Amazone has grown its disc range with the Certos, a trailed cultivator for those wanting to move soil down to more traditional heavy discing depths. We take the Certos out to the field to see what it has to offer
Although the thinking behind compact disc harrows is to work shallow and fast, there are growers who want the option to mix more soil and trash, and this is why Amazone has introduced the Certos. Ranking above the top tickling, plain disc Catros and serrated disc Catros +, the newcomer provides more cut and mix. Compared to the tine-based Cenius, which needs 60-70hp/m up front when tilling at 200mm, the Certos has a power requirement of 50hp/m when at the same depth. Working widths go up in 1.0m increments from 4.0m to 7.0m.
The Certos features 660mm diameter, 6mm thick concave discs with a notched profile to give them a more aggressive bite. These spin on maintenance-free bearings, which should ease the daily whip round with a grease gun. Working depth can be altered from 70mm down to 200mm, making this a versatile stubble tool.
The massive cast iron disc mounting arms also hint that this is not just a lighter land tiller. As per the norm the disc arms are clamped to the frame with four rubber sausages to provide some give, although for life in the Certos these have been beefed up and made bigger to allow the discs to work down deeper, potentially stepping in for a plough. Gang spacing is 1.05m, which is more than those compact discs that have been developed as mounted machines; the Certos only comes in trailed format. Disc-to-disc spacing over the working width is 175mm, which translates to 350mm between discs on the same gang. The leading row of discs are angled at 22° while those behind are fixed at 17°, a set-up claimed to give plenty of mixing and chopping action. Both disc gangs have an inclination of 5°. In our test there was no issue with soil penetration.
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