Technology in Farm Machinery Field

yellowsocks93 · Dec 18, 2003

OK, so if we used stronger steel in the frame as I was saying and reinforce them like we do now we would have a winning combination. If the frame has less tendency to deform because of the new steel or other metal maybe less cross members on the frame would be needed. You can't go using some crappy metal for the frame and expect it to last. Panoz Auto uses aluminum in their frames for cars and they are very strong. Well designed frames they have. I think I was trying to say that if tractor manufactures made frames like that for tractors they would be even better. Using different metals and alloys to create a super frame that would be very strong. And if I had a choice I would go back and relive the 1980's because I was not old enough to remember much. /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif
I don't get why everybody is so hard on Nomad for bringing up one point that we may see in the near future. After all look how fast computers have changed and are changing. JMHO.

cowboydoc · Dec 18, 2003

Well for myself I just don't see that the farm industry is technology poor as nomad suggests. Nor do I believe that the engineering looks at farming as producing the cheapest material out there because farmers are too poor to buy any good stuff. So far all he's brought up is a turbo kit. Heck they've had turbo kits since the 70's. I'm still not sure what the big deal with performance enhancements are. That is in the auto industry as well. You can chip a 300hp porsche and make it better if you want. Plus according to many engineers the deere/cat partnership is light years ahead of the auto industry in application and design of fuel cell technology. Also hydraulics, clutches, cooling, etc. are all very advanced in the new engine designs from Deere. I'm not sure about others but I'm sure they're keeping up as well. The clutches in tractors today last five times as long as they did 20 years ago. The clutch in a pickup is virtually unchanged in the last 20 years ago.

I'm not saying they should stop going. I'm all for bigger and better ideas but I think there have been significant bigger and better ideas over the years just as much as the auto industry.

Bird · Dec 18, 2003

( just don't see that the farm industry is technology poor )

Me, neither. I think you've said it pretty well, Richard.

MossRoad · Dec 18, 2003

To make his question as simple as I can...

I believe he is asking if anyone knows if any more high tech materials are being used in anything besides the manifold that he mentions.

He also seems to be asking why there aren't more people working on high tech materials in agriculture.

Several people have pointed out that profits drive research. If there's no profit in using some hi tech materials in a product, it is never going to be used, no matter how much it improves the product. Manufacturers aren't going to give stuff away for free.

And I couldn't agree more with RobS' statements regarding agricultural equiment VS automotive equipment. Cars are no longer just a machine to get you from Point A to Point B(at least to most folks). Cars are luxury items and status symbols in a large part of our society. Tractors are still considered tools.

txdon · Dec 18, 2003

MossRoad got it. The Ag tractor is a tool not the finished product like the car. The finished product is on the grocery shelves. The big money goes to the increase the desire/convience factor of the finished product. The technology of how to put the finished product on the grocery shelves without a tractor “wow” – now we are talking revolutionary technical ideas. By the time we finish this high tech thread the Ag tractor might only evolve to a “recreational” vehicle.

TXDon

cowboydoc · Dec 18, 2003

Go ride in a 9000 series JD cab tractor and you will not want to get out. It's already better than most luxury cars.

rambler · Dec 19, 2003

Case disk blades & plow bottoms are made of rare-earth metal alloys. Lots of alloys are used in tractors - if & where they add any benifit.

Many disk, cultivator, etc. frames are made of alloys that are difficult to weld with standard welding rods. Farmers tend to need to fix things out in the field themselves with simple tools. We request that things be kept simple, and actually don't like the new hi-tech metals & such for these applications. I believe there has been no big advancements because farmers do not want implements that are more difficult to repair.

I would hope you consider the new stealth airplane fighters in the USA to be high tech. But, the gatling guns in them were designed over 35 years ago, and are basically unchanged - even using the same clips of ammo. This is because it is a proven, mature product. Anything improving it in one way, makes it poorer in another way.

Much of farm implements are at that level. Carbon fiber would be a poor replacement for steel on a farm implement - it would make it worse, not better.

The only real advancements are laser, computer, radar, and other such info gathering devices which you are not considering here. That is fine, but the basic machine have matured - they are as good as it gets.

To advance, you would have to invent a new machine. There is not much left to improve on what we are already using.

There is much research & development on the plow, but you might not see this? The plow turned into a chisel plow; then into a disk ripper; then into a zone tillage machine; and now into a vertical tillage machine, where it almost does no tillage at all that you can see on the surface, but shatters up the hardpan, compaction, but keeps the soil stucture intact so it will not easily recompact.

All these machines use good old steel; but they are very big advancements in technology. Steel (with some chrome added for hardfacing the edges) is the best there is. However, the machine has evolved tremendously over the past 5 years.

I consider that a great deal of technical advancement. Don't you?

--->Paul

rambler · Dec 19, 2003

( OK, so if we used stronger steel in the frame as I was saying and reinforce them like we do now we would have a winning
combination. If the frame has less tendency to deform because of the new steel or other metal maybe less cross members on
the frame would be needed. You can't go using some crappy metal for the frame and expect it to last. Panoz Auto uses
aluminum in their frames for cars and they are very strong. Well designed frames they have. I think I was trying to say that if
tractor manufactures made frames like that for tractors they would be even better. Using different metals and alloys to create a
super frame that would be very strong. And if I had a choice I would go back and relive the 1980's because I was not old enough
to remember much.
I don't get why everybody is so hard on Nomad for bringing up one point that we may see in the near future. After all look how
fast computers have changed and are changing. JMHO.

