# Tesla Tractors?



## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

AgWeb..

Regards, Mike

http://www.agweb.com/blog/janzen-ag-law-blog/when-will-teslas-electricity-come-to-the-farm/


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

"Remember the Electrall"...

Later! OL J R


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## stack em up (Mar 7, 2013)

luke strawwalker said:


> "Remember the Electrall"...
> 
> Later! OL J R


We are not that far away from that though honestly. I just finished installing a Graham electric drive on a Kinze planter the other day. Have to add another alternator to support the planters needs. I told the customer that he'd probably be better off adding a PTO driven alternator.... He found absolutely no humor in that....


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## somedevildawg (Jun 20, 2011)

Wasn't there a link to a company that made a retro kit for Deere tractors to make them electric? I thought it was a cool idea.....regulating speed would be easy greasy, no transmission to worry with....think they were using them in autonomous tractors?


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## Grateful11 (Apr 5, 2009)

I kinda agree with this idea:

"The utility tractor. Growing up, there were many chores performed by smaller tractors that only operated a couple hours per day. For example, we used a silage loader-tractor to feed cattle twice per day. An all-electric tractor could do this, and the rest of the time it could sit plugged into a charger waiting for its next task. One hurdle to electric road-going vehicles is the battery weight is substantial. This would not be a problem on a tractor, which requires ballast anyway. But its not just utility tractors, there are many jobs on the farm that require power only a few hours per day. The extremely complex Tier 4 emission requirements for farm diesel are another reason alternative fuel sources could work."


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

stack em up said:


> We are not that far away from that though honestly. I just finished installing a Graham electric drive on a Kinze planter the other day. Have to add another alternator to support the planters needs. I told the customer that he'd probably be better off adding a PTO driven alternator.... He found absolutely no humor in that....


Yeah, it was an idea ahead of its time. Folks didn't like the shock and fire risks that came with it at the time, but there's ways around that (to some extent).

Diesel electric has been the gold standard in railway service for 60 years... there's a reason for that. Truth be told, diesel electric would probably be more efficient in tractors and farm machinery than hydrostatic or hydraulic. Of course hydraulics will always have their place, but I'm reminded of the old IH 656's with the hydrostatic transmissions, the early Deere FWA that were hydrostatically powered, etc. As you said, with planters electric drives are becoming the standard due to the easy speed changes they allow for variable rate planting. While some things are just plain easier to drive with belts, shafts, and gears, some things DO make sense to drive electrically...

I'd have to search through my volumes of tractor books, but I seem to recall one of the big manufacturers experimenting with a fuel cell powered tractor. For those unfamiliar with the concept, fuel cells are electrolytic cells that chemically convert chemical compounds into electricity, which are commonly used in aerospace, especially spacecraft (fuel cells first flew on the Gemini missions in the mid-60's, powered all the Apollo spacecraft, and provided all the electrical power for the space shuttles in orbit... in short, if its in space and doesn't have solar panels or a plutonium powered Radioisotope Thermal Generator (RTG-- usually only used in outer planet probes, though the Mars Rover Curiosity is currently toodling around Mars with one for power right now) it's probably powered by fuel cells. Anyway, I seem to recall (maybe Allis Chalmers?) experimenting with a hydrogen fuel cell powered tractor back in the 70's?? Fuel cells use reverse electrolysis to convert hydrogen and oxygen gas into electricity and water (opposite of the reaction that passes electricity through water and breaks water into hydrogen and oxygen gas). Such a tractor would only emit water as a waste product. It wouldn't need heavy batteries as the fuel cells would generate the electricity from the hydrogen/oxygen gas on the go, and send that electricity to a high efficiency electric motor that would then drive the transmission/final drive, and deliver power to the implement drives...

Later! OL J R


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## luke strawwalker (Jul 31, 2014)

luke strawwalker said:


> Yeah, it was an idea ahead of its time. Folks didn't like the shock and fire risks that came with it at the time, but there's ways around that (to some extent).
> 
> Diesel electric has been the gold standard in railway service for 60 years... there's a reason for that. Truth be told, diesel electric would probably be more efficient in tractors and farm machinery than hydrostatic or hydraulic. Of course hydraulics will always have their place, but I'm reminded of the old IH 656's with the hydrostatic transmissions, the early Deere FWA that were hydrostatically powered, etc. As you said, with planters electric drives are becoming the standard due to the easy speed changes they allow for variable rate planting. While some things are just plain easier to drive with belts, shafts, and gears, some things DO make sense to drive electrically...
> 
> ...


