I think you have the model #'s right Pete but CNH doesn't market the "precision"
drill in a black dress in NA.
I wonder what spacing and openers you have?

 

Are you keeping the down pressure hydraulic lever engaged?

 

yes mate.

 

Hope this helps Don. oh, and it is on 12 inch spacings

 

**bump**

 

I had found on some of the Case IH drills (PH800) that some parts were not made correctly. The original PH800 had a adjusting slot in the arm on the piece that the press wheel mounting assembly was bolted on to, this allowed for adjustment to zero out the row units to make sure they were all the same. The press wheel assembly has two large bolts, I think it take a 15/16 wrench and one is a fixed pivot hole and the other was in a slot so that it could move up or down. Later machines I think around 2011 time frame removed the slot and just had two fixed holes. I have been on three drills with the two fixed holes and found they were not drilled in right spot, so you could have two row units set to the same notch on the depth adjustment but seeding at different depths in the field and in order to make it right you had to adjust each row unit at different spots on the depth adjustment mechinism. We put the older style arm that had the adjustment slot in it and the problem went away, those parts have all been depleted from the parts system but they are suppose to have corrected the manufacturing process for the arms with fixed holes to make sure they are all drilled and made correctly. I would take a look at this area of the machine, maybe even swap row unit that you state is not right with one that is and see if the problem follows, then you would know the arm is not made right. Remember there are left and right row units so swap like units.

Also keep in mind when looking at depth is to make sure you start measuring where the press wheel ran as these drills can throw a lot of dirt based on the opener you are running and it can cover other row units that have already seeded. Move all that light fluffy thrown dirt until you get to the hard packed soil and then start to measure.

I hope this helps you out to solve your problem.

Jeff

 

Thank you very much for the reply. It sounds quite likely that this is the issue. While the few openers in the very middle of the machine are the biggest offenders, a closer look today at the depth of all the openers revealed that there are in fact small inconsistencies across most of the bar. The largest difference is about 3/4 of an inch in sowing depth, which is really disappionting. We will look into this further tomorrow, but we think this is the issue.

Thanks again for the reply, very, very helpful.

As a side note, I wonder if our brand new machine is in fact brand new from the factory and they still haven't fixed the issue, or if the machine is in fact from the run of builds were they were having the problem as you described? Hopefully time will tell.

 

Two more things come to mind.

1. I see you are running factory openers, make sure the seed and fertilizer tubes are in the right spot as there is about a 3/4 inch difference in depth between the fertilizer and seed opening. I have seen some machines that the air packed correctly so seed was going in the fertilizer side so it was deeper than targeted. Each notch is suppose to change depth 1/8 incurments from 0 to 2 inches. If everything is correct then you should be able to set it to those notches to your desired target depth and be pretty close.

2. If you have the older adjustable press wheels the bolts could have come loose making some row units different than others. Get the machine on good level concrete and see where all the openers touch the ground and adjust as needed.


Jeff

 

sneeky, how fast are you seeding because if you go too fast it could throw a lot of dirt and therefore the rear openers could cover the front seed rows. If your centre part of the drill seems shallower than the rest of the drill it's most likely because you have the big duals of the tractor firming the seed bed ahead of the openers and therefore those openers aren't throwing as much dirt as the wings, also the aircart coming behind packs the seedbed again in the centre of the drill.

Remember this is all just speculation on my part after I saw the pictures you posted. This was one of the biggest reasons we switched to a single disc machine...we have near perfect seed placement now across the whole machine but we have other issues but I guess they haven't made a drill yet to satisfy all of us across a wide variety of seeding conditions.

Hope you can figure out what the problem is and get it fixed to your liking.

 

Have a Bourgault paralink and had similar problems in my first year. Ended up that I had too much down pressure. It would slightly lift the rear of the drill up and that causes the openers to lean back more and not penetrate as well.

If you can find a nice hard place you can set openers down on ground in float and measure how far packer wheel sits off ground to make sure they are all the same.

