AUTO GUIDANCE ▶▶▶ System steers away stress for South African farmer
One of the first trial users of the CartACE sys- tem is Danie Bester, from Rietbult Estates near Balfour Mpumalanga in South Africa. Here he runs a farming operation known as Deepwater Trading, growing arable crops and grazing beef on a total of 1,465ha in a soybeans and corn rotation. Every other year, due to moisture constraints, he drops the soybeans and grows sunflowers on some fields instead. “I do already use a lot of tech- nology – yield mapping, guidance and steer- ing, as well as planter control, application control of sprays and fertiliser using Isobus connectivity. This is all run through Ag Lead- er equipment and terminals with its SMS Ad- vanced software to carry out all the data management,” he explains. With his own Ag Leader RTK GPS correction base station, InCommand 1200 and Integra terminals already in use on his equipment, Danie was a prime candidate to try out the new CartACE system. “Yes, we do struggle to hire skilled labour, especially grain cart oper- ators,” says Danie. “Our harvesting conditions also create a lot of dust, so that’s a big chal- lenge. Another major issue is with operators not always keeping true to the unloading line – they can struggle to drive the correct distance from the combine, causing the auger not to be centred over the grain cart.” Adding: “We quickly discovered one of the system’s great benefits as it overcomes wor- ries about the grain cart being lined up with combine and concerns about the operator moving off the unloading line.”
Dust and dark Rietbult Estates harvests its crops with a Case IH 6130 combine, which is accompanied by five John Deere tractors and a Case IH. “We tested the system in my JD 8300, which al- ready has an InCommand terminal and also normally pulls the grain cart. It was so easy to use. It took my operator less than one minute to get going! The grain cart uses the logged passes of the combine to create itself a ‘guidance track’ to run along. This means it exactly follows the previous combine pass and this, of course, lines up with the rest of the field,” he explains. Employing the CartACE
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South African farmer Danie Bester is one of the first users of the CartACE system. He says it relieves stress on operators and improves efficiency.
system during harvest has really reduced the stress levels when unloading, the farmer adds. “It’s an addition that really makes har- vesting and unloading more efficient. The ability for the grain cart operator to be able to track the combine on-screen makes it easi- er to see where the combine is working and from where to approach it. We have a lot of rolling ground, so the combine is not always visually in sight. The system also makes it eas- ier to unload in dusty conditions and at night, without having to worry about grain spillage.”
Reducing stress And yes, of course, also knowing that the grain cart and header will not collide is very assuring. “It really lowers stress levels for the operator and me. Operators are much less stressed about making mistakes and feel they are more in control. They like the way they
can visually monitor the operation with Cart- ACE in action, rather than having to be con- stantly looking around and manually ‘aiming’, which can lead to errors,” explains Danie. Anything that helps reduce stress at harvest is a worthwhile investment, he feels. “Using this definitely lower stress and anything that does that is always better. Less fatigue hope- fully means no accidents and being able to safely guide your grain cart without risk of hitting the header also provides some nice peace of mind,” he says. If in the future the system, or something sim- ilar, could provide full automation for the grain cart would Danie use it? “I really hope it does move in that direction as far as possible. I personally feel that there will always have to be a human presence, but I do feel tech- nology always increases efficiency. And that’s why I would use it, for sure,” he explains.
▶ FUTURE FARMING | 22 May 2020 49
PHOTO: AG LEADER
PHOTO: DANIE BESTER
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