Gasoline Tractors are they coming Back ?

[denchen]

Further to my earlier post on diesel/petrol[gas]/electric, well not tractor related, but on my local farmers radio program here in England, a guy has just been on about their new machine. They have developed an autonomous electric, drill/weeder. This thing has solar panels that charge the battery, and off it goes setting the seeds, then weeding between the seeds, running 24 hours per day. In the winter you can buy an extra battery, charge it on the farm and then change it during the day. Not a tractor doing heavy work, but could be a start. If you want one they are £76,000 and a spare battery is around £6,000. Don't all rush to buy one and please form an orderly queue.

 

[Hay Dude]

We need to realize that anything HEAVY like fuels or containers of DEF is also going to cost more, because it costs more.

When the price of fuel or DEF doubles, like it has, fuel costs more to transport too, because trucks and railroads cost more to operate. Trucks run of diesel and DEF, obviously and that goes into the price at the pump or the store where you buy DEF.

It also costs more to produce fuel, because all of the fuel extraction and manufacturing process increases because of…….the cost of fuel.

DEF should cost more, because it’s heavy and costs more now to transport, but 2X seems a little extreme though. There might be some shameless profiteering going on.

Look at the wholesale goods price index. That is the measure of what producers & manufacturers pay for raw goods to make retail finished products. It has been much worse than inflation.

 

[Hay Dude]

Further to my earlier post on diesel/petrol[gas]/electric, well not tractor related, but on my local farmers radio program here in England, a guy has just been on about their new machine. They have developed an autonomous electric, drill/weeder. This thing has solar panels that charge the battery, and off it goes setting the seeds, then weeding between the seeds, running 24 hours per day. In the winter you can buy an extra battery, charge it on the farm and then change it during the day. Not a tractor doing heavy work, but could be a start. If you want one they are £76,000 and a spare battery is around £6,000. Don't all rush to buy one and please form an orderly queue.

Thats a good use for battery technology.
Eventually a breakthrough is coming. Either batteries/motors will run tractors, or the ICE will be improved to nearly zero emissions.

 

[dcarman]

Torque my friends! Torque is still better in a diesel verses gas engines. In a tractor torque gives you that extra pulling power your tractor needs. Diesel being less volatile, burns slower, and just naturally makes more torque in each cylinder.
Granted if you add superchargers and turbochargers and electronic fuel controls you can get a lot of torque out of a gas engine too but you've certainly complicated the process and increased the price and maintenance costs.
As Jstpssng said diesel stores bettter. You can take an old diesel that has been setting for years and put fuel in (if it needs it) and start it. it runs fine. A gas rig will have shellac in the fuel system everywhere that will have to be cleaned out. And if it was the gas with ethanol who knows what other damage it has done.
Most of the smaller tractors are super efficient on fuel. So the price difference in gas vs diesel is almost insignificant unless your running your tractor 24/7

 

[Hay Dude]

The guys running 15-35HP tractors would do fine with well built gas engines for occasional use.
When you get into commercial, agricultural, constant high draw use, a diesel engine is a better choice.
Small occasional operators shouldn’t have to spend thousands extra for the required DEF/DPF systems which make diesels now cost so much more.
The payback isn’t there.

 

[Sid Post]

The guys running 15-35HP tractors would do fine with well built gas engines for occasional use.
When you get into commercial, agricultural, constant high draw use, a diesel engine is a better choice.

Similar arguments in pickups. Does the modern "minivan" need a diesel engine? And how many miles do I need to pull a really heavy trailer each year to justify the higher cost of ownership and the higher cost of the initial purchase price?

 

[Hay Dude]

Similar arguments in pickups. Does the modern "minivan" need a diesel engine? And how many miles do I need to pull a really heavy trailer each year to justify the higher cost of ownership and the higher cost of the initial purchase price?

You have to sit down and pencil it out. Usually the answer is “no” unless you drive high miles or in my case, need the torque to pull loads beyond what a gas truck will pull.

 

[rScotty]

No way absolutely not. Gasoline tractors can never compete with a DIESEL and they don't last near as long..

Still using our 1958 JD530. Nice old GASOLINE AG tractor with power steering, live independent PTO, loader, and probably the nicest 3pt hitch ever. Quiet, starts right up, runs nice.

Tore the engine down at approx 12,000 hrs because I had the time and was sure it needed something. Everything within specs. Cleaned it up, did a ring and valve job and now has a few thousand more hours.
It seems to be working just fine.
Over the last 20 years I have replaced the tachometer, fuel filter, and cleaned out the carb...
Uh... come to think of it, the the tach was about 30 years ago & reupholstered the seat then too.

 

[sunandsand]

The game just changed . . .

Article in today's news that the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California just got a net energy gain from their experimental fusion reactor. 2.1 Megajoules in, 2.5 Megajoules out.

Official announcement tomorrow (Tuesday), sneak preview on Ars Technica website.

That means the whole idea of "fusion" to create power has just been shown to work.

Now to commercialize it - if you have stock in coal mines, sell now, if you have stock in oil companies, start to get nervous, when this starts to work large-scale, nobody will need supertankers any more, OPEC will be a relic and a sorry footnote, copper (for wires) is going to go up in price because everything will be electric. Oil prices will plummet because of much less demand, same for natural gas, same for suppliers of oil well equipment, pipelines, less need for tank cars or gasoline trucks, the list goes on.

The stone age didn't end because we ran out of rocks, we discovered something better.

Now that we know the concept works (after 50+ years of trying!), we want to plan ahead because this changes all kinds of things. It may take 20 years for large scale commercialization, but it will happen. It will also encourage lots of smaller companies that have been working on fusion to redouble their efforts because now fusion isn't just theoretical, it actually works - small, for the first time, but Orville and Wilbur's first flight was only 127 feet or so, and you see what developed out of that.

Best Regards,

Mike/Florida

 

[sunandsand]

Question was just asked "and where do we send the spent fuel rods?"

Same place we send the exhaust from light bulbs and electric motors - there isn't any.

Fission reactors use fuel rods plus graphite rods to moderate the reaction. Those ARE a problem because they stay radioactive and dangerous for thousands of years.

Fusion reactors don't use fuel rods. It is my understanding that what makes it work is high powered lasers (REALLY high powered lasers) are focused on a pellet of Deuterium (heavy water) and the Deuterium is completely consumed in the process. No byproducts, and if there are any at all, it is a tiny, tiny amount and isn't radioactive at all. It is like trying to burn ashes, there's nothing left to burn.

Best Regards,

Mike/Florida