No Till 174

[clodhopper]

Anyone ever rigged or have any ideas about rigging a 174 runner planter with a no till blade in front of the runner blade? Just looking for ideas and opinions. thanks in advance

[gusbratz]

I am not interested in no till because all the poison spray seems like a bad idea, I like cultivating and plowing any way. just me, maybe I am missing something.

[Super A]

I think agri supply sells a no-till coulter and shank, you'd need to come up with a bar ahead of the runner to mount it. Not sure how good a runner is going to work, even behind a coulter but if you don't have a lot of trash on the ground you might get by ok. I expect you'll need to have a more agressive way to cover the seed too.

What are you going to try to no-till? For the last couple seasons I have been curious about some of the Roundup Ready sweet corn varieties that are available, but the seed is so expensive I'm too cheap to try any.....

Al

[clodhopper]

My thing is soil compaction. I have a lot of clay in my soil, and it seems to do better the LESS I cultivate. I was gonna try no tilling the garden since I have tons of leaf waste to use for mulch. More work and less seat time, but more productive possibly. Was not going to use any herbicides. I basically cover the garden spot with leaf matter each year and burn it, but this year I decided to let the leaves lay. I would have to remove the leaves where my rows are going, and then use the leaves for mulch after emergence. What's your take on that Al? You are the man in the know!

[Super A]

Well we're still pretty backwards and disk and chisel plow and field cultivate he*ll out of everything, but I think if you can get the runner in the ground, and get the seed covered, there's no reason it won't work.

I would leave the leaves on the ground, and then rig up something like a set of Dawn row cleaners ahead /beside the no-till coulter:



It should give you something like this:


Again, get the seed in the ground and covered. In heavy soil I am not sure how good a 174 would do, but you may never know 'till you try.

Al

[bythepond88]

I basically cover the garden spot with leaf matter each year and burn it

IMHO, you should be tilling those leaves (and grass clippings, too, if you have them) into the clay instead of burning them. I had clay soil where my garden is when I moved there. Each year I would use grass clippings for mulch, and in the fall, pile on the leaves and rototill it in the spring (I have since learned it have been better for the soil to till in the fall). After about 4-5 years, I did not need to power till in the spring. I could drive a pitchfork all the way in with one hand. YMMV, of course.

[DD92cubs]

I think agri supply sells a no-till coulter and shank, you'd need to come up with a bar ahead of the runner to mount it. Not sure how good a runner is going to work, even behind a coulter but if you don't have a lot of trash on the ground you might get by ok. I expect you'll need to have a more agressive way to cover the seed too.

What are you going to try to no-till? For the last couple seasons I have been curious about some of the Roundup Ready sweet corn varieties that are available, but the seed is so expensive I'm too cheap to try any.....

Al

From my experience the round up ready sweetcorn was terrible no where near as sweet and way too pricey in my opinion. That could have been the variety we tried though.

As far as the 174 on no till I am not sure how well it would perform being an older style runner planter. Most modern planters have disc openers and covering wheels and perform well without the coulter depending on trash. It would be an interesting idea if it didn't take much modification.

[Super A]

I think agri supply sells a no-till coulter and shank, you'd need to come up with a bar ahead of the runner to mount it. Not sure how good a runner is going to work, even behind a coulter but if you don't have a lot of trash on the ground you might get by ok. I expect you'll need to have a more agressive way to cover the seed too.

What are you going to try to no-till? For the last couple seasons I have been curious about some of the Roundup Ready sweet corn varieties that are available, but the seed is so expensive I'm too cheap to try any.....

Al

As far as the 174 on no till I am not sure how well it would perform being an older style runner planter. Most modern planters have disc openers and covering wheels and perform well without the coulter depending on trash. It would be an interesting idea if it didn't take much modification.

Agree. A small unit planter with disk openers like a JD 71 would be much better.

Al

[SONNY]

No-till anything eats up more power than you can get from cub OR a SA----also you gotta run about 10 miles an hour for the units to work properly! (ask me how I know????)---also all that weight hanging on a cub is just not gonna work!
Round-up sweet corn IS terrible, (they gotta long ways of GMO work to do on it to get taste into it.)
I still use chems. and always will,(cant hand weed 5 acres with my crippled body) thanks; sonny

[Super A]

No-till anything eats up more power than you can get from cub OR a SA----also you gotta run about 10 miles an hour for the units to work properly! (ask me how I know????)---also all that weight hanging on a cub is just not gonna work!
Round-up sweet corn IS terrible, (they gotta long ways of GMO work to do on it to get taste into it.)
I still use chems. and always will,(cant hand weed 5 acres with my crippled body) thanks; sonny

10 MPH definitely not. If anything you might run slower depending on conditions. Even the most sophisticated planter is not going to space seed very well that fast. Depending on the planter set-up and soil type/condition extra weight may or may not be necessary to get the openers in the ground. That extra weight can be from physically adding weight to the machine, or (more commonly) from down pressure springs. (My dad bought a new planter 3 years ago and it actually uses a compressor/air bladder system to vary the down pressure.) To fully determine if it would work or not, we would need to see what clodhopper's soil is like. I think his biggest limitation will be the runner opener.

I haven't tried it yet but with a cheap coulter unit and a 185 planter unit, I believe you could easily make a no-till setup for a Cub that would work in my soils, but they are more on the sandy side.

Al

[SONNY]

My neighbor wont run less than 10 and has excellent stands----but then he runs a green machine--- 16 row has to pull it with BIG 4-wd tractor. thanks; sonny

[Jim Becker]

Use the tool bar of a furrowing attachment to mount a coulter ahead of the runner. You may want to try one or a pair of disk hillers to open a groove for the runner.

[Super A]

My neighbor wont run less than 10 and has excellent stands----but then he runs a green machine--- 16 row has to pull it with BIG 4-wd tractor. thanks; sonny

May be (A Max Emerge is good but I don't know that it's that good) but not necessary. Typical speed is 4.5-7 MPH.

Al

[DD92cubs]

My neighbor wont run less than 10 and has excellent stands----but then he runs a green machine--- 16 row has to pull it with BIG 4-wd tractor. thanks; sonny

May be (A Max Emerge is good but I don't know that it's that good) but not necessary. Typical speed is 4.5-7 MPH.

Al

I second that, the fastest we have planted was a freckle over 7mph with a 12 row 900 cyclo usually run the 5mph area though.