Plough query

[neilw]

Can anyone offer any guidance as to why on the Kvernland website it says that only 135hp is needed for a 7 furrow semi mounted plough, but 261 is needed for a 6 furrow mounted. is this because one is trailed and one mounted, or is it something to do with minimum and maximum hp required?? I know (depending on soil type) 25 hp per furrow is the standard but it is quite a difference....!

[archbarch]

where did you get the 25hp/ furrow from? It can also depend on furrow width and body type. its said that slatted boards take less hp, they were designed for heavy clay soil, less surface area of the board equals less friction therefore easier to pull, however ive never seen them used on heavy soil.

I would say the semi mounted figure is wrong unless its very shallow, i havent visited the Kv website. Generally you do need more hp for a mounted plough

as a larger tractor is needed to handle the weight.

[neilw]

Im pretty sure the 25hp came from aprevious topic on here, could be wrong though...

here is a link to the specifications of the KV trailed...

http://www.kverneland.com/irj/go/km/docs/documents/Multimedia/grp/ien/pdf/kve/en/pbrb.pdf

[Murray]

7 furrow that the contractor runs cant be put on the 6830 because when we go to reverse it shes like to coupe the tractor, farm next to them runs a fendt 820 with a 6 furrow fully mounted they have her swung out to take 2 inch less than the 7 furrow and that fendt is seems to handle it but would never try it on the 68. bad enough swinging the 5 furrow out and she has 28 boards on it

[Eurodeere]

Fully mounted plough is heavy and needs a tractor heavy enough to lift it and turn it over while staying on it's own four wheels. A semi mounted plough leaves the majority of it's weight on terra firma when it turns over etc. Each furrow still only needs similar power to pull it.

Kverneland always stated 20 to 25 hp per furrow depending on soil type but that was when tractors were real and a horse power equaled a shire horse, now I have the impression a horsepower equals a shetland pony with the size of tractos people buy and the implements they connect to them!

[Simon]

I imagine it has something to do with draught as well, a semi mounted plough is very easy to control, set the depth / transport wheel on the back and you're off.... fully mounted ploughs just take a bit more pulling.... I found ploughing with a semi-mounted plough to be ridiculously easy, no worrying about maintaining your depths or tweaking the draught control, just set it up at the start of the field and keep going....

[MODELFARMER]

I imagine it has something to do with draught as well, a semi mounted plough is very easy to control, set the depth / transport wheel on the back and you're off.... fully mounted ploughs just take a bit more pulling.... I found ploughing with a semi-mounted plough to be ridiculously easy, no worrying about maintaining your depths or tweaking the draught control, just set it up at the start of the field and keep going....

you do realise there is a depth wheel on a mounted plough?? so actually when in the ground there is no difference between mounted an semi i'd assume?

About the horsepower statement, I run me 6930 deere with the 4 furrow 14inch Kv mounted, our 6420s works the same plough,

I'd like a 5 furrow, now, going by horsepower ratings is impossible, my 6930 runs around 185hp so in theory at 25 hp per furrow I could pull a 7 furrow, HA HA NOT A BL00$Y MISSION!!!

on flat level MAYBE, what about that puddle or that sticky clay headland?? never a chance, I could make my 69 220 horsepower with a chip but that will not give me the grip needed to actualy put the power to the ground,

Really i'd need rear wheel weights like whats on bigger fendts to make the tractor preform as what her horsepower will let it!

At the minute i think a 5 furrow vari width would be nice but then me 64 is rulled out as the weight would leave it unsafe but still at 120 hp standard (now chipped to 140) anymore than 4 furrows would be silly on the back of it.

Horsepower of a tractor just does not multiply into grip and balence like it used to say in the 80's or early 90's.

[schw84]

Well I know a guy who ploughs with a 7 furrow vari-width Kvernland with an MF8480. It struggles some times to pull it when shes opened up, but the vari box on the MF makes pulling easy. Only problem was this year he snapped the plough in half as the tractor just kept pulling. The Hp all depends on the soil. We pull 5 furrows behind 150hp wheeled tractor and that struggles sometimes, other times you can be doing 8mph (that also is not recommended)

[Murray]

We fill the 6830s back tyres with water if the 5 furr is swung out it gives alot more grip but still being cought out in a wet patch with tyres fill of water, i bet thats fun getting out, as ricky says wheel weights would be the job

[ploughmaster]

I think that a lot of the problem is the increasing prevalent lack of knowledge of tyres and traction, and the basic principles of weight transfer.  Years ago, most farmers, managers and tractor drivers seemed to understand these things (often without realising it - it just came naturally).  Nowadays, all that most people think about is power. 

