Profile
Some years ago Brad Lukac was responsible for Case IH’s ACV project (Autonomous Concept Vehicle). Now he is Global Product Manager for Magnum tractors.
cab. This primarily serves as a partial solution to the issue of a shortage of good drivers. At level four, two or more tractors drive fully autonomously, but there is someone on-site to oversee everything. This means you could control a tractor with a chaser bin from a combine, for example. Finally, level five, which is what CNH regards as fully autonomous working, is when the machine performs the work entirely by itself and the manager just stays in the office. This is what was illustrated by the cabless ACV.
Testing in practice CNH Industrial currently operates two plants in which autonomous vehicles are being tested. At least, those are the ones it has an- nounced publicly. There are supposedly more test tractors in oper- ation in the background, and one of these is at Bolthouse Farms, one of the largest carrot growers in North America. The men have two Quadtracs, which are being used to test out the ACV technolo- gy. This crop farmer uses a three-shank subsoiler to turn over a large area of land down to one metre deep to enable carrots to grow straight down. It is repetitive work done at low speed. The tractor operates at level three, and sometimes, when the condi- tions are right, the driver steps out and it continues working at level four. Two Quadtracs then operate entirely autonomously, though someone is on hand to supervise. Autonomous New Holland T4 narrow tractors are running at an- other test farm: Gallo, a large wine grower in Tulare, California. In this case too, there is always someone present or the driver is
controlling one of the two tractors. According to the CNH devel- opment team, the first autonomous tractors ready for use in the practical setting will be operating in between fruit trees and in vineyards. It is also in these sectors that the group is seeing the greatest market demand, and for this reason, the development team is focusing on autonomous narrow tractors. All the lessons learned at the test farms will be applied by the CNH development team to the large tractors, as they hope to make the technology available for the entire range of tractors.
The need is great CNH Industrial is not yet able to say when the tractors will be ready for practical use. “As soon as possible,” answers Mr Lukac. “There is some urgency. In many parts of the world, they are struggling to find drivers. Take a simple example: my parents run a crop farm. We have a chaser bin that rides alongside the com- bine and empties into freight trucks on the roadside. That way of working is very common here. But because there are so few driv- ers available, that chaser bin is often nothing more than a dump- ing site in the corner of the plot. That situation is happening more and more. Believe me, the need is great. I have met crop farmers who drive to a bar in the morning before harvest time and take unemployed bar customers back with them just to drive the trac- tor. That’s the reality. There is a shortage of trained drivers. And automation will make it possible to still get the work done with less-well-trained drivers or even no drivers at all.”
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