Grain Drill Depth Gauge

Grain drill depth gauge PLANTERS Planters 16-4-15 "We've always had trouble consistently planting seed at the right depth with our 24-ft. Melroe hoe drill. On loam soil, it goes in too deeply and on hard knolls, it seeds too shallow," says Jack Longbow, Tisdale, Sask., who says he's solved the problem with an easy-to-read depth gauge that mounts on the, front side of his drill. Until he installed the gauge, Longbow says he had to guess the depth as he hydraulically adjusted depth on the go when seeding conditions changed. "It was always hard to know just where we were at," he says. Here's how he made his depth gauge: "I welded a 5/16-in. rod about 40 in. long to the front gang lift mechanism. As the hydraulic ram rotates the front gang up and down, the pointer moves in a much larger arc across a graduated scale which I made out of a piece of 14 ga. steel attached to a reinforced upright angle iron. Numbers are painted across the gauge about every 2 in. "Number 9 is the deepest and number 1 is out of the ground. Now, with a quick glance, I can see exactly how deep we are seeding. With a bit of trial and error, I soon learned where to put it for our varying field conditions. We've used the gauge for the past two seasons and find it to be a big help in improving crop stands. "I'm sure the idea would work on almost any drill although you may have to mount the indicator rod differently." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Jack Longbow, Box 2033, Tisdale, Sask. SOE 1TO (ph 306 873-4864).

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