Wide, folding power harrows, like pneumatic drills, have been around for quite some time. Now Lemken has brought the two together in one mounted cultivator/drill combination. We tried the new 9/450K last autumn to find out if one plus one adds up to more than two
A good team can achieve much more than the sum of its parts – or so the theory goes. And in practice many farms have switched to establishing crops using the power harrow/drill technique because the system saves one pass, plus a tractor and man.
But, in the process, many large farms and contractors may have compromised output by sticking with a 3m wide combination when a 4m or wider set-up would have been more appropriate. The time and hassle involved in dismounting and moving these wider outfits on trailers, they reason, can often
outweigh the benefit from any gains in higher workrates in the field.
One alternative is to stick the drill’s hopper on a front linkage, leaving just the foldable power harrow and coulter frame on the back. But as the sales of such combinations show, this is a route that is seldom followed.
Clearly, this is a dilemma that was not lost on Lemken: Its new wide, foldable, rear-mounted cultivator/drill combination is aimed at satisfying growing demand for a higher output (wider) but more mobile set-up.
The combination comprises the now familiar Zirkon power harrow fitted with the recently introduced Solitair pneumatic drill. Both implements are available with hydraulic folding as the 9/400 K and 9/450 K models, with working widths of 4.0m and 4.5m, respectively.
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