insulating mat and may not break down for a long, long time also leaves more mud underneath. Your comment about "residue coming up like a mat" sounds like that scenario.
Gearge Rehm at the Univ of MN has done a lot of fertilizer work. He says his research has shown that you can often cut fertilizer by more than 1/3 if it is placed in a band or strip where and when the plant needs it.
I would try to clear the strip better if you can. I'll post some photos I took with AS recently. They are on a different computer.
Regards,
Jim at Dawn
Edited by Jim 5/8/2006 03:00
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Anyone here run planters on Bauer Bars??? Jim you may want to jump in here as well......
