# vertical tillage tool



## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

With the wet weather we were considering a vertical tillage tool for late summer and fall planting . We are in all "HEL" highly erodible land. Anyone have experience with vertical tillage tools. We are probably limited to seed bed preparation only.


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## PaMike (Dec 7, 2013)

Neighbor rents a Landall from Binkleys and really likes it. He also has rented a Salford in the past. Their big sunflower disc needs rebuilt and he is considering putting the less concave vertical till blades on it as opposed to traditional disc blades. The sunflower blade spacing is slightly further apart than vert till blades but he thinks he will get similar results without spending 40k on a new unit.

They run the vert till mostly on ground that was untouched since harvest. Ground that had a manure spreader on it still gets chiseled...

He runs a kinze notill for beans and corn.


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## bbos2 (Mar 20, 2015)

I ran an excelerator this spring on some heavy manure ground from the previous fall. It was corstalks. Worked well. We had gangs angled pretty aggessivly and ran fast. It turned it pretty black and left smooth even finish. They do,nice job on the fall too. Don't move a lot of dirt. But will leave a nice seed bed


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

bbos2 said:


> I ran an excelerator this spring on some heavy manure ground from the previous fall. It was corstalks. Worked well. We had gangs angled pretty aggessivly and ran fast. It turned it pretty black and left smooth even finish. They do,nice job on the fall too. Don't move a lot of dirt. But will leave a nice seed bed


 that's what we're looking for something that would do a nice job like that and not move a lot of dirt and get some manure through the residual and help dry things out ,were wet. I'd like to stay 3 inches or less in the working depth the machine works with. Do you know what your overall depth was fully prepared seedbed and with the tool you used would 3 inches be a practical number??


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Technically they claim to only work as deep as your going to plant. Here it would have to be something like a Salford with individually mounted blades, even at 5-6 MPH a disc here is a major pain to keep running from rocks, something like a Turbo Till would get the sh*t beat out of it. Personally we use the add on coulter kits on our 25' chisel plow. One assembly has two blades 6" apart, bolt em on in place of the points, we had some extra shanks and respaced things a little so the blades actually run 5" 6" 5" 6" spacings.


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## haybaler101 (Nov 30, 2008)

I run a Great Plains turbo till with an air seeder on it to plant cover crops. Run 8 mph and 1.5" deep in bean stubble to seed ryegrass and 3" deep in corn stalks to seed cereal rye. Moves very little dirt but does a great job of getting a stand. Takes a bunch of horsepower, no less than 10 per foot.


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## Northeast PA hay and beef (Jan 29, 2017)

We use a kverneland qaulidisc. You can adjust depth 1 in to 8 in. We use in fall after sorghum and spring after rye. One pass thru stubble and ready to plant. Took 3 passes over 20 year grass field for proper seed bed, but beats plowing.


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## Smoothy (Apr 26, 2015)

As haybaler said they are hp robbers. I demoed a great plains turbo max 12 foot on a 6210r j.d and it shocked me at how it made that tractor work. I was really happy how it worked and I liked that there was quite a bit of adjustment for depth and aggressiveness.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

I know I am going to see what's locally available to demonstrate, Salford for sure is available I'm not sure about the others and I think I would really like to try a Great Plains. Back in the day when we tilled we had some real Rocky Hills. After 20 years of no till one thing I don't miss is dealing with the rocks. I would think at an inch and a half 4 to inches the tool would not pull up rocks


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## RuttedField (Apr 24, 2016)

For what my 2 cents is worth, I would stay away from Sunflower Equipment. I have no experience with Sunflower Vertical Tillage Equipment, but do have some with a disc harrow of their make.

We only farmed 1000 acres of corn or so, but after only a few years, the bearings on the Sunflower crapped out to a tune of $12,000. Considering the cost of the machine, what little it was run, and the replacement bearing costs, I thought it was excessive.

Maybe other peoples experience varies however....


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## hillside hay (Feb 4, 2013)

I saw a Penta? I believe at CNY. Looks to be heavy built Sales guy Eric said they ran the 15 ft with 120 hp. Said it pulls alot easier than one would think. Appears to be a cross between Salford and Landoll features.


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## Northeast PA hay and beef (Jan 29, 2017)

I know our t6070 which runs around 140 hp wants no more than the 11.5 ft qaulidisc. It might pull a 13 ft on flat ground, but our hills really work it. We do go about 4 inches down. I know our jd6715 120hp won't pull it on hills at all. Maybe it is just that much heavier, but i don't see how a 120hp could pull a 15ft machine, unless they are barely scratching the ground.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

RuttedField said:


> For what my 2 cents is worth, I would stay away from Sunflower Equipment. I have no experience with Sunflower Vertical Tillage Equipment, but do have some with a disc harrow of their make.
> 
> We only farmed 1000 acres of corn or so, but after only a few years, the bearings on the Sunflower crapped out to a tune of $12,000. Considering the cost of the machine, what little it was run, and the replacement bearing costs, I thought it was excessive.
> 
> Maybe other peoples experience varies however....


In the early 1990's we had a Sunflower n/t Drill . Defiantly bottom end in performance and Quality


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## PaMike (Dec 7, 2013)

endrow said:


> In the early 1990's we had a Sunflower n/t Drill . Defiantly bottom end in performance and Quality


Interesting...my buddy works at Binkley's and swears the sunflower is the best...

But then today they had to park it cause the ground was too hard and they couldn't get it in the ground far enough...

What is your opinion is the best?


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## hillside hay (Feb 4, 2013)

Northeast PA hay and beef said:


> I know our t6070 which runs around 140 hp wants no more than the 11.5 ft qaulidisc. It might pull a 13 ft on flat ground, but our hills really work it. We do go about 4 inches down. I know our jd6715 120hp won't pull it on hills at all. Maybe it is just that much heavier, but i don't see how a 120hp could pull a 15ft machine, unless they are barely scratching the ground.


drawbar ponies not engine. I should've specified


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## mlappin (Jun 25, 2009)

Here seeing a LOT more Salfords and less Turbo Tills, we have rocks, hitting them with a disc is bad enough, now imagine hitting them running 2-4 mph faster. Used Turbo Tills around here are pretty much beat to sh*t from rocks. I like the independent mounted blades on the Salford and the fact they can pivot for corners.

Far as how deep to run it and how much horsepower, the "experts" claim not to run it any deeper than you intend to plant, so depending on the soil and terrain and planting practices horsepower per foot will very greatly. Roughly 8-10hp per foot. We pull our 25 footer 7-8 mile per hour with a White 4-210.


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## IH 1586 (Oct 16, 2014)

Does anybody use vertical tillage to maintain hay fields? Came across an article about it in the April/May issue of hay and forage magazine. I found it interesting and posed the question to my great plains dealer. He pretty much said it would not work as I would want. Already researched Salford after mlappin's post above and liked what I read. Also liked the idea about having a seeder on them for cover crops. Makes me wonder about utilizing it to refresh hay fields and maybe some side work to justify, similar to what I was thinking with the drill idea I have in another thread.

The bad part is 16' is minimum to put the seeder on which puts me at the bare min with hp requirements.

Tell me if I'm wrong but if I went over the field several times would I be able to just use my regular drill if I were to put in a field of oats avoiding having to buy a no-till drill.


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## endrow (Dec 15, 2011)

PaMike said:


> Interesting...my buddy works at Binkley's and swears the sunflower is the best...
> 
> But then today they had to park it cause the ground was too hard and they couldn't get it in the ground far enough...
> 
> What is your opinion is the best?


I like the JD 1590 that will not be best for everyone . Ran a 9411 Sunflower 15 FT For about 7 years bought new put 10k acres on it . What I did not like .. Row Units Clustered to close together Trash would Jam sometimes . Used 3point caddy cart had to lift entire drill all seed and fertilizer every time just to pick up blades , high maitance.. Small opener blades had to change as soon as slite bit of wear or would cause problems. Long flexible rubber hoses when drill would squat hoses would bend and buckle create they uneven seed flow . The big one poor depth control almost impossible to plant small seeds . All parallel and verticle limkage they just place to flat steel bars beside each other drilled a hole in both stuck a bushing .. washer on each side and bolt and the steel wore before the bushings .. That was the big problem they stuck plain steel bushings in a hole and the hole wore before the bushing .., But this was back in a day maybe they got better


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