Is soil behind tractor tires thrown further affecting depth?

 

Thank you all for the responses. We have tried the machine using a big range of speeds and pressures, The issue is still there.

Our machine does not have adjustable press wheels. Our flexicoil territory manager has organised for them to be machined so that we can adjust them. We are 95% sure that this is the problem. From what you have been saying bigblockford390 is that flexicoil are aware of the problem over there. The thing that is pissing me off at the moment is that no one in Australia has heard of this issue. Wouldn't have thought it was hard for Flexicoil to pick up the phone to Australia and inform us that there is an issue. Our dealer and Flexicoil rep have been great, just seems there has been a lack of communication from the manufacturer though. Time will tell I guess.

 

Maybe not sneeky, I joined this forum because in 09 I had a seedhawk bar and bin.
Could not get the bin to work, through this forum found out that it's a common problem.
Funnily enough I was the only person that had, had the problems. The forum proved otherwise.

 

Flexi coil Australia have never heard of their gear breaking down and I think they are to scared to ask Canada in case they sound stupid

 

That really pisses me off when people act like that because it does not help any one involved and in the end they always look stupid. They need to pull their head out of their asses use every resource they have to fix the problem its not like you didn't pay alot of money for the piece of equipment.

End rant

 

Just in case it helps anyone else out there, here are some pictures of what we are doing to hopefully solve this issue.

Picture of the press/guage wheel assembled



Picture of the press wheel arm with press wheel removed. Still not sure why there are two holes in one side of the arm????? They are going to cut a slot basically covering the two holes which are currently there which will emable us to move the press wheel to compensate for any inaccuraces in the manufacturing process. This is what the bars used to be like, still no answer from flexicoil about why they changed or if they have there own fix. Pretty confident though thhat this will fix the problem.

 

I am over here in the states and ran into this last year about this time of year and it took several months for us to prove to Saskatoon what was going on. I sent parts back and they tested them to verify that they were not made correctly. Over the course of the year I found several other red and a couple blue machines as well that had this. I am not sure the relationship between Aus and Saskatoon (CNH/Flexi-Coil) and how info is shared or communicated, but I spent a bunch of time working on this and a few other key issues with these machines with engineering last year.

The slot was removed to save time in manufacturing.

As of last fall the slot was still missing and not sure it was going back into production, but they had changed the manufactuing process and improved the jigging of the part and also implemented a test procedure to test them to make sure all parts are made to spec. New parts are suppose to be made to spec that are in the part system.

I like the idea of the slot but some customers were concerned it would slip over time and would get out of adjustment. I think a slot is the way to go.

Jeff

 

Well, after slotting all the press wheel holders and going through and levelling each opener all is still not well......Getting really puzzled now as to what is going on. Maybe there is a problem with the amount of pressure getting to the tynes. We are only sowing fairly shallow at the moment into reasonably soft ground and tynes seem to be breaking out, well at least i think they are........Back to the drawing board. Really shouldnt have these issues with a new machine. Man hours are really starting to add up on trying to get it right, mostly by our dealer and the flexicoil rep who have been very supportive.

 

What pressure are you running in the packer tires Pete?

 

15psi

 

Ok.
Then I got nothing for you.
Sorry.

 

****! had me all excited! Just waiting for that really simple thing that makes me feel really silly but fixes my issue.

 

Just wondering, does anybody use the extra weight package for these drills?

 

The weight package is used if you have turned up the frame pressure high enough to keep the machine in the ground that it starts to lift the front main tandem wheels off the ground. Adding the weight kit can reduce hydraulic pressure requirements by 400 PSI I believe (for the frame setting) and will keep the front tandem wheels back on the ground. Since it reduces the hydraulic pressure requirement needed to keep the machine in the ground you can add more hydraulic pressure to put more down force on the frame sections before it begins to lift the front wheels off the ground.

