It is always important to understand and comply with the most demanding and interesting requirements of farmers, which ultimately lead to the development of new machines with new features.
Falcon HW tank wagons are such machines. They were recently introduced as a novelty at the Agritechnica exhibition in Hannover, and at the beginning of April one of them conquered the first hundreds of hectares of Ukrainian fields.
It is a machine with a 5000 liter tank divided into two 2 000 and 3 000 liter chambers with separate dosing devices. Huge low-pressure wheels ensure minimal ground pressure. The car is equipped with a three-point hitch of category III for aggregation with tillage tools.
Today, the intelligent solution for ISOBUS agriculture is already offered in the basic machine configuration. This allows you to work with a variable amount in the case of two types of fertilizers, which can be controlled according to application maps. On request, automatic continuous weighing of the fertilizer in the hopper is also possible.
The three-point hitch allows you to aggregate with a range of other hitch devices from a deep cultivator, a disc cultivator for stubble cultivating and strip tillage. Such a combination of application of several types of fertilizers together with strip tillage is an excellent solution for the correct use of the above resources.
The Falcon HW hopper started working in Ukraine together with a Farmet Strip Till 6 tillage machine, working width 6 m and 12 rows with a row spacing of 50 cm. Spacing 70 cm or 75 cm is possible on request. Strip Till 6 is a relatively interesting technology that uses resources very efficiently and is one of the minimization technologies. But it requires some knowledge and the desire to try new things from the world of new technologies.
The front notched discs clean the row of crop residues and then the cutting disc divides the soil into two parts to minimize the formation of ridges and form a strip of cultivated soil. The first notched discs pull the plant residues to the sides. This is followed by the deposition of fertilizer, in this case two types of fertilizer into two horizons. Large side discs ensure the formation of worked strips of soil.
A double roller equipped with cleaning scrapers for work in humid conditions completes the work. It perfectly aligns the spacing of stripes and rows with plant residues that are fixed in it, compacts the soil back and crushes clods.
It is worth notice that the precise placement of fertilizers in the root development zone of cultivated plants leads to a reduction in the dose of fertilizer applied. It is a very economically advantageous method, environmentally friendly and suitable for any conditions.
Remember that the transition to new minimization technologies of tillage requires first the creation of a quality soil structure, the soil should not be compacted. But about that next time.
After working on the first hundred hectares of Ukrainian fields, I think I can safely say that the Falcon HW tank wagon and Strip Till 6 have done very good job while working in difficult given conditions and demonstrated reliable and efficient work.
Oleg Prihodko
representative of Farmet a. s. in Ukraine
