[HoRFarmsJesse]

The large spring on each row unit, anyone had to replace them? Any specs on max compressed length to allow?

No idea on acreage, but were on our third set of blades (brand new, 20acres on them), 2nd set of boots.

I first thought our problem slicing through wheat straw was typical hairpinning last year, so we rebladed. We were down around 17" anyways. This year with blades is even worse, but i noticed that at our normal pressure (orange/red line~1000psi), the depth wheels arent even close to touching the ground, and the shoe is hovering over the ground as well. Blade only and inch or so deep. We are fully weighted, not that hard of ground, and never had issues getting plenty of downpressure. It is heavy enough to not lift the frame wheels.
I slowly cranked more and more on the depth pressure until i maxed it out well into the red at 2250psi. The top of the rotating bar is at the 15-20* angle, and the depth bands are finally touching dirt, but somethings not right.

Only thing i can think is that the cylinders may be maxing out at this point and the springs just arent transferring the load.

Any other ideas? I did have a leak in the return line at the SCV, but fixed that and problem remains.

New ingersoll blades. 20ft, 7.5" spacing, clay/black ground with moisture, behind 100bu. wheat with a tough straw characteristic in this variety

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Do these cylinders need to be bled if tey get air in them? Only other possibility I can come up with. Most Deere cylinders do not require it though.

 

[Big Cob]

We have a 20' JD 1590 2 point hitch drill and I don't think we have ever had to be much into the red on the down pressure gauge to penetrate even the hardest clay ground we have.
I am presuming you are level front to rear and that you have your hydraulic system set correctly to accommodate the active down pressure system on it . In real hard ground I have seen ours lift the frame up some , but have never seen it not penetrate or not cut through the residue . We do carry some extra seed on the drill with homemade 50 bu extensions. Hair pinning has only ever occurred on us if we were in real sandy soil or clay that is way too wet .
Just a thought , if you lock your ranks up do they fade down over night ?
Wondering if you have a bad cylinder and it may have a slight bypass to it not letting you get the active down pressure to actually work properly . (Or a bad valve maybe)

We have never had issues with the springs you mention .

Have you always had penetration and hair pinning issues or just since you changed the blades ?

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Everything from the tractor to the planter is set properly. We have probably run this planter 7 to 10 years with no major issues such as this. Frame is level, hydraulics are maxed on the tractor, which is an 8130. The gangs were leaking down with the valve left open, but not with the valve closed. I was attributing that to the hose that I fixed yesterday. When I get to the planter in 15 minutes I'll see if it leaked down at all overnight with the hose fixed.

The gauge does show something around 500 PSI every now and then with the gangs in the up position, which I don't ever remember it doing before. A simple flick of the switch though usually returns to 0.

After thinking about it more last night, even if there was a hydraulic issue, with the bars rotated to the proper angle and the blade still not pushing in the ground I can't see how it would be anything other than the springs. We have never adjusted them or touch them or replace them and any sort of way. I'm going to see if I can find the manual And see if they have some specs on them, but I doubt it. I just wish I knew at what point they are considered worn out.

Today we've always had some hair Penning, with the type of week that we use pretty heavy stroll. But that is usually the seed in the Furrough mixed with straw and Strahl pack then on top instead of dirt. This however is the Furrough then the straw and seed laying on top. Last night before I left, I had Max down pressure on it came to a stop walked out and could put my fingers underneath the boot between the ground and the dirt, with a new boot. The boots are in the middle hole on the mount

i think this issue has probably slowly been getting worse and worse, but we were just misdiagnosing it the whole time, probably back to two or three years ago

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Are you hooked up to your planter now? Would it be a lot of trouble to ask if you could get a measurement on your springs unloaded and then also it down pressure applied? That would be a monster help to me.

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

In the uncompressed state, our springs are actually 1/8" longer than a neighbors. Cant get a comparison on compressed though as hes not hooked up.

All 4 gangs have leaked down to the ground overnight with valve open. Does not do it when shut.

 

[Big Cob]

Unfortunately our drill is cleaned up and parked in a shed until fall wheat .
Or I guess that's a good thing for us .
I can't think of anything off the top of my head , do you have a decent deere dealer near you that would let you pick their brain ?

Your cylinders are stroking all the way ?

We run our active down pressure set with as little of flow as we can and still get the job done .

 

[Big Cob]

After Re Reading your original post , if it were me I would take a serious look into your cylinders .
Run a leak by and pressure test on them .

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Springs only compress 1.5". It has to be in the hydraulic system.

Was ready to get a new valve/gauge assembly but my Deere tech thinks its an internal leak in one cylinder. In the process of checking each by putting hoses straight to the cylinder and seeing if any press down harder. Have a setup on the way to check SCVs, but so far its made no difference which one i use. They are all set to continuous, flow 10.

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Hooked directly to each cylinder one at a time and got same result. Then bled all the cylinders and tried again. Got an extra .5" of spring compression and seemed to help some. I can get most units in the ground, but it has to be 3mph or less and im still hairpinning some straw. Its not helping that its the toughest/thickest straw ive ever seen.

John Deere tech wants to rebuild each cylinder, and we are still waiting to pressure test the SCVs. Gangs leak down a couple inches in 10mins, with tractor running sitting still.

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Going to try moving the boots to the lowest position tomorrow. Ive never heard of anyone having to do it around here, and ill probably have to switch it back when it gets wet and everything is plugging up, but the book says drop them in heavy residue...and im floating right over the straw with them. So ill update after in case anyone has similar problems.

Just going to wait on rebuilding the cylinders until im done planting.

 

[bent]

Is there a chance you put all the new blades on backwards? (bevel on wrong side)

Or you could have really hard ground. My old 1560 would plant in a gravel road.

 

[HoRFarmsJesse]

Is there a chance you put all the new blades on backwards? (bevel on wrong side)

Or you could have really hard ground. My old 1560 would plant in a gravel road.

No theyre on the correct way. I tried a couple units with the boots in the lower hole and it did seem to help placing the seed lower, and didnt seem to negatively affect blade depth. Thinking a decent band aid fix for a leaking cylinder.

 

[Haystack]

farmboy2; Why don't you just set the pressure to max (if that's whats required) and then let your tractor spool go back to the hold position? You should do this before going to maximum ground speed. The cylinders will only move a fraction even if the piston seals were totally shot, because the cylinders will now be hydrostatically locked because there is no place for the fluid to go. The shaft side of the cylinder has far less volume than the opposite side and a fluid can not be compressed. You will never fail the opener from pressure, only the gauge wheel if you make it carry too much weight.

The opener is not the limiting factor in how much straw can be penetrated with the Deere design, its what holds the opener in the ground that limits it. We put an 1895 over 100,000 acres, always with the spool in hold or it would do a crappy job in heavy surface trash conditions.

The Deere guy will tell you, "you can't do that it's an independent opener requiring continuous oil flow blah blah blah." It's not, it's a glorified gang drill that can plant into anything when its understood what causes its limitation, and John Deere doesn't pay it's shareholders from farming land.

 

[matt hagny]

As with any spring, the big coil spring on those openers will eventually get weak and need to be replaced, but that's going to be after mega-acres of hard running (springs compressed a lot, and/or cycling a lot from bounce). However, I think 'Haystack' is onto something with the hydraulics -- excellent info.

 

[Haystack]

I guess the editor doesn't have a sense of humor, must have got an e-mail from somebody with a drawer full of green and yellow underwear!