============== (

But we can't count the computer, because the is just for info gathering & control. That is outside Nomad's rules.

What good would an aluminumn tractor frame be? It would weight less, so we would need to add more cast iron weights to the front & rear of the tractor. Silly!

If we come up with a stronger alloy that uses less cross members, the tractor will weigh less - and we will have to add more cast weight again. Silly!

In either case, the exotic metals & engineering will cost more. And the extra cast iron weights will cost more. So you will have a tractor that weighs & preforms the same as before - and it costs more. What is the benefit of using the 'higher technology'? It would just be a total waste. It would create a _worse_ tractor, not a better one!

A racing or touring car _needs_ high tech - the lighter it is, the faster it goes.

A tractor needs to weigh a lot. there is no point in developing a different frame. If you do, it does not gain you _anything_. The tractor will just need more weight added to make up for what you took away.

JD made some tube frames on some of their implements. Higher-tech alloys so they were stronger. Then they had to fill the tube with metal shavings because the implement was too light, wouldn't stay in the ground. Over time the metal slag inside the alloy tube would form a gas, and presurize the tube. Several farmers wer hurt by trying to dril or weld into these tubes, and the pressurized gas let loose. In addition the alloy was hard to weld, making repairs difficult.

Was this good higher technology? A solid steel bar would have been cheaper and stronger & weighed as much as the hi-tech alloy tube JD developed. Which is _better_, the high tech or the good strong old way?

Perhaps high tech moves slowly because farmers are smarter than most people, richer, and can figure out the good from the bad. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Rather than developing some stronger steel frame and calling it better as you do - just make the current frame a little thicker if it is too weak. Doesn't cost much, gives us a stronger frame, and we can buy one or 2 less cast iron weights. Now _that_ is a whole lot better - not some high-tech frame that costs double.

For a car you are right - less weight = more speed for a racer, better fuel milage for a transportation car. But you are not thinking right for a tractor - what you & nomad are talking about is totally worthless technology for a tractor. It would be a step backwards.

Why do you want to move agriculture backwards?

Nomad is fond of electric solar powered tractors, and other such. Now, whoever could _produce_ a good working totally different machine - THAT would have value. That would be a major step forward. No one, certainly not nomad, has actually come up with something useful that works. But human nature is always looking for some way to take that big step forward. On that one small point I agree with nomad. It's wonderful to dream & try.

But in the real world, the advances in technology need to provide a benifit. So far, none of the dreaming has provided an advantage over the old tried & true ways.

--->Paul

nomad · Dec 19, 2003

We can summarize opinions of all people in two categories;

1. yes, farm machinery field is a primitive technology RELATIVE to, for ex., car technology.

2. No, farm machinery field is as high tech as car tech, if not higher.

Category 1 can be summarized by this sentence of MossRoad

MossRoad: "... Cars are luxury items and status symbols in a large part of our society. Tractors are STILL considered tools..."

This sentence was repeated by others too. So, there is such a truth even if we are bouncing in a bounded domain bounded by the education system. We see such truths, even though we don't realize how important they in fact are.

Category 2, opposing Category 1, can be summarized simply by this sentence of Cowboydoc:

Cowboydoc: "... Go ride in a 9000 series JD cab tractor and you will not want to get out. It's already better than most luxury cars..."

Cowboydoc, is this a single example? Rare examples aren't worth in comparisons. I mean you can give JD 9000 series as only one example, but many examples can be given on many luxury cars.

Concerning the weight: I see many claims that the extra weight in a tractor is a plus. No, this isn't a truth. There is a 250 pound man who can lift only 100 pounds and there is a 150 pound man who can lift more than 250 pounds. The weight is a thing, the strenth/strong is another thing. There are many ways of increasing strenth/power of a tractor. This can be done by many ways; by using special alloys in the frames, by special structural designs, by changing mass gravity center of tractor, etc. etc. For ex., lets take mass gravity center of tractor; I didn't make any calculation, but can still have a prediction. I assume by lowering mass center of tractor a few inches toward the ground and shifting it a few inches toward the rear will reduce the weight of tractor in some degree. You would have the work done by a lighter tractor. Lets not miss that attachments which follow the tractor when operating in the field are actually advancing faster than tractors and tractors are following attachments in factory design departments of tractors. Todays tractors are not exactly designed well according to the advancement in attachments. If this was done so, today's tractors would be lighter as their mass gravity centers would be different than the current position of that center.

To Paul (Rampler); Solar powered tractors aren't a dream. They can be considered as a dream as long as you like to burn the fossil fuels. This (burning fossils) is wanted by "some" who you probably know. Only 1% of investments on fossil fuel powered engines were transferred to the researches on solar powered tractors, you would have seen now that the dreams were other things than solar tractors.

nomad · Dec 19, 2003

Concerning the mass gravity center of tractors;

Tractor designers;
Make the tractor with a variable position gravity center so that when an attachment is added to the tractor the optimium gravity center coordinate can be adjusted automatically. How can be done? I have an idea, but don't have any money lol.