I had the pleasure of riding with a W WI custom operator yesterday planting corn with a new JD 16R30 1770NT.  This customer has our Dawn Rfx hydraulic row unit down pressure system running automatically using JD row unit gage wheel sensors, new JD monitor and our Dawn/640Labs I-pad ground hardness mapping and down force control system.

The 16 row planter was divided into 5 or 6 control groups. With one row sensor controlling 3 or 4 adjacent row units. Ground hardness was mapped on his I-pad and he used his JD monitor to check his margin.

This customer was custom planting corn on silage corn in a field which had widely varying soil conditions from loose blow sand to the hard clay common in this area. The owner had used a Turbotill around the perimeter of the field, there was a strip of a recently sprayed rye cover crop across the field, etc.  

There were places where half of the planter was going through some no till corn stalks while the other half was going through loose recently Turbo tilled headlands....

Riding in the tractor cab with this customer, I had the same feeling I had many years ago riding through a fairly uniform looking IL soybean field with the first combine yield monitor Steve Faivre and I developed in the early 90's and for the first time really seeing/measuring yield variations in a row and field.  This is a new day in planting. Once you can measure the variations you can adapt to them leading to better productivity.

Yesterday, the variation in row unit downforce between the different row unit groups to maintain the same margin force on the row unit depth stops (and maintain constant seed depth) was amazing, even when the whole planter appeared to be in uniform conditions!

As a long time planter row cleaner person, I was amazed at how this customers floating row cleaners never appeared to actually float! 

Remembering a S MN customer and New Ag Talk poster who has fields with peat on one end and hard clay on the other, I recalled there was no one row unit down force setting which was appropriate for both ends of each pass. And the change in optimum downforce often occurs so quickly that there is no way a slow acting compressible air system can possibly adjust fast enough, even planting relatively slowly at 4 to 5 mph as we were.

Not the picture below where we went across a red sandy knob then back to clay as well as in and out of Turbotilled ground to no till to a cover crop...

In the peat to clay field I recall how the row unit gage wheels would sink into the peat 3 or 4" at one end of the field and almost zero at the hard clay end of the field. This inconsistent row unit "sink in" depth across a field is probably the main reason we have seen benefits to "floating" type row cleaners.

Conversely, as I saw yesterday, If we can quickly and automatically adjust planter row unit to maintain a near constant margin force on the gage wheel depth stops, planter sink in is almost a constant and floating a row cleaner becomes less important. There may in fact be better seed depth uniformity from using a fixed row cleaner, back close to the gage wheels, if we can keep the planter row unit at constant depth relative to the soil surface.

Reading other recent posts on this Crop Talk page, I can see that this automatic hydraulic control may have helped corn planting in many cases this spring.

This customer also mounted a pressure gage, visible from the tractor cab, on each control group to visually see the difference in row unit down force across the width of the planter.  As we planted I watch  his gages and it was amazing to see the differences in down force required across the planter to maintain at least 50 lb of margin on the depth stops. There were places where there was a 4 to 1 difference across the width!  100 lb on some rows and close to 400 lb on others.

Note in the pictures below the suitcase weights on the wings. The JD monitor was quick to point out that we needed weight on the wings, in addition to the markers, if we were going to be able to maintain the desired margin on the outer row units.

The I-pad display is setup so that red color indicates higher hydraulic pressures and harder ground. In the one pic you will see a red area in a line. This turned out to be a combine or grain cart path in an untilled/no till area of the field!

What also comes to mind is that if we are seeing this degree of variation and downforce requirement in this field at 4-1/2-5 mph, in order to use the high speed capability of the new generation of seed metering units, a quick acting automatic row unit down force control system is going to be essential EVEN in highly worked ground. Soil type changes in highly worked ground seem to cause as dramatic a change in downforce to maintain a constant margin as changes in tillage.

Sorry to go on so long but I find this very exciting and applaud the work done by Joe, Rodney and their team to get this system into production.

I admit to being somewhat skeptical of the need for a lot of groups or row by row control,,, thinking whole planter would be sufficient. It doesn't take too long riding in the cab of a working system to see the need for multiple control zones across the width of wider planters, even this 16 row.  As this system matures, I am sure this customer will be going to row by row, especially in his custom planting where every field may be different.

I think this is a new day in planting technology, and one with potentially large paybacks and quick ROI for many customers. As Dr Fred Below of the U of IL discussed at the last NNTC, in order to hit 300 bu you need every seed to count.

Uniform seed depth leads to uniform emergence and higher yields. Row unit down force appropriate for the exact spot being planted is a big help in achieving uniform seed depths and is probably even more critical at higher forward planter speeds.

Here are some pictures from yesterday. Rather than explain each one ask if you have any questions.

Jim at Dawn

The unit with the red box in pic B is the control unit for the 3 or 4 unit group. It is adjusting down pressure on the go based on a signal from the standard JD row unit gage wheel sensor intercepted from the Canbus system.

btw the unplanted area in picture E was just that. This customer had made a pass around the outside of the field with markers then came back and laid out a new A-B line with auto steer for the first time in this field.  He came back and filled in the open area using swath control shutoffs. Still seems amazing you can plant 2 or 3 missing rows with a 16 row planter and not double plant.

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