NOTED southern Queensland producer John Foley, also the man who started the Agri-Dry grain drier business, is once again using his engineering skills to benefit farmers.
Having retired when he was 60, and with a tad more time on his hands, plus wanting to indulge in his passion for controlled traffic (CT) farming, he has once again dusted down his drawing board.
Growing mostly corn and wheat on his 650 acre Allora property that can be irrigated via a giant centre-pivot irrigator, John Foley has 15 year’s experience in CT farming operations, believing in the principle of limiting the footprint of heavy machinery across his paddocks.
The idea of reducing wheelings, brought to widespread public attention by acknowledged CT champion Jeff Tullberg, is gradually winning over farmers to its benefits which include preserving soil in the best possible condition to achieve top-yielding crops.
Conceding it can be difficult to pinpoint the precise yield gains on his paddocks, John Foley said: “You only have to look at a paddock where the header has been driving around to see the yields aren’t so good where it doesn’t stick on the tracks.”
Interestingly, one of the the district’s best-known farming identities first opted to set up a 2m (6ft) wide tram track system that also suited his sprayer and manure spreader. While it is possible to extend a header’s wheelbase ‘out,’ the job of reducing it to 2m is simply impractical for one of agriculture’s biggest machines.
All the while, however, John Foley was becoming increasingly aware that the market-leading tractor marque in this country – John Deere – required ‘cotton-reels’ be inserted in its front wheels if their owners wanted to operate them on 3m wide tram tracks.
“But this arrangement places a far greater stress on existing steering components, including ball joints, king pins and wheel bearings,” he said.
Contemplating the purchase of a new Deere tractor equipped with an independent link suspension (ILS) system, Mr Foley, who says he is still “pretty handy around the workshop,” took it on himself to sketch out a possible solution.
“If you give your mind a problem, analyse it, go away and come back later, you often say to yourself ‘why didn’t I think of that last week’,” he said.
Essentially, he has come up with a way to extend a John Deere ILS-equipped tractor’s front axle design out from 2m to 3m, thereby broadening its appeal amongst the larger broadacre producers likely to buy a 300hp-plus machine.
“The present method of using tram-tracking employs cotton reels to extend the front wheels out to 3m,” Mr Foley said.
“But this restricts the normal carrying capacity of the tractor and excludes front-mounted air seeders, spray tanks and seed bins,” he added.
Essentially, Mr Foley’s design simply moves the tractor’s ILS system, in this instance on an 8530 John Deere, out by some 600mm on each side of the tractor, requiring extensions to the steering rods, drive shafts and hydraulic hoses.
Specially produced kits, which are shortly to become available, should not affect the tractor’s warranty.
The thinking here is that since John Deere’s ILS geometry remains unchanged, it does not interfere with the rest of the tractor’s mechanical or hydraulic systems.
“Its showing at the recent Ag Show attracted strong support from farmers,” Mr Foley said.
The point to make here is that the concept caught the eye of the judges who bumped up against it in the Queensland Country Life inventions competition, awarding it first prize.
An early adopter of CT farming, Mr Foley concedes his soon-to-be-released kits will appeal principally to high-end producers which make up the top five to 10 percent of Australia’s farming community.
The first unit was built about two years ago with the initial design proving the concept was worthy of further development.
This has seen the project taken on board by the Toowoomba-based C and C Machining and Engineering group. Formerly known as Tasweld Engineering, it has been widening tractors for the past 12 years including some of John's earlier machines. C&C's director, Peter Cilento, gave full credit to John Foley’s engineering credentials.
“We have since entered into a commercial arrangement,” he said.
On the warranty issue, Mr Cilento says, while he cannot vouch for the warranties of individual companies, he has worked closely with most of them for some years and cannot foresee any difficulties.
That aside, and as far as the season is concerned, John Foley describes it as “pretty ordinary,” with increasing worries about water availability surfacing throughout the district.
* More details on: candcmachining.com.au
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