Now that you slotted the holes for the press wheels and went though and zeroed them out, what is the symptom you are seeing in the field? When you zeroed them out were they all touching the ground at the same time with each row unit being set to the same notch on the depth stop? Did it improve the seed placement between row units? If so how much improvement? How fast are you traveling? With the factory CNH openers they really throw a lot of dirt to other row units, especially when you get above 4.5 MPH in the field. With single shoot openers such as Bourgault Tillage Tools openers you can get up to around 6.5 MPH before it seams to throw too much dirt. This is more noticeable on drills with 10 inch row spacing compared to machines with 12 inch row spacing.

Have you verified the air pack is routed correctly to each opener? The fertilizer side of the CNH opener is around 3/4 of an inch deeper than the seed side and I had a dealer last year put the seed tubes on the fertilizer side of the openers and could never get shallow enough on the setting because it was 3/4 in deeper than what it should have been.

Operating range on the pneumatic press wheel is 10-20 PSI, the closer to 10 you can get it with out rolling the tire off the rim seems to work the best.

I should also ask if you noticed before you sloted the wholes for the press wheels did you try to put the machine on concrete and see if they were off between row units?

Jeff

 

Mate, I have nothing to offer with the issues you are having but I sure would be pissed off if it was me by now. Realy do fell or you.

Madsnake

 

Thanks for the further information Jeff, you have been a great help and its really appreciated.

Had a bit of success yesterday. After levelling all of the openers with the slot at first we thought there was still the same issue, but after a little while I went back through the process (as I had done before we slotted the press wheels) of running the machine at different wing and opener pressures and soon found that the machine started to work pretty darn well with an opener pressure of 60% and a wing pressure of 50%. I was running it higher to start with after we had slotted the press wheels and it did seem to be lifting the main front beam.

We don't have an area of concrete out side to test perfect levelling, but we have an area of very level ground and when we were adjusting the openers with the slot we used a jig that was pretty long to get it as accurate as possible. To give you an idea of how different each opener was we have some opens set at the top of the slot and some set at the bottom! As it turns out the openers in the middle were actually the openers that were correct, so the other 85% or so were wrong! With a little fine tuning we will have each opener dead level. So, putting the slots in the machine helped enormously.

We now seem to be having another problem. It appears that these machines don't like different soil conditions in a paddock. In any sort of wheel tract left by the spray rig, or in ground that's a little harder or softer the opener just seems to lift up and wont penetrate the soil. When we had a closer look at the standard Flexicoil point we realised that the seed wing of the point looks like it actually acts as a "sled". We think that this can't be helping the point engage the ground consistently. We are also starting to feel that more weight may be needed. Our next step is to try some more weight and try some different points to see if we can make it handle varying ground conditions. I must stress here that the soil conditions we are talking about are not extreme, our previous 820 bar had no troubles what so ever in these sort of conditions.

At the moment we are not putting seed in the ground. It has been that far off that we simply look at how deep the trench in the ground is.

The machine is on 12 inch spacings and I have tried speeds from 2mph to 6mph.

 

There is a shim kit available though CNH parts (enough parts to do all row units), its an appoximitly 1/8 inch thick plate and two self tapping screws and it attaches to the row unit. Its a little hard to explain but I will do my best, look at the tow unit where the hydraulic cylinder attaches to the row unit, it is actually hooked to a cam mechanism that connects to the shank/opener assembly and when the hydraulics engage it pushes that cam and shank/opener against the back part of the row unit where the arms that you just machined slots in attaches to. The shim attaches to the back part of the row unit, where the cam pushes against it and it changes the angle of attack on the shank/opener assembly by not letting it go into the full forward position when engaged but rather keeps it tilted back a little. It would be very easy for you to make them, the plate is not flat, but has a slight bend to it and it will make sense when you look at the row unit where this piece goes. The screws go on one side of the bend to attach it to the row unit and the other side of the bend is where the cam mechanism pushes against. You might try to make some and see if it helps keep them in the ground. Think of the row unit pressure as the old fashion spring type shank drill, that is the pressure at which the opener trips out of the ground. 1450 hydraulic pressure is like a 550 pound trip on that drill. The frame pressure is what keeps the entire machine in ground. I forget how much the CNH weight kits weight, there is different weights weather its a 10 foot frame section or a 15 foot frame section and they attach just in front of the rear carrying wheels in the A-frame area of the frame section.

