6 READ-TIME
Practicality Drives New Farm Equipment Innovations
May 14, 2024
For decades, farmers have surrendered to the intoxicating lure of new paint. And why not? New equipment is exciting, and it seems like every year there are new bells and whistles intended to make farm work easier and more efficient.
But is farm equipment going the way of, say, smartphones, where improvement for improvement’s sake seems to guide some of those design decisions? John Greig doesn’t think so.
A senior technology editor with Glacier FarmMedia, Greig has been reporting on farm equipment and tech innovations for 25 years, so he has a good perspective on the arc of change over time. And while he sees the same things all of us do — increasing size, horsepower, automation — he notes that manufacturers are trying to solve problems farmers actually have, even if they don’t know they have them yet.
“A lot of change can meet resistance at first,” says Greig. “An early example is autosteer. You’d hear, ‘I don’t need that to steer my tractor!’ Then suddenly farmers realized that they were not quite as tired at the end of a day because they were not having to make minute decisions every few minutes.”
So, what are the auto-steer equivalents today? While attending Agritechnica in Hanover, Germany, last November, the world’s largest farm equipment show, Grieg noticed some trends that might interest Canadian farmers. Here are his observations.
John Deere 8R models have an EVT option where the Transmission has a generator that creates electric power.
BETTER NOT BIGGER
Manufacturers are rethinking how to get more out of large equipment without increasing the size. At Agritechnica, a prime example of this came from New Holland.
“The New Holland CR11 combine has an increased harvesting capacity without increasing the size of the machine,” says Greig. Clever redesign and engineering of the previous CR10 model has resulted in a harvester with higher horsepower and much greater capacity without making an already big machine even bigger and heavier.
Similarly, Greig says tractor manufacturers are developing higher horsepower machines that maintain the “footprint” of earlier models. He mentions Massey Ferguson’s 9S tractors, which, among other innovations, are lighter per horsepower than other large tractors.
There are a few reasons driving this effort among manufacturers to avoid increasing equipment size. Part of it comes down to the ability to efficiently move machines from one field to another on rural roads — there’s only so big they can get. But Greig says there is also a considered focus on minimizing soil compaction.
“You see tracks on more tractors now, which is one nod to compaction reduction,” he says. “Tire technology has come a long way, too. Your average radial tire is less compacting and inflation tech allows you to inflate your tires to run on the road and deflate them when in the field.”
SENSORS NEED TO MAKE SENSE
Greig noticed a real expansion of sensor use at Agritechnica. “The technology in tractors is expanding,” he says. “We’re in the early stages of data collection. There are field monitors, implement monitoring — there are screens everywhere, and that’s evolved to the proliferation of sensors. The good and the bad is that if one sensor goes, your tractor is just sitting there.”
The Canada display at Agritechnica in Hanover, Germany in 2023.
This could be the “cool new toy” but Greig thinks what stays and what goes in the world of sensors will come down to pure utility. If observation from the cab is as good as a sensor at detecting when an action needs to be taken, then why pay for a sensor? It comes down to adoption costs, he says. “Is the problem you’re solving worth the money you’re paying to solve it?”
ALTERNATIVE FUELS: WATCH THIS SPACE
“You see tracks on more tractors now, which is one nod to compaction reduction”,
JOHN GREIG, SENIOR TECHNOLOGY EDITOR, GLACIER FARMMEDIA
At Agritechnica, Greig saw a concerted effort from many manufacturers to build engines that run on something other than diesel, or at least in conjunction with diesel. Electric power, hydrogen, biodiesel — it’s all in the mix.
Just about every manufacturer has small electric battery-operated utility vehicles, like 100 hp tractors, telehandlers, forklifts and TMR mixers, he says, but they’re expensive and run for only four hours or so on a single charge. They’re coming down in price, much like electric passenger vehicles, but the value proposition isn’t quite there yet.
“A self-propelled TMR mixer makes some sense as there would be no emissions in the barn,” he says and adds that these smaller electric vehicles might have a fit for those jobs around the yard where they’re used only once or twice a day for short periods of time.
“But for equipment you need to run to get things done, there won’t be anything electric anytime soon,” he says. Battery weight is the obvious barrier to electric field equipment and that is why manufacturers are looking at hybrid engines where an electric battery kicks in when the engine is being asked to draw more power — much like a hybrid passenger car does — or equipment that can partially generate its own power.
“Some John Deere 8R models have an EVT option where the transmission has a generator that creates electric power,” he says. “That power can be fed back to implements, say a potato harvester, that could max out the hydraulic capacity and the horsepower of the tractor.” It’s basically an added source of power when and where you need it without burdening the main engine and burning more fuel.
“Hydrogen is probably going to drive zero emissions equipment,” says Greig. It makes sense in a lot of ways — hydrogen is energy-dense so it can provide a lot of power efficiently and without any emissions. As Greig points out, Ontario’s 401 corridor already has hydrogen fueling options available, so it’s coming.
But how practical and cost effective will any of this be as opposed to getting a bigger diesel engine? “There has to be a reason to get there, and it has to be more than just carbon reduction,” says Greig. “There has to be another practical reason.”
COST AND SUPPLY CHAINS
While farm machinery may not be increasing in size, it is certainly getting more expensive. “Cost is escalating beyond where I thought it would be,” says Greig. “People find ways to make it work, but I don’t think the cost is going down any time soon.”
Part of that comes down to supply chain issues brought on during the pandemic that continue to linger today. Greig says that this has led to some fundamental changes in how manufacturers structure their businesses.
The manufacturers at Agritechnica talked about reducing the amount of just-in-time component delivery, expanding their networks of suppliers for key components, and keeping more inventory in house, just in case, says Greig. But, while all that helps alleviate supply chain risk, it does come at a cost as it is more expensive to have multiple suppliers and more parts on hand. This will keep used equipment prices high, too.