Wider tyres don't really help with grip, whilst you get a greater area in contact with the soil, the weight is too spread out to allow the friction between soil and tyre to resist the torque.  Setting the correct tyre pressure and some extra weight will help, and water ballast is more effective than adding scrap iron to the tractor (but isn't as easy to remove when you want the tractor for a lighter job - it also needs filling with a calcium chloride solution to stop it freezing, which then creates a potential pollution problem when you take it out or get a leak!).

With mounted equipment, you also need to understand the basics of weight transfer; the rear wheels are the pivot point between the plough and the tractor; as the tractor takes the weight of the plough as the draft control works, it effectively transfers weight from the front of the tractor onto the rear wheels.  A relatively small amount of extra weight on the front can make a lot of difference.  In most circumstances, there is very little point adding extra weight to the rear wheels when using fully mounted equipment.

Semi-mounted and trailed equipment doesn't give this weight transfer effect, so you have to take a different approach, and for these you need to add weight to the rear as well as to the front.

Correctly tyred, with the right pressure for the weight on them, and the tractor correctly ballasted, a 150hp two wheel drive tractor will be capable of pulling the same draft as a 150hp four wheel drive! (NIAE at Silsoe proved this very effectively in the early 80's). 

To go back to the original question; the 135hp for the 7 furrow semi mounted sounds perfectly reasonable, but the 261 for the 6 furrow mounted sounds rather high, and I would think (as has already been suggested) that it is a case of needing a heavier tractor to safely control the weight of the plough (and the need for greater lift capacity).

Depending on the soil type, conditions and ploughing depth, I would normally expect to see 6 furrows on a 150hp tractor.  Bigger tractors often don't pull more in proportion to the extra power because with the bigger machine comes extra weight, which takes horsepower to move it around (eg. I have seen estimates that a Quadtrac 535 uses around 150hp just to move itself about, without doing any work!!).  Interestingly, the furrow width has quite a small influence by comparison to the number of furrows - i.e. in the same soil at the same depth, 6 x 14" furrows will take less pulling than 7 x 12" furrows.

I don't know if LANTRA still do the 'Tyres and Traction' training courses, but they are very well worth doing if you have the opportunity.  I did one about 20 years ago, given by Martin McAllister who was one of those involved in the research done at Silsoe in the late 70's/early 80's, so it was all from the 'horses mouth' as it were. The principles are still the same.

[Simon]

you do realise there is a depth wheel on a mounted plough?? so actually when in the ground there is no difference between mounted an semi i'd assume?

About the horsepower statement, I run me 6930 deere with the 4 furrow 14inch Kv mounted, our 6420s works the same plough,

I'd like a 5 furrow, now, going by horsepower ratings is impossible, my 6930 runs around 185hp so in theory at 25 hp per furrow I could pull a 7 furrow, HA HA NOT A BL00$Y MISSION!!!

on flat level MAYBE, what about that puddle or that sticky clay headland?? never a chance, I could make my 69 220 horsepower with a chip but that will not give me the grip needed to actualy put the power to the ground,

Really i'd need rear wheel weights like whats on bigger fendts to make the tractor preform as what her horsepower will let it!

At the minute i think a 5 furrow vari width would be nice but then me 64 is rulled out as the weight would leave it unsafe but still at 120 hp standard (now chipped to 140) anymore than 4 furrows would be silly on the back of it.

Horsepower of a tractor just does not multiply into grip and balence like it used to say in the 80's or early 90's.

Thanks Ricky....   

No, what I meant was that on a SM the transport wheel mounted to the rear is wider and mounted such that the furrows are suspended from the beam, effectively negating any effects of draught from the rear of the plough on the tractor.... on a mounted plough, many depth wheels are on the side of the beam [although there are also plenty with it mounted on the end of the beam too..] but they do less to override the effects of draught on the tractor...

Just a theory of course.... 

[ploughmaster]

...on a mounted plough, many depth wheels are on the side of the beam [although there are also plenty with it mounted on the end of the beam too..] but they do less to override the effects of draught on the tractor...

Just a theory of course.... 

Which is of course how draft control works - transferring weight from the implement on to the rear wheels of the tractor and an equivalent amount from the front of the tractor to maintain grip and traction.

If you let all the weight down onto the depth wheel, it becomes a deadweight pull and you don't get the grip.  You can hold the weight on the tractor quite effectively no matter where the wheel is mounted.