It may help you keep the openers in the ground when you go though those changes in ground condition. The kits were made when these drills were first launched here in the states to tip the opener back to keep them from plugging the mud but it might help with your situation too.

I am personally not a fan of the CNH openers. I think there are better choices on the market, at least over here in the states. I am not sure what you have available to you over there. I really prefer the Bourgault Tillage tool openers, they have replaceable tips, narrow bodies which helps with less soil movement and are built nicely. Dutch makes a decent opener but it is wider and can move more soil and its angle of attack to the ground is different and my experance has been they are harder to keep in the ground. Atom Jet makes one but like the CNH its all welded together with no replaceable parts. The down side is it is fairly expensive to swap out double shoot openers.

Jeff

 

Thanks Jeff. I really appreciate your suggestions and knowledge. I will keep you posted on how we get on. As I said before, I have been getting great support here and with your input im sure we will sort it out. Only thing really missing is a rain at the moment!

Regards,
Pete

 

p2070

We have had the dealer here for 6 day longs hours and the cant get the dam thing to fold and unfold correctly keeps releasing the left wing lock. Our seeding depth was pretty good we set the tire track openers a little deeper. In worked ground it sucked we had to go like 2mph We are using the factory side band openers. Kinda wish woulda just bought a 5000 flexi.

 

We have had the dealer here for 6 day longs hours and the cant get the dam thing to fold and unfold correctly keeps releasing the left wing lock. Our seeding depth was pretty good we set the tire track openers a little deeper. In worked ground it sucked we had to go like 2mph We are using the factory side band openers. Kinda wish woulda just bought a 5000 flexi.

I came across a 50 foot machine that would do the same thing you are talking about, when folding the right side back the left side would release and get too far away from the sensor and shut down the fold process. The dealer loosened up all the mounting bolts up front where the whole latch mechinism was with the hydraulic cylinders and was able to move it and when it was re-set even though the left side lock jaw still moved a little it was not enough to allow the draw tube to go back away from the sensor. You might look at that and see if it helps you out at all.

I should add the first two years of production the lock jaw mechinism was bolted to front hitch via U-bolts. Some time in 2012 they switched to a plate that was welded to the hitch and a plate welded to the lock jaw mechinism and they simply bolt them together. The machine I worked on had the older style U-bolt so we could move it. The U-bolts were removed in favor or plates and bolts to keep from cracking the frames where these pieces all bolt together. There is a kit that can convert older machines to the new style bolt on pieces, plus it adds another cross brace between the left and right side of the front hitch.

Jeff

 

Well, another day of trying to figure this one out. We are sure that the issue is now with the factory flexicoil points. THEY JUST WON'T DIG!!! We put another point on one of the openers and difference was staggering. We are now going to get a few different points from Dutch and Bourgault and see which one gives us the best result. What the original points are doing is just running along a certain hardness in the ground and depending on how deep that "harder" soil is, that's where the depth of the opener is bottoming out. Also noticed that we were getting soil throw at 7km/h! Pretty poor considering I could do 10 or 11km/h with the old flexicoil 820 before I was getting the same amount of throw, hmmmmm I thought that buying a 60ft machine over a 40ft machine would let me cover more country, not so with the original points. The weight kit also made a difference, don't actually have one just put the equivalent weight on it with tractor weights. so, I think with the new slots drilled in and the openers levelled, with a weight kit and aftermarket points we will have a machine capable of doing what it said it would do.

Has anyone got some thoughts on Dutch or Bourgault points? we will be trying a fair few variants.

Thanks again to our dealer and flexicoil guys. While we have been having issues its been great to see some real customer service and backup!!! It really does make a difference.

I'll make an effort to get some pics and video of the different points in action.