Home-Built 54-Ft Fertilizer Top Dresser

Home-Built 54-Ft Fertilizer Top Dresser BALE HANDLING Bale Handling (31B) 18-3-8 Montana farmer Keith Hertel uses a Concord air seeder cart and 54-ft. tractor-mounted booms to top dress nitrogen onto small grains and hay fields and also to seed alfalfa and grass seed while applying fertilizer at the same time. "This system works excellent for us. We no longer have to rent a cart from the fertilizer company and the system itself is a lot more efficient. You can apply fertilizer in more wind than with conventional spreaders and it's more accurate," says Hertel. The fold-forward booms mount on the tractor 3-pt. and the Concord air cart tows behind. One large tube brings fertilizer up to a central distributor directly behind the tractor which then directs material to four separate distributors spaced out along the boom. From there, fertilizer is split into hose drops spaced evenly all along the heavy-built boom, which has a 14-ft. long piece of 4 by 4-in. square tubing at center to provide the main support. Hertel does three jobs with the Concord cart since he also added air distributors to a tillage toolbar so he can tow the Con-cord cart behind that to deep band fertlizer before switching the cart over be-hind his air seeder to seed grain. For transport, the booms fold forward by hydraulic cylinder. The ends of the boom rest on a bar mounted across the front of the tractor. Raising the 3-pt. hitch when the boom is folded puts downward pressure on the tips of the booms so they stay on the crossbar. Shear pins on the cylinders that fold the wings prevent damage if the booms ever hit an obstacle. Boom wings are sup-ported by an air shock and spring so they won't bounce if the tractor hits a hole or an obstacle. Contact FARM SHOW Followup, Karl J. Hertel, Box 34, Moore, Mont. 59464 (ph 406 374-2270).

To read the rest of this story, download this issue below or click here to register with your account number.