And of course, correctly set up, the tractor should normally take most of the weight of a fully mounted plough, with the depth wheel only working to hold the plough out to the set depth. If you put all the weight down on the wheel, the draft control will not work as effectively (it will have to move the arms further to take the weight off the plough and transfer it to the tractor rear wheels) so you don't get the extra grip, and you will probably have to use a bigger, heavier tractor to compensate (which is in fact what a great many farms are doing  ). Hence why the first farm I worked on 30 years  ago used a 146hp tractor on a 6 furrow reversible plough, but you now see most 6 furrow ploughs on a 200 -300hp monstrosity!

[Eurodeere]

Good points here made by many people. A semi mounted plough should be pulled by a tractor with lower link sensing, that way you will get draft control. A 6930 at 185 hp will not pull a 7 furrow plough but years ago I knew of a 4450 (160 hp) that would pull a 7 furrow vari width plough on heavy clay and up some slopes many people questioned growing crops on, as I said I think the power of the horse has decreased.

[Murray]

Good points here made by many people. A semi mounted plough should be pulled by a tractor with lower link sensing, that way you will get draft control. A 6930 at 185 hp will not pull a 7 furrow plough but years ago I knew of a 4450 (160 hp) that would pull a 7 furrow vari width plough on heavy clay and up some slopes many people questioned growing crops on, as I said I think the power of the horse has decreased.

6930 will pull a 7 furrow plough, as the contractor has put the 6830 on his 7 furrow many a time, she just struggles to reverse it because the plough is like to through the tractor over on her side!

[nashmach]

6930 will pull a 7 furrow plough, as the contractor has put the 6830 on his 7 furrow many a time, she just struggles to reverse it because the plough is like to through the tractor over on her side!

What kind of soil though - there is a big difference between sand and heavy clay!

[Murray]

What kind of soil though - there is a big difference between sand and heavy clay!

stone/clay. theres only a few farms with decent ground round here thats a pleasure to plough

[flash 600]

it has alot to with soil types a lot of our land is heavy we have the two 7sod kevs on the 936 fendts and they can struggle at times we have a farm taken near the coast light sandy soil and you can pull it with 160hp deutz so condtions has a lot to do with it our neighbour runs a kev 5 sod fully mounted on a jd 8400 and  it can lift the front of the 8400 the weight of it is unreal alot heavier than our own

[MODELFARMER]

Good points here made by many people. A semi mounted plough should be pulled by a tractor with lower link sensing, that way you will get draft control. A 6930 at 185 hp will not pull a 7 furrow plough but years ago I knew of a 4450 (160 hp) that would pull a 7 furrow vari width plough on heavy clay and up some slopes many people questioned growing crops on, as I said I think the power of the horse has decreased.

Its not the power thats a problem, it getting the power transfered to the ground, i think would be my poblem with a bigger plough, maybe a 4 furrow variwidth then i can open it up on easy soil and shut it down when pulling is a problem, will take pics tomorrow of what type of groung i'm working on, sometimes i envy gav he gets to work nice stuff 

[MODELFARMER]

I had a wee problem on saturday afternoon, and of course being a saturday dealers closed have to wait to get new part tomorrow

I set her down and caught a rock in the verge on the headland . . . .££££££..... oops

[Murray]

oh nasty lad

[nashmach]

One new board so - lucky though the frog doesn't look bent.

Could have kept ploughing the one way?

[neilw]

at least it's sorted now mate!!! looked bad though..

[Murray]

at least it's sorted now mate!!! looked bad though..

thats nothing its when you knock 3 sets of boards of the 7 furr and get a huge stone wedged in her, thats bad  ;D

[MODELFARMER]

Thats why we have spring release not ridgid,

New board £108, Nitromors (spelling) to take off paint (our ground is gentle on wearing parts but boards can run dirty even with the slightest rust)

Ploughed 7 acres today in our best field next a river, used to flood once a year now banks built up silt is a brilliant thing for ground!!! Noticed more and more fert needed since flooding stopped, hmmmmm

That particular field is actually abrasive so ploughed it to shine the board, which it just about has, 14 acres to do tomorrow morning, thats our ploughin done, have a few contracts to the country to plough.

For example on our wearing parts the plough has done maybe 150 acres a year and only has had 4 sets of points, no other metal unless a broken part, and Touch wood, past 2 years shares were breaking alot this year havn't broke one, , , , , Now having said that i'll take 12 spare for tomorrow ha ha!

[Light Land]

*Kverneland 12 furrow DA100

*Case 9350 (max hp 325)(14ton tractor)

*Ploughing shallow stoney silt soils with a gravel subsoil 12 inch wide 7inch furrows

Ploughing was a ask for the tractor,as it was unable to put the power to the ground.In very hard going the plough would ride up out of the ground or the tractor would start to pig root or spin the wheels.I don't think there is a wrong tractor and plough match,just what works for you.