We discussed this same power source for use on a moon base on another forum... Using an electrolysis unit, you can break water, as the working fluid, down into hydrogen and oxygen gas (one collects at the anode (positive electrode) the other gas collects at the cathode (negative electrode). This gas can be siphoned off separately and compressed into storage tanks. The power source for the electrolysis unit can be solar powered, or it can be electricity from a nuclear reactor, or from the regular power grid here on Earth... wind, whatever... On the Moon your choices are basically limited to solar (either solar-electric via photoelectric cells (solar panels) or solar-thermal using mirrors to concentrate solar energy and heat a working fluid, typically liquid sodium or boil mercury, and use that heated working fluid to drive a turbine or Brayton-cycle generator to produce electricity, or use a nuclear generator (nuclear thermal is most efficient) to produce the electricity. On the Moon, the gases could be stored in the unused propellant tanks of landing stages used to construct the lunar base, recycling these items for further use. On Earth, all you'd need is suitable storage tanks or cylinders. On the Moon, you have two weeks straight of uninterrupted daylight at equatorial latitudes, and at the polar regions, with the right setup, you potentially could have uninterrupted solar power at all times, tracking the sun as it circles the horizon every 28 days.

During the two-week lunar night, (at most locations other than the poles) fuel cells would use the stored hydrogen/oxygen gases and convert them back to water, producing electricity at the same time (basically, "releasing" the electrical energy stored in the gases as they turn back into water). The water can then be pumped into storage tanks (again, old propellant tanks, fitted with the proper thermal conditioning equipment to prevent freeze-up or boil-off) so it would be recaptured for recycling through the electrolysis unit on the next solar "charging" cycle two weeks later... over and over again in an endless cycle.

For a tractor, you'd convert the hydrogen and oxygen gas inside the fuel cell back into demineralized water. This COULD simply be dumped overboard, but it'd probably make more sense to store it and reuse it, since you'd do better using demineralized water in the electrolysis unit than regular "tap" water, to prevent buildup of harmful minerals (and electrolytic breakdown of some chemical compounds that might commonly be found in ordinary water, like salt into sodium and chlorine gas... This water could easily be stored in an onboard tank and then pumped back into the electrolyzer at the same time it was being fueled up with compressed hydrogen and oxygen...

It's a systemic approach...

Later! OL J R


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## Farmineer95 (Aug 11, 2014)

I recently had a conversation with a friend about something like that. Except in a skidsteer. Forklifts already use batteries over hydraulic systems. Emmissioned engined aren't seeming to like short run cycles and engine replacement under warranty would seem to get the OEMs attention. Why not an electric skid loader? The application I'm thinking of is on dairies for pushing/mixing feed. Might run a half hour to push feed on dairies under say 200 milking.

Maybe OEMs are smarter than that. Might not be dairies that size much longer.


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## stack em up (Mar 7, 2013)

Allis Chalmers built the fuel cell tractor based off of a D-14 I believe. It's on display at the McLeod County Historical society in Hutchinson MN. Very very cool. Was near 100"% efficiency. Just not cost effective or size effective for 1958.


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## deadmoose (Oct 30, 2011)

Vol said:


> AgWeb..
> 
> Regards, Mike
> 
> http://www.agweb.com/blog/janzen-ag-law-blog/when-will-teslas-electricity-come-to-the-farm/


So do you pull a battery trailer if you want heat or ac? Electric resistance heat is awfully spendy on regular power rates here. Only cost effective off peak for me.


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## Vol (Jul 5, 2009)

deadmoose said:


> So do you pull a battery trailer if you want heat or ac? Electric resistance heat is awfully spendy on regular power rates here. Only cost effective off peak for me.


[email protected] ask the author. 

Regards, Mike


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## slowzuki (Mar 8, 2011)

It depends on farm size but lots of dairies here the loader tractor sits plugged in all winter anyways running a block heater. Often if you are doing morning chores it only runs an hour or so to feed and push out the aisles. It would be handy if you could run it even 10 min on electric before you'd need to start the diesel, I hate starting the tractor at -30 just to use it for a couple of minutes to lift a pallet out of the truck etc.

Lots of heat comes off the electric motor so just cool it with the heater core.



deadmoose said:


> So do you pull a battery trailer if you want heat or ac? Electric resistance heat is awfully spendy on regular power rates here. Only cost effective off peak for me.


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## deadmoose (Oct 30, 2011)

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1054000_question-how-do-electric-cars-volt-leaf-heat-passengers

Sounds like you do what I do on my open station. Dress for the